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Title : Donkey Derby: Red Rum sweeps all before him
link : Donkey Derby: Red Rum sweeps all before him
Donkey Derby: Red Rum sweeps all before him
Politics is a brutal business; an ungrateful or indifferent public and criticism in the media go with the territory, but for real cruelty and treachery nothing is likely to surpass the machinations of your own party colleagues.It seems that Bill Thomas, until last week's elections one of Labour's councillors for Lliedi ward in Llanelli, and his son Clive were recently refused entry to the party's AGM, even though Bill is still technically the Labour mayor of Llanelli for a few more days.
Bill was a hard working, respected and popular councillor, described as a "true gent" by one prominent Plaid rival. What marked him out was that he was not afraid to speak his mind, often to the discomfort of his party's top brass and senior council officers. For years he tried to highlight the folly of building houses on flood plains, and he campaigned long and hard to protect the Burry Inlet from releases of raw sewage which he believed were responsible for devastating damage to the cockle beds, and the impact that had on the livelihoods of the cocklers and the loss of species such as oyster catchers.
For his pains, Bill was repeatedly ordered to sit down and shut up in the council chamber, often by Labour colleagues, and it was ironic that on the day voters went to the polls, the European Court of Justice announced that the UK authorities were guilty of allowing pollution of this fragile ecosystem.
But despite his willingness to stand up for issues which the Labour Party and the powers-that-be would rather not have aired, Bill remained a loyal member of his party.
When he was unexpectedly deselected by Labour in Lliedi, Bill could have stood against Labour as an independent, but he chose not to.
According to reliable sources, Bill lost the selection process when a number of normally inactive members suddenly came out in support of Rob James who had just moved to Llanelli from Neath.
Although James appears quickly to have made friends with Tegwen and Co, rank and file members can have known precious little about the ambitious young man who had turned up on their doorsteps. Ordinary members would have been surprised to learn that Rob James' record as a councillor in Neath Port Talbot was less than exemplary and that he had gained a degree of notoriety in his former stomping ground for being largely invisible during his five year term there.
But perhaps that misses the point. James's victory in the selection process had nothing to do with his track record, which was nothing to boast about, and everything to do with who he knew in the party machine.
When during the election campaign a Plaid candidate published details of James's attendance record at NPT, he threatened legal action. He also made what he termed a "formal complaint" against this blog, demanding to know where the attendance figures came from while giving the impression that he was the victim of a smear campaign.
After it was pointed out to him that the figures came from Neath Port Talbot council, James was not heard from again, but he appears to have continued to proclaim in Lliedi that the figures were lies, and that both he and his "young family" were being targeted by opponents. There is not a shred of evidence to support that claim.
Rob James's decision to stand in Lliedi was vindicated on polling day when not only did the newcomer win, but he won by a country mile, beating Bill Thomas's vote in Labour's best ever year in 2012 by 237 votes on a turnover which was only slightly up from 34.9% to 39%.
As Jac o' the North notes here, if this had been a horse race, the stewards would be taking an interest in this truly remarkable outcome. A distinctly mediocre hack with poor form was transformed into Red Rum. Where did those 237 votes come from?
But Rob's run of luck did not end there because days later Red Rum romped past Kevin Madge with almost 40 years spent in local government in Carmarthenshire to become the new deputy leader of the Labour group.
Meanwhile, the Labour vote in Rob's old ward in Neath Port Talbot suffered a dramatic collapse.
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