Why Your Council Tax is So High

The_White_Horse

i recently wrote to our council about some proposed yellow lines they are putting down in our streets (as we are near a station). nearly all the residents want them and the process has been ongoing for years. they have written to residents umpteen times, had a display in local centres to show what it will look like, and so on and so on - everything but actually putting the lines down.

i wrote to the guy to ask why it takes so long, and when he replied he had about 20 letters after his name. all idiotic traffic management courses and parking scheme management courses etc, that we all know are (a) meaningless and (b) were paid for by the tax payer, and were probably undertaken at some 4 or 5 star hotel.

an absolute 100% waste of tax payer money. these council workers are contemptable scum bags.

molerat

The council that installed car park pay machines that did not accept Scottish bank notes ...........in Scotland http://news.stv.tv/scotland/highlands-islands/190971-car-park-machine-refuses-scottish-money/
Strange that the Tesco self checkouts will accept anything thrown at them, they have certainly taken some screwed up scabby ones from me.

This comes along with complaints of hold ups leaving the car park at peak times. Why did they not have a foyer pay machine so that you pay before the scrabble to exit. This system seems to work well elsewhere.

movilogo

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1304625/Council-staff-waste-thirds-working-day.html

I think they waste 90% of their time!

Andy_L

Really2 wrote: »

I like the excuse.



Call me thick but if say the garage should be 6'6" wide no mater how big the bricks are you would still measure 6'6" of internal width before building the internal walls.

If the bricks were bigger surely overall the whole building should be bigger than planed as I presume they have used the same number of bricks they were going to use.

Depends how the info was sent to the buliders.
If it said an internal dimension of 6'6'' then you'd hope that would happen.
If it said a width of 6'6'' again you'd hope someone would check if that was an internal or external dimension
If they just said fit 10 garages in that 70' space assuming they'd use 6'' thick walls ("as they've always done in the past") but the contractor uses 12'' walls as they've got a load of thick bricks left over from a previous job then you can see an imminent !!!!-up.

My suspicion is that the council, (in order to save money) weren't employing proper engineers to project manage the job who'd have the experience to anticipate & avoid these sort of problems

kriss_boy

Andy_L wrote: »

No idea about any sort of finances. 2 guys for 2 days alone costs more than £150 just on pay even before the cherry picker & other employment costs

Ok my estimate was carp but I can tell you labour including overheads would be about £11 per hour and the cherry picker around £7 ex vat per hour.

My point was simply that for the sake of a few hunderd pounds that particular council perhaps avoided a couple of grand in claims.

Im not for one minute suggesting most councils run anywhere near as cost effectively as they could by stupid news stories like that hold no weight.

kriss_boy

The_White_Horse wrote: »

i recently wrote to our council about some proposed yellow lines they are putting down in our streets (as we are near a station). nearly all the residents want them and the process has been ongoing for years. they have written to residents umpteen times, had a display in local centres to show what it will look like, and so on and so on - everything but actually putting the lines down.

i wrote to the guy to ask why it takes so long, and when he replied he had about 20 letters after his name. all idiotic traffic management courses and parking scheme management courses etc, that we all know are (a) meaningless and (b) were paid for by the tax payer, and were probably undertaken at some 4 or 5 star hotel.

an absolute 100% waste of tax payer money. these council workers are contemptable scum bags.

Haha you made that story up!! Hah!

olly300

The_White_Horse wrote: »

i recently wrote to our council about some proposed yellow lines they are putting down in our streets (as we are near a station). nearly all the residents want them and the process has been ongoing for years. they have written to residents umpteen times, had a display in local centres to show what it will look like, and so on and so on - everything but actually putting the lines down.

i wrote to the guy to ask why it takes so long, and when he replied he had about 20 letters after his name. all idiotic traffic management courses and parking scheme management courses etc, that we all know are (a) meaningless and (b) were paid for by the tax payer, and were probably undertaken at some 4 or 5 star hotel.

an absolute 100% waste of tax payer money. these council workers are contemptable scum bags.

That's because the guy hasn't learnt the tricks of getting traffic consultations through the public.

What they need to do is leave the minimum time for consultations and do them in late July and August when most people are on holiday. Otherwise the complaints from a few residents mean they have to redo the proposals.

That's what all the councils around me do to get the stuff through.

They have something like 14 days for the consultation but you don't as a resident actually receive the papers, which arrive by 2nd class post, until day 10 at the earliest. Then as they take place in July and August loads of people are away. In the pack is a 2nd class envelope which means unless it's sent back immediately the reply deadline date is missed.

Chris2685

97% of respondents were white whereas only 96.37% of residents are white.

Says it all about how useful that survey was!

Andy_L

Chris2685 wrote: »

97% of respondents were white whereas only 96.37% of residents are white.

Says it all about how useful that survey was!

Quite a possible result. In fact from a methodology point of view they've done very well to get their demographic balance that close

abaxas

Just to add.

No council actually recycled anything other than for 'tonnage'.

I asked at my local tip if they could keep an eye out for some old kitchen units for my garage. Answer, sorry no, nothing is allowed to leave it must all be broken down and sold.

Is that really recycling? Or is it done for profit?