Thread by @johnelworthy

1:A short thread on a moment in Fenland politics. Politics, as many of you know, in Fenland can be a challenging issue to report on fairly and accurately.

Wisbech is especially fraught because of the make-up of the local Conservative association.

2:They effectively run politics in the town and decry anyone who opposes them.

Woe betide if you cross the floor, as former mayor Michael Hill did. He’s since been vilified and suddenly has become the laziest councillor ever (well according to his former colleagues that is).

3:It is very difficult reporting on any of this, and I refrained from publishing copies of an email exchange between the Tory leader @fenlandcouncil Chris Boden and Peter Freeman.

The latter has moderate ‘form’ insomuch as he stood as an independent (unsuccessfully)in 2019.

4:Two months ago, he wrote to Cllr Boden expressing some concerns. Those were not widely shared at the time (he did send me copies, privately) but until now has simply sat on them.

This week he opted to make them public. One suspects the disdain heaped on Cllr Hill prompted it

5:Mr Freeman told Cllr Boden that at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic when community support was beginning to establish itself “three Wisbech councillors decided to car share to carry out this service going totally against government rules laid down;

6: .....as you would expect said councillors and the leader of Fenland District council came up with all sorts of reasons allowing them to do so".

7:Mr Freeman suggested it was a breach of lockdown for three people from separate households to car share.

Cllr Boden replied that it was OK but then added some extra thoughts.

8: “I hadn’t recognised your name and originally assumed that you were a concerned and well-meaning member of the public, contacting me out of a sense of public duty,” replied Cllr Boden.

9: Cllr Boden wrote; “I’ve since been most concerned to discover that you ….. have a history of being part of the unpleasant and often poisonous so-called ‘political discourse’ online in Wisbech – something I’ve called on all participants to back away from in the public good.

10: “From your actions it appears that, far from being an ordinary citizen acting in good faith, you were using the extraordinary circumstances of the crisis to further the petty spats which pass in Wisbech as being online politics and for which Wisbech has become notorious”.

11: And so it went on until the crunch line “it very much looks as if you were really continuing to pursue a petty political vendetta against certain local Councillors and using their volunteering effort in this most serious crisis so to do.

12: Cllr Boden again: "Writing in a personal capacity rather than as Leader of Fenland District Council, I have to say that that, if true, would place you among the lowest of the low”.

13: I know Cllr Boden, a good and competent councillor since arriving in the Fens a few years ago after a career in the City of London. Generally considered by many – including me- to be doing a fair job.

14: I know Mr Freeman, too, a hard-working and community focused. A good egg. He and his wife work tirelessly for the town –he, rightly, lives by the principle of not suffering fools gladly.

15: Terms like ‘hatefest’ get used regularly in Wisbech politics (it was used again this week by the town council leader).

You might hope that with coronavirus that would have been a better spirit of co-operation.

16: It hasn’t.

And that, quite simply, is regrettable.
The End.