Wednesday’s Oldham Council meeting was another extraordinarily chaotic affair after which local Liberal Democrats have condemned Conservative Councillor Robert Barnes who represents Chadderton South.
Mark Kenyon, Liberal Democrat councillor for Grotton, Springhead & Lees, said: “Local Conservative voters must be wondering what exactly it is they’ve done wrong to deserve a Tory councillor quite like Robert Barnes.
“I speak to voters every single day and Conservative people tend to be fierce advocates for the value of tradition and playing by the rules. They also tend to be keenly interested in the council getting things done rather than waffling on.
He continued: “So there must be a lot of head scratching going on after seeing Barnes’ performance on Wednesday. Barnes repeatedly refused to follow the rules, completely ignored the Mayor when she told him he’d run out of time, then shouted at the Mayor and council colleagues. You wouldn’t get away with that at work, so why does Barnes think you can in the Council chamber? He seemed to be more interested in auditioning to replace Boris as the Tory’s next bad boy rule breaker rather than getting anything done for the people of the borough.”
He concludes: “We must be able to do politics without resorting to this type of behaviour. I’ll be reporting him to Standards. I know I’m not the only one.”