The basic allowance of £7,620 is paid to Councillors in Knowsley, but there are also 'special responsibility allowances' which are 'wages' paid to councillors who are chairpersons or vice chairpersons of the various council committees which seem to have grown in number over the years. Along with personal expenses, this 'special responsibility allowance' can add up to a very tidy sum indeed. Even if your local Councillor isn't claiming anything beyond the £7,620 basic, he/she may well be also working full time. If they are, and they have not got supporters to help them - they are not going to do a lot are they?

Below we give the names of the various councillors who sit on the various committees and the sum they receive for doing so. Note the 'Huyton Mafia' having complete control of the Cabinet which actually rules Kirkby and Halewood. The Huyton New Labour Mafia has come up trumps for all the best and most rewarding and influential jobs or positions. Two of our best Councillors lost their seats trying to point this out. Tommy Rossiter and Brian Williams were both victims of the 'tall poppy' syndrome we have here in local politics. They stood up and got chopped down by the rest of the Labourites here in Kirkby. But Kirkby Times predicts that they are part of the future of Kirkby, the Huyton Middle Class wannabe Mafia is not.

Ronnie Round: Council Leader - (Huyton) top of the leeches charts with a wallet busting £22,860

Leader of Opposition - The Lib Dem leader gets the not to be sniffed at prize of £5,715

Cabinet Members

All Cabinet Members receive the nice bonus of £11,430 plus anything else they can get their hands on - the cabinet members are as follows…

Ronnie Round

Regeneration and Development - GJ Morgan. (Huyton)

Health and Social Care - JK Keith. (Huyton)

Education and Lifelong Leisure - LG Nolan. (Huyton)

Leisure Community and Culture - A Scroggins. (Knowsley)

Corporate and Customer Services - BM O Hara. (Huyton)

Community Safety and Social Inclusion - E Parker. (Kirkby)

Environment and Operational Services - B Swann. (Halewood)

Finance and IST - NF Keats. (Kirkby)

Scrutiny committee's

There are 7 various scrutiny committee's, the Chairpersons receive £5,175, the vice Chair receives £2,858. That's 14 jobs up for grabs. Sweeteners for the boys and girls. They think it's a 'just reward' for what they've done - which is basically sell off Kirkby to make Huyton, or parts of it, the capital of Knowsley.

You can see who got the 14 scrutiny committee jobs on the Knowsley Council Website.

Chairpersons of Area Forums

Chairpersons of Area Forums get very comfortable wage of £3,810 - R Crummie is Chair and T Grierson is the vice chair of North Kirkby Area Forum. J Aston (a former Sacred Heart pupil) is chair of the South Kirkby Area Forum and D Lonergan who has letters after his name is the vice chair and lives in Fazakerley which would make him a fount of knowledge on North Kirkby we presume.

Vice Chairperson of Area Forums - £1,905 (see above)

The rest of the Area forums are also covered on Knowsley Councils website

Chairperson of Planning Committee - V Cullen gets the prize of £3.810

Vice Chairperson of planning committee - Ms DM Reid trails in with a runners up gift of £1,905

Chairperson of Licensing Committee -RS Maguire gets his fingers round a nice tasty £3,810

Vice Chairperson of licensing committee - T Russell- gets £1,905, tantalisingly close to making the round sum of 2 grand!

Merseyside Waste Disposal Representative - £762 (almost rubbish compared to the other rewards but still worth having is it not?)

All this was decided and rubber stamped by the collective 'goodness' and 'greatness' of Knowsley Council at the AGM Council meeting in May 2003. (11 councillors were absent ) The information was released in June 2003 - apologies for the delay. The meetings are NEVER advertised too much and are conveniently held in Huyton. The 'Area forums' seem to have been short on the ground up here and in future Kirkby Times will advertise them and also record them for the public record.

Personal Expenses Charts still to be released!

Don't forget - the Councillors still have to declare their personal expenses - we haven't had the 2002 - 2003 seasons results in yet - be prepared to be shocked at the sheer greed of some of these people - Jim Keight, now trying to plot a comeback from his sitting room or maybe his own mind, cashed in to the tune of almost £5000 in travel expenses in the season 2000/2001 and ate and drank his way through £2,337 worth of Substinance. No wonder he was looking a bit plump towards the end. In comparison a Northwood Councillor hardly got a couple of dozen fish suppers with a paltry £98.98p expenses. But the King of Substinance with a whopping £5, 042, 81p was Councillor BM O Hare, part of a husband and wife team of Councillors who collectively grabbed the sum of approx £803 every week for 'serving' the people in 2000 - 2001 . Some would call this 'self service'. What a greedy pair! Talk about keep it in the family.

Smarty Pants! - Our articulate leaders speak out!

Councillor O Hara (Mrs) thought it was also clever, a while back, to email Kirkby Times with a reply to an email that simply said…."Ha ha smarty pants what was spelt wrong, get a life" Real clever stuff there from an elected representative of the people who is also chairperson of the Environment and Housing Scrutiny Committee - readers of this website will be interested to know that Cllr O Hara has chosen to ignore emails sent regarding deteriorating conditions in Hi Rise Flats - she can view the memorial left to an old lady who died possibly being robbed by a junkie in the very same Hi rise flats. I daresay it's the nearest she'd come to scrutinising the conditions endured by pensioners in Kirkby and the worse parts of Huyton.

Chairperson

Note - All of Knowsley Council official papers refer to 'Chairman' when it should in fact read 'Chairperson'. Kirkby Times isn't being politically correct - it's just pretty bloody stupid to call a woman a 'chairman' - any chance of Knowsley Council joining the rest of us in the 21st century on this one?

Things are going to get better?

Please send any information about Councillors to Kirkby Times. This will enable the website to become a database of information on various 'political players' where the community can study their activities and expenses in ease and comfort. If local councillors and political players know that they are being carefully watched they may actually make the effort to do more. Those who have nothing to hide have nothing to fear. Those who have so far used there careers in the local Labour Party dominated Council to pay off a mortgage or two will soon realise that the theme song for New Labour is now changing to - "Things are gonna get worse"

Coming soon - 'MP's of the future' - we look at the most likely candidates for the Labour Party here in Kirkby. We have the inside info about the 'chosen few' who are being groomed in the perhaps naive hope they will be Labour MP's one day. Also Coming Soon - Kirkby's Most Unwanted - councillors with unsafe seats are highlighted so anyone can choose to take them on. Plus a special report on the 2004 Council Elections and what it means to us.