Will she or won’t she

There is a most curious sight down County Hall at the moment, where long lines of people are standing with their ears pressed to the walls of the Administration Group's accommodation, listening to the screams and wails as the 'arrangements' over who is getting what from the trough at the Annual General Meeting are thrashed out – and all the ears are members of the Adminstration (well the unlucky ones, I guess, the excluded). If they want to know what's going on they should just ask the Opposition, officers or indeed the guy who changes the water bottles – as everyone else seems to know. Unless, of course, this is just an elaborate game of double-bluff. But what the hell – it's amusing, even if it isn't true.

It seems that the elevation of Tricky Dicky, the Earl of Gower, to the Lord Mayorship, has provided the excuse to kick him out of his much abused Chairmanship of the Area 2 Planning Committee. Enough it seems is enough! Even thought the numbers of Planning Committees has doubled, TD's name is not on any of them. Less clear is the position of his running mate – the Mountain Man of Mawr – as he prepares for his second chance at the summit. I would think that he should be pretty safe as Chair of one of the Licensing Committees – as he is generally considered to have done a decent (well decent enough) and conscientious job – all the other stuff notwithstanding.

However, what of Milady Fitzgerald? Well the talk here seems pretty consistent, she's not to be the newly minted Chairman of the Authority after all. Here too, it seems, enough is enough. What has seemed to have stuck in a few throats is that in creating this post, no-one (not least the recently departed Monitoring Officer) seemed to have read the provisions of the Local Government Act, which puts this position second only to the Queen (or her representative) in order of Precedence. In other words, up the front before the Lord Mayor! This is undoubtedly going to get changed – but the risk that it might be the Princess of Penllegaer even if only for a few weeks seems a reward too far – not least to the aforementioned Earl of Gower, who considered he was much put upon in his last outing. A bit of public jostling would be amusing, however.

What is less clear, is where Milady goes. There is one team screaming for her to depart hence to the back-benches, where she should have gone before ("and not before bloody time" as one eloquent Admin-er said). Another that she will become the Chair of Planning – it would seem that they are seriously trying to put the nose of their newest member (The aforementioned etc) critically out of joint. However, there is life in the old dear yet as there is a third version ---- that she is working busily behind the scenes trying to shaft one (anyone) in the Cabinet and get back the place that she so properly and rightfully claims as her birthright. (You may have forgotten – or may not be aware, that Milady has never been an ordinary back-bencher. She arrived newly elected and so (obviously) newly minted as non-cannon fodder. She was not to be one of that underclass destined to fight for the light and an SRA, forced to turn to quick fixes of caffeine and free biscuits and a moan in the Members Lounge (I'll have to think of a synonym here. I was going to use the Funeral Parlour – but that was too near an advert for Mervyn)).

The favourite for the knife in the back is her Independent colleague, Cllr Gareth Sullivan. Well it's either him or John Hague – and he's too much of a bruiser, with half a brick always readily to hand in his elegantly tailored trousers!

Time will reveal all, as always.

Update: I was reminded prior to tonight's Council Meeting that there is another candidate that I had forgotten - the Eastside Gaulieter, the BNP supporting steriliser - Herr Allan Robinson (but then on performance, eminently forgettable). Certainly there would be a synergy in an exchange of positions between Milady and the goosestepper as they share very similar views on parenting support. So it seems unlikley that she would want to cuckoo him out of the nest.  I also rather think that he too would put up a fight - and he is rumoured to be much in favour with the Big Yin himself. But would he become the Council Chairman? If anything - he would be more unpopular (and unwanted) that Milady - mind you the prospect of him trying to manage a Council meeting has a certain morbid fascination (I am truly sick!). Whilst he would be politically closer to his Earlship, I still don't think that TD would find the idea of him taking precedence an easy swallow.