Re~Stirred Forum

Although much of the funding of Birmingham City Council is directly applied to specific areas such as education, there is still a considerable amount that has to be allocated and spent by the various Cabinet Members.

Can anyone give me an opinion on the following (given that in the view of a significant number of people that I talk to who believe that Birmingham will be under Labour control in 2012):

Will the present Labour Shadow Cabinet members have the skills, experience and knowledge to manage the budget (if those shadow positions are confirmed to cabinet Posts in 2012)?

Will a new Labour administration in Birmingham in 2012 have taken on board the historical reality of mistakes that the previous Labour council were penalised for by the electorate back in the past making the decision to support other parties within the city?

Can someone tell me which are the present Labour councillors that should be followed, if one has an interest in politics, as being the potential high flyers that will sweep away the 'old guard' within Labour's ranks?

Will the city be safe and Birmingham's economy grow when Labour come to power in 2012?

No as simple as that

Given that they can't even manage to shadow the finance portfolio, one can but have concerns!

Gerry
There are a number of new Labour Councillors with a lot of skills, experience, and most notably the qualifications to take up, and carry out the posts in cabinet.

Most notably in my opinon there is a well educated, and politically intelligent solicitor Majid Mahmood who managed two defeat the evergreen Gwyneth Neilly in her own backyard. In addition there is the rather young lifelong political chap Waseem Zaffar from the Lozells ward who was a CEO at the age of 18, and Nawaz Ali who I believe is an Accountant by profession. In their ranks they still have the likes of John Clancy, Stewart Stacey, John Cotton and Barry Henley who all have the credentials to manage cabinet posts.

Unfortunately the Labour Party will not allow the so called "junior" councillors positions instead will most probably allocate their long serving councillors posts as a sort of reward for being loyal to the heirachy in the bad old days.

So answer to your quesion is that I too am most concerned

Sorry, can't let that one stand without probing. CEO? Of which global monolith?

I think it was either Arthur Anderson, Enron or possibly Marconi.

Cllr Waseem is big businessman who helps lots of people.
You just jealous of him because he is young man who made success of business and made money. He will be great cllr and be big name

Not 'jealous' at all. I just know nowt about him and am genuinely interested. If he has generated wealth off his own back I say all power to his elbow. I'm just genuinely interested in what he was "CEO" of. CEO is a job title historically used for very large corporate groups where you require a role to sit above presidents or VPs of either geographic divisions or discreet business units.

There was a trend from the turn of the millenium of everyone who used to call themselves an MD calling themselves a CEO (even charities started doing it). I run my own business. I could call myself CEO but I think it would misrepresent the size of my operations!

So I'm trying to understand how somebody appointed an 18 year old a CEO, or if it was just a case of him registering a company at companies house and deciding to call himself CEO? What business is he in?

My eye-brows have touched the ceiling.

Out in the 'burbs most people won't have heard of him, never mind be jealous of him. It wasn't unreasonable to ask whether his 'experience' as a CEO when he was 18 (stop laughing at the back) had any parallels with running a city with a £3.5bn budget. If he was doing something special then, his career has certainly gone backwards.

Mind you I can see why Khalid Mahmood would put him in charge of his paperclips. Who else could make Khalid look relatively attractive?

The profile part of his blog suggests no gainful employment whatever. A J.P. and 'community activist'.

Indeed - the only directorship he claims is of the Azad, Jammu and Kashmir Development Corporation CIC. He was a indeed a director of this, for about a year to June 2009. The company was dissolved in March 2010, having filed nothing but dormant accounts. Not exactly big business. Of course, he could be a sole trader or partner in a business, but that doesn't exactly gel with the CEO stuff. In fact, he has held 9 directorships listed at Companies House, but only the Birmingham Tribunal Unit has not been dissolved. He did describe himself as CEO of Handsworth Recreation Group Limited, dissolved in 2008, whose last filed accounts (for 2005) were "small". Also, hardly big business.

I have not yet met this gentleman, and none of the above is intended to be a criticism of him, but people should be careful just how they "big-up" others when the facts are so readily available. I think "Windbag" has done Cllr Zaffar few favours with his post.

I'm not sure I ought to ask what a "pubic company" is.

True, though the claim was made that he was a big businessman. Such evidence as there is doesn't necessarily support that. As I suggested, sometimes one's friends can be one's worst eenmies over things like this.

Didn't he claim to be a union representative for taxi drivers when the airport contract issue blew up? I think he said that at the licensing meeting.

No Cllr Waseem not charge of paperclips he much more important person.You are being unfair.
See Cllr Waseem's jobs

http://waseemzaffar.com/about/

He does lot for community and thats why people voted for him 71% of vote.

I suppose the lists are entitled "in the community", so fair enough that it doesn't detail this huge business success you allude to...?

Mr Windbag. Thanks for the list. It does show a very community minded person and I don't want to seem churlish. Taking a role as a JP, Councillor and School Governor are all very admirable things to do and it would be great if more people were as community minded as this man seems to be.

However, the discussion is about capability and experience - not commitment or willingness. There was a claim made somewhere above that this chap as an 'ex-CEO' would be the right stuff for a Cabinet role with very large budget accountability. I see nothing in his blog to suggest he has ever had a job outside of politics - I may be wrong on this and am genuinely interested to be put right if that is the case.

There is a breed of 'career politician' has infected our national politics over the last couple of decades (as seen at the top table of both Labour and the Tories) and we are the poorer for it. I worry if we're going the same way at local level.

Waseem is on a strong upward political tract and could be an MP sooner rather than later, an impressive man I have to say (and a villa supporter !!)

as to the thread, what councillor has the skills anyway, the officiers do that and the councillors make political decisons given choices.

And obviously, the selection of Khalid Mahmood shows how high the bar is set for that particular achievement.

and he increased his majority a lot whilst most labour MP's lost votes so must be doing something right ?

Well I take it that from the present ranks of some 55 Labour Councillors, contributors to this forum only indicate two potential rising stars both elected for the first time this year, Majid Mahmood and Waseem Zaffar.

A clever politician, so I am informed, knows when and when not to make their move. I am sure Councillor Majid Mahmood is one to watch for the future, young, dynamic, intelligent, capable and good with people management but I see a potential problem with those long serving labour councillors that may not see his potential and encourage and support him. There are a lot of back bench labour councillors, that in my opinion, would have made good members of parliament but because they did not push themselves forward or were encouraged by their party and so have remained in the background.
So maybe it is not too wise to be a shrinking violet and one may need to blow ones own trumpet to be heard.

I am sure Councillor Zaffar is not a person to remain quietly in the background.

not a chance, backed by his MP he pushed out a sitting councillor, shows determination and ruthless streak.

Could they organise the proverbial P*ss up in a Brewery ????

Purrrrlease! Let's not mistake being the subject matter of this thread (particularly unsupportable claims having been made in respect of the CV of a newly-elected Councillor), for your actual talent or ability. It's really not the same thing. At all.

Cllr Waseem is talented and has many friends. He has won more votes than anyone in his election, shows he has ability and can be big Cllr in future and MP . He has worked with all kinds of different people to make things happen for people even before he become Cllr. So he will do even more now because he is the best.

What's a "big Cllr"?

I think it is a bit like those 'big beasts' that out-of-touch political commentators are always banging on about.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/pers ... tinct.html

The peoples running the council have been lost in the courts about the Adult savings. So why no questions about those cllrs. New cllrs like Cllr Waseem are talented and intelligent and bring lot of ability to the Council