Bert wronged?

Bert's displeased, feels his identity is too thinly disguised, and that he's getting too rough a ride, on the pages of this blog. Possibly, or it may be that Bert's become habituated to the uncritical, soft-soap fluffings that pass for press coverage in the Morpeth Herald; that being deferentially stroked by the pre-warmed, fur-mittened hands of the Herald's stenographers has come to seem normal to him, no less than his due.

During their campaign, eager to demonstrate that their concerns were widespread and not exclusive to a raucous saloon bar of boomer-generation car-dependents with an overweening sense of entitlement, Lights Out! launched a “survey”. The Herald helped, of course, circulating copies of the questionnaire to their readership with the paper, while Lights Out!ers worked the high street, from stalls festooned with their banners, placards and insignia. Impossible to mistake them for reputable, neutral opinion pollsters; overtly a pressure group agitating.

Have you ever, on spotting a chugger in hi-viz tabard, pursued him or her, perhaps crossing a street to do so, waiting until he/she finished pitching to his/her current mark, in order to say “I just want you to know that I am resolutely indifferent to the fate of the Sumatran Woolly Rhino; so chug on that, pal!”? Me neither. I mention it because there was no mechanism in place for recording numbers of people declining to be part of this self-selected claque. Nor was there a mechanism in place to prevent claqueurs filling in multiple questionnaires over the months this was happening. I witnessed a woman, hands full of shopping bags, half turned to go, giving verbal responses over her shoulder to, er.. Bill who was filling in the form for her. I tuned in at the question - and I paraphrase - “do you come to Morpeth less often now the universally detested lights are causing insufferable delays to hard shopping families?” “I do try to avoid that junction” was her nuanced, hedging reply. “We'll call that a 'Yes'” said Bill, ticking. It may be that my fleeting observation coincided with the sole instance of a respondent's answer being falsified, but that seems improbable.

Perhaps mistrustful of those they were trying to mobilise, fearful that if given free rein too many would express their objections with undiplomatic variants of “Oi Morpeth, get out of my way; can't you see I'm Driving here!?” the leadership helped shape responses with a vetted framework of pre-approved areas of potential concern. Pedestrian safety, street scene aesthetics, other road user safety and congestion. Worthy, considerate stuff. Of course, anyone really concerned about these issues would limit their personal car use within Morpeth to the essential minimum, but we'll let that slide for the moment.. 

Circa 2,000 questionnaires were filled. That represents about 4% of Morpeth and catchment's population, based on the old Castle Morpeth District Council boundaries. 

The Herald gave Councillor David Towns (Con) generous platform to trumpet this shabbiness as a “very comprehensive and statistically reliable” survey proving “95% of people dislike the lights”, without so much as arching an editorial eyebrow, let alone challenging him with “knock it off Towns, you insult us and our readership with this shameful bollocks.”

Robert Mugabe, who's never achieved better than 93% of the popular vote, is sending his electoral team over to learn from Lights Out!, while Father Patrick O'Shaughnessy has gone one better - a very comprehensive and statistically reliable survey of his congregation last Sunday proving that no fewer than 100% of people believe in God.

Why does this matter? Because Bert and Clarence, with the tireless support of the Herald, surfed this brackish wavelet of car user resentment to seats on the Town Council, and that's bad news for anyone hoping to see the town develop along less car-shafted lines in future. The Morpeth Neighbourhood Development Plan, currently in consultation, offers the usual blandishments about increasing active and sustainable personal transport modal share, much as did the last Morpeth Town Plan and every County Council Full Local Transport Plan in this new millennium. This can't be achieved without in some situations de-prioritising the narrow self-interest of the carred and, as we've seen, the carred will fight and fight dirty to defend the priority to which they've become accustomed.

So back to Bert's disquiet about this blog. It's true that Fiats Medea, Nero, Herod and Chronos haven't cropped up in our occasional chats. Nor have Fiats Mellitus, Infarction, Hypertension and Infanticide. They don't exist: I'm merely riffing. However we did exchange views on the trials of Josie, Bert opining that an able-bodied adult using a single-occupant car for a within-Morpeth commute of 1.3 miles was sensible, as it rains sometimes. I must apologise, then, for having overlooked the rubidium exoskeletons of Morpeth car users.

On a darker note, when the Herald begrudgingly added - as a footnote to a front page spread protesting the indignities suffered by drivers at the hands of “over-zealous” Parking Enforcement Officers - mention of the verbal assaults and death threats being dished out to PEOs, Bert was unable to condemn this pre-meditated thuggery (yes premeditated: police officers are largely immune to this sort of shit because empowered to visit uncomfortable consequences on the perpetrator; PEOs aren't; drivers know this and pick their targets), sided with the drivers and muttered about their deserving lee-way and leniency and periods of grace. No harm in being loyal to your constituents or knowing on which side your political bread is buttered I suppose, but I worry about this Faustian pact Bert's struck for advancement, and for his soul.