Bristol Mayor takes taxpayer-funded jaunts to Dublin and Cannes to help cultivate sense
---- of self-importance With ?35m of unachievable cuts randomly delivered across council
budgets, now MAYOR GORGEOUS can get on with the more serious aspects of his role... Like
enjoying jolly outings abroad at the expense of ordinary Bristoians. ---- The year?s first
freebie trip overseas for George came in February when he spent a couple of days in Dublin
at the ?World Alliance of Cities Against Poverty?. A stop-off on the INTERNATIONAL POVERTY
INDUSTRY grand tour, the event was themed around technology and cities, and attracted
mostly faceless EU and UN bureaucrats with fat expense accounts and plenty of time on
their hands. ---- Gushing publicity offered lucky attendees the opportunity ?to marry
practical experience to blue sky thinking? and hear words of wisdom spouted by
self-important bigwigs from the Big Four accountancy firms.
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?...a four-day party with loads of lobster and champagne on yachts...?
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They, of course, are famed for their robust approach to preventing
poverty by, erm, creating it on a grand scale across
the entire western world by signing off dodgy
bank balance sheets just prior to their collapse
into bankruptcy and creating the need for mass
public bailouts.
See the pattern here? Those that have caused
mass poverty are now selling solutions to it back
to governments. Other speakers included the
aptly named Patricia Bastard of Yellow Window
Design Consultants and the Queen of the inter-
national poverty scene, former Irish premier Mary
?Antoinette? Robinson.
But this was a mere warm-up for the main
event that Junket George attended a few weeks
later: the MIPIM property conference in Cannes,
delightfully situated on the French C?te d?Azur.
And what was this conference all about? Public
relations people will try to tell you ?MIPIM pro-
vides a unique opportunity for industry decision-
makers to meet, develop long-term relationships
and showcase their latest development projects.?
However, a more honest appraisal is available
from Clare Barrett, managing editor of Property
Week magazine, who helpfully explains, ?It?s basi-
cally a four-day party with loads of lobster and
champagne on yachts.?
When now-disbanded quango the South West
Regional Development Agency attended this
piss-up a few years ago, they managed to run up a ?61k
bill for running a press conference and two cheese
and wine parties. But it is suspected that George and
the large entourage he assembled for this must-go
event managed to smash that pre-austerity record
with a whopping ?100k+ tab. George
even forked out for his glamorous assistant Zoe
to attend and to provide him with her late night
?list-ticking? services, as well as dragging along a
local artist to flaunt - just to show people how
wacky he is.
No doubt Cannes reverberated to the question,
?Qui le fuck est la poshe idiote Anglais avec les
pantalons rouges??
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» (en) Britain, AF, The Bristoloan V4 , #2 April 2013 - JUNKET GEORGE DOES EUROPE