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FORMER Brookside boss Phil Redmond has been hailed by the Echo as 'the great white hope' for 2008 after being given a seat on the board of the Culture Company.Multi-millionaire Redmond has ambitions to be the Labour Party's candidate for Liverpool's elected Ma
yor post 2008.And he is now being touted by the chattering classes as "the people's choice" for Capital of Culture and the man who, as the Echo rather lamely puts it, will 'bring real culture to real people".
The Echo breathlessly informs us that the man behind Brookside and Hollyoaks has 'already made approaches to cultural icons Bleasdale, Russell and McGough. (Why couldn't anyone else speak to them, then? ed)
We will only record that Redmond is a mate of Sir Diddy's, writes a crap and boring column in the Daily Post and has done very little to discernibly change the stereotype of Liverpool people as 'scallies and slappers'.
Read this excruciating and nebulous quote from the 'man of the people' and groan:
"I will be working to find innovative ways to enable anyone who wishes to take part in 2008, young, old or in-betweenies, to have that opportunity. To have a go at something. To try something different. Who knows what we will turn up. And what we will leave behind for the future. 2008 should simply be a starting point.''
We shall see what else he specifically comes up with for all those 'in-betweenies' amongst us.
Much better news is that Radio Merseyside's Roger Phillips is also on Board. (Although the small-minded Echo jealously failed to adequately convey his much more legitimate claims to be a 'voice of the people',
ed).
In stark contrast to the Redmond rubbish, Phillips said: "I see my role as being a critical friend - and one who can convey the opinions of the Merseyside public on a wide range of issues. I'm very keen that Liverpool's communities are fully involved in the planning and staging of the celebrations and that involvement continues well beyond 2008.''
Phillips is a sound appointment who, unlike much of the Board, cares about the city and its people. Seems he agreed to take a seat at the table as an olive branch for refusing the poisoned chalice of Cultural Ambassador. Good for him. Let's hope he doesn't get neutered by them.
And as far as re-arranging the deckchairs on the Titanic is concerned, Liverpool subCulture got six out of the nine casualties correct.
OUT go Sir Diddy's mate Michael Brown (hurrah,ed); Neil Cossons (boss of Tate Britain and a serious blow to Liverpool's hopes of national cultural credibility, ed); David McDonnell, Brenda Smith, Andrew Worthington and Bob Scott, (all of whom we predicted, ed) plus the Community College's Wally Brown (why?) and Pat Loughrey (BBC). Bob Scott's sacking is not remarked by the Echo, sadly. In fact, the Echo have ignored all of those who have been given the push. (Strange news values, ed)
IN are Redmond and Phillips, with Merseytravel's Neil Scales as transport advisor (very imaginative, ed)
STAYING PUT are Loyd Grossman, Louise Ellman MP, Bryan Gray (NWDA), Tom Bloxham (Arts Co), Sue Woodward (Granada) Ruth Gould (Disability Arts) and amazingly, Roy Morris, from the Mersey Partnership. (The politicians will find another way to skin that cat, methinks, ed).
Drummond Bone-head (right) has held on to his chair too, regrettably.
So it remains to be seen what each of their unique and individual contributions will now be to making Liverpool 2008, the life-changing event it should be.
Perhaps our Board members might like to tell us all exactly what areas of cultural activity they will now each be concentrating on, (purely in the interests of transparency and accountability, dontchaknow? ed)
For example, they could each tell us three things they plan to do in the next three months which will make a real difference, couldn't they?
We shall make one other observation about this new line-up: It hardly reflects the city's diverse communities, does it?
We dont want tokenism. But we do think a more determined effort could and should have been made to engage genuine representatives of the city's cultural and artistic communities.
Instead we will still have a lot of middle-class men in suits, sitting around pontificating, not getting their hands dirty - but spending millions of pounds in public money.
So, hardly a radical departure for the Titanic.
Much better news is that Radio Merseyside's Roger Phillips is also on Board. (Although the small-minded Echo jealously failed to adequately convey his much more legitimate claims to be a 'voice of the people',
ed).In stark contrast to the Redmond rubbish, Phillips said: "I see my role as being a critical friend - and one who can convey the opinions of the Merseyside public on a wide range of issues. I'm very keen that Liverpool's communities are fully involved in the planning and staging of the celebrations and that involvement continues well beyond 2008.''
Phillips is a sound appointment who, unlike much of the Board, cares about the city and its people. Seems he agreed to take a seat at the table as an olive branch for refusing the poisoned chalice of Cultural Ambassador. Good for him. Let's hope he doesn't get neutered by them.
And as far as re-arranging the deckchairs on the Titanic is concerned, Liverpool subCulture got six out of the nine casualties correct.
OUT go Sir Diddy's mate Michael Brown (hurrah,ed); Neil Cossons (boss of Tate Britain and a serious blow to Liverpool's hopes of national cultural credibility, ed); David McDonnell, Brenda Smith, Andrew Worthington and Bob Scott, (all of whom we predicted, ed) plus the Community College's Wally Brown (why?) and Pat Loughrey (BBC). Bob Scott's sacking is not remarked by the Echo, sadly. In fact, the Echo have ignored all of those who have been given the push. (Strange news values, ed)
IN are Redmond and Phillips, with Merseytravel's Neil Scales as transport advisor (very imaginative, ed)
STAYING PUT are Loyd Grossman, Louise Ellman MP, Bryan Gray (NWDA), Tom Bloxham (Arts Co), Sue Woodward (Granada) Ruth Gould (Disability Arts) and amazingly, Roy Morris, from the Mersey Partnership. (The politicians will find another way to skin that cat, methinks, ed).
Drummond Bone-head (right) has held on to his chair too, regrettably.
So it remains to be seen what each of their unique and individual contributions will now be to making Liverpool 2008, the life-changing event it should be.
Perhaps our Board members might like to tell us all exactly what areas of cultural activity they will now each be concentrating on, (purely in the interests of transparency and accountability, dontchaknow? ed)
For example, they could each tell us three things they plan to do in the next three months which will make a real difference, couldn't they?
We shall make one other observation about this new line-up: It hardly reflects the city's diverse communities, does it?
We dont want tokenism. But we do think a more determined effort could and should have been made to engage genuine representatives of the city's cultural and artistic communities.
Instead we will still have a lot of middle-class men in suits, sitting around pontificating, not getting their hands dirty - but spending millions of pounds in public money.
So, hardly a radical departure for the Titanic.
5 comments:
I'd rather have TIN HEAD
Redmond seems to think he can make it up as he goes along. Perhaps the entire population can get dressed up as Santa?
Let us hope that Mr Scales makes a more useful contribution than he has at Merseytravel with his botched tram scheme
Fascinating. They are all at sea, aren't they?
why is redmond the only one who can speak to willy russel or alan bleasdale. has the harbarrowboy lost the power of speech then? what is he being paid to do instead?
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