GET YOUR SNOUTS OUT OF OUR JOBS; Workers rage at Plaid cuts.THE magnificent seven yesterday stood up to condemn a snouts-in-the-trough council.A small group of council workers took to the streets to protest about cash cuts which may cost the jobs of hundreds of fellow workers. The outcry outside the council offices in Rhondda came only hours after The Welsh Mirror revealed that Plaid councillors had been accused of sticking their snouts in the trough with a whacking pay bonanza. Labour angrily accused them of "unbelievable arrogance". And that provoked a bitter political slanging match slanging match Noun an angry quarrel in which people trade insults slanging match n (BRIT) (col) → bronca gorda slanging match n ( over sleaze sleaze n. A sleazy condition, quality, or appearance: "His record of public service is untouched by any stain of shadiness or sleaze" James J. Kilpatrick. and raw greed in the valleys of South Wales South Wales south n → sud m du Pays de Galles . We broke the story yesterday that Plaid Cymru Plaid Cymru Noun the Welsh nationalist party [Welsh] bosses had voted themselves massive new pay increases - in spite of running a council which was now bankrupt. But the nationalists' top brass on the Rhondda Cynon Taff
They said it was Labour who ruined the council. It was Labour who ran up millions in debts. But worse yet, according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. Plaid council leader Pauline Jarman Pauline Jarman, born 1945, is a Welsh politician. She was the Plaid Cymru National Assembly for Wales Member for South Wales Central from 1999 to 2003. Educated at Mountain Ash Grammar School, she is a former Cynon Valley Borough Councillor and Mid Glamorgan County , Labour had run a corrupt and ruinous ru·in·ous adj. 1. Causing or apt to cause ruin; destructive. 2. Falling to ruin; dilapidated or decayed. ru council in which councillors had claimed expenses for doing nothing. The bitter row broke after The Mirror disclosed that the new Plaid Cymru leadership was about to pay itself between pounds 5,000 and pounds 7,000 EXTRA a year. The council is losing pounds 12,000 a day. And is about to make hundreds of council workers redundant AND slash vital services. Labour yesterday accused the nationalists of "greed, sleaze, and unbelievable arrogance". Pauline Jarman accused Labour of creating "a rotten system of payments" which these new pay hikes would sort. The new system she said would actually save money. This is despite major new pay hikes which would give the council leader an extra pounds 7,000 a year, and the deputy leader and seven other "council cabinet" members an extra pounds 5,000 apiece. She claimed there had been widespread abuses by the former Labour-led council. They had run up big bills doing nothing. "Under the old system they could claim pounds 22 a meeting for up to three meetings a day. "Many of them would pop in to meetings, sit down for five minutes in each, and then claim pounds 66 a day on top of their basic allowance," she claimed. She denies the revelations will have damaged her crusade to clean up the council. Plaid Cymru seized control of the council in May and face losses of more than pounds 26 million. Jarman swept in to power under the banner of "stopping the rot". Since then she has had to go cap in hand to the National Assembly pleading for the council to be bailed out. Losing thousands every day, hundreds of its workers and their families now face the prospect of the dole. |
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