[Acrylic-bob]

Lindsay:

I can agree with the main thrust of your posts, particularly the bit about life being too short.
However, because life is so short, I think it is imperative that we seek to make the very best of what we have and ensure that what we pass on to the next generation is improved by our stewardship rather than diminished by it.
The carping and complaints surrounding this 13 minute video may be seen by some as a storm in a tea-cup whipped up by people who have little better with which to occupy themselves, and part of me would agree with that proposition; any argument is better than none if you are bored. But I also think that those who serve the public and administer the public purse must at all times be prepared to give a full accounting of their actions conducted in the public interest. To do otherwise leaves the door wide open to dictatorship.
If we are to avoid the creation of, and the evils inherant in the dictatorship of a cultural or poilitcal elite then we must be perpetually on our guard. As Edmund Burke helpfully points out: ‘The only thing necessary for the triumph [of evil] is for good men to do nothing.’
The discussion on this particular thread may seem, on the face of it, nothing more than petty carping over a ha'porth of tar, but it goes further and deeper than that. Indeed, it goes to the heart of the democratic process itself. At a time when all areas of public expenditure are being subjected to scrutiny and the need for a pound's expenditure to represent a pound's value and worth can hardly be more pressing, it is not surprising that the hardpressed taxpayer should question those in public life who hand out public money like some latterday Bourbon king.
Gayle may be very good at what she does, though personally, I have yet to be convinced. We cannot have someone dispensing public money whenever and wherever she sees fit and prancing around Hyndburn like the Mother Theresa of the arts world without reference to the taxpayer. Because in the end, one way or another, wherever this money is sourced it comes ultimately from us, the taxpayer.
And, even Mother Theresa was accountable to the Vatican.
Garinda, not unreasonably and not impolitely, has asked where the funding for three community arts projects came from. I will now add my name to that request, and I strongly urge others to do the same.