PARCA/Nosey
NoseyPARCA is an online newsfeed about Plantation, Fort William
Nosey press releases are typically issued by Jennifer Seitz and published on EMD's (=Mark Drayton's) eponymous 'Download' on SubStack - see link (in subheading) below. Most releases are drafted, or at least pre-drafted, by Mark, mercilessly edited by Jennifer, and subsequently released by her if she's prepared to put her name to them. (This is by no means guaranteed, but we usually get there eventually.)
2022 Archive (NB: This is usually updated first)
April/May 2022
<#1> (11th April), <#2> (13th April), <#3> (17th April), <#4> (18th April). <#5> (30th April). <#6> (1st May).
END of archive
NB: Occasionally, entries are added to the above list a few days or so in advance of the scheduled publication of a release.
Style and process
Nosey house style for press releases is, first, to refer to them as 'press releases' rather than 'news releases' because that's the vernacular. However, 'NEWS RELEASE' is used in the heading of the release itself because it is more accurate and genuine editors are familiar with both terms. Other than that, Nosey house style is basically Mark's own, and other contributors are encouraged to adapt theirs to his, within reason.
Each draft release begins with:
/*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ DRAFT ONLY - NEWS RELEASE - DRAFT ONLY /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/
Each issued release begins with:
/*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ NEWS RELEASE - NEWS RELEASE - NEWS RELEASE /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/
A typical release generally continues with something along the lines of:
NEWS RELEASE Community councillor announces new initiative to [...] DD MONTH YYYY FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
As yet, Nosey have never needed to embargo a press release (but you never know, right?).
A typical release generally concludes with with something along the lines of:
Entirely predictably, Mr Drayton couldn't resist further adding that, ideally, residents should join the <https://NextDoor.co.uk> social-networking platform/app rather than relying on Facebook, say. "I don't trust that censorship-loving [Mark] Zuckerberg bastard any further than I could comfortably excrete him," Mr Drayton has previously explained. "Fuck that cunt." As we reported six days ago, Mr Drayton's views regarding Mr Zuckerberg are all-too-well known to readers of his 'Wednesday Headway' SubStack columns, part of his so-called 'Drayton Download': on 8th & 15th September 2021 Mr Drayton re-posted a long article by British-born science journalist Nicholas Wade defending the 'lab-leak' hypothesis of Covid-19's origin; Mr Drayton's brief introduction (at <https://draytonmark.substack.com/p/wed-head-xxv-pt1>) forthrightly condemned Facebook for censoring discussion of the theory. Mr Zuckerberg remains unavailable for comment. END NOTE FOR EDITORS Further information about this release can be obtained from the following: (for NoseyPARCA DOT WordPress DOT com) Jennifer Seitz (Secretary) that.tiresome.rationalist AT gmail DOT com (as a member of Fort William, Inverlochy, and Torlundy Community Council) Mark Drayton EddieMDrayton AT gmail DOT com /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/
The "Fuck that cunt" quotation is sometimes included, sometimes omitted. Kind of depends on whether it's my time of the month. -Jx
--
For office use only:-
Drafting Area
News Release #5
<https://NoseyPARCA.WordPress.com> news release #5 - 26th April 2022
/*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/
DRAFT ONLY - NEWS RELEASE - DRAFT ONLY
/*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/
NEWS RELEASE
Community councillor accuses FITCC chair of "sartorial treachery"
26 APRIL 2022 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Fort William, Inverlochy, and Torlundy Community Council chairman Mr Mark Linfield is "in serious danger of becoming a traitor to his own T-shirt collection," jokes community councillor Mark Drayton as he relaxes after another long day in front of a laptop writing emails and drafting articles for his 'Drayton Download' SubStack. Drayton, presently the only community councillor presently to live in Fort William's only high-SIMD (Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation) estate, Plantation, has had rather more time to write since last Tuesday evening because he now has much less to read. "As well as barring me from future meetings, FITCC have apparently decided to remove me from the email list because I haven't heard a peep out of [FITCC secretary] Tricia [Jordan] since. I consider that to be pretty foolish, because both she and Mark [Linfield] have readily acknowledged the quality of the analysis I've done on several documents this year alone, with comments like 'good spot' and 'I totally agree.' I'm giving them a few more days - maybe a little longer - to cool-off before I go through the archive and marshall the evidence. After all, as [hard-left US activist Saul] Alinsky's fifth rule rightly states, 'ridicule is man's most potent weapon.'"
(TBC)
[..] He confirmed that his SubStack (at <https://DraytonMark.SubStack.com>) would be the "centre of operations" for this, but also that other social network platforms would be "drawn into the circle," enabling questions to be posed publically (as comments below the master copy of this very news release at <https://DraytonMark.SubStack.com/p/news-release-4>, or privately by email, NextDoor message, or even SMS (to 07933 760031).
Entirely predictably, Mr Drayton couldn't resist further adding that, ideally, residents should join the <https://NextDoor.co.uk> social-networking platform/app rather than relying on Facebook, say. "I don't trust that censorship-loving [Mark] Zuckerberg bastard any further than I could comfortably excrete him," Mr Drayton has previously explained. "Fuck that cunt."
As we reported exactly a week ago, Mr Drayton's views regarding Mr Zuckerberg are all-too-well known to readers of his 'Wednesday Headway' SubStack columns, part of his so-called 'Drayton Download': on 8th & 15th September 2021 Mr Drayton re-posted a long article by British-born science journalist Nicholas Wade defending the 'lab-leak' hypothesis of Covid-19's origin; Mr Drayton's brief introduction (at <https://draytonmark.substack.com/p/wed-head-xxv-pt1>) forthrightly condemned Facebook for censoring discussion of the theory.
Mr Zuckerberg remains unavailable for comment.
END
NOTE FOR EDITORS Further information about this release can be obtained from the following: (for NoseyPARCA DOT WordPress DOT com)
Jennifer Seitz (Secretary) that.tiresome.rationalist AT gmail DOT com
(as a member of Fort William, Inverlochy, and Torlundy Community Council)
Mark Drayton EddieMDrayton AT gmail DOT com
/*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/ /*\ \*/
Vote (last)
Well, folks: nothing much has changed since last week so, if you can stomach voting Tory at all I hope you will vote for Dr Fawcett; if not, I hope you will support Mr MacLennan. What you do down-ballot won't matter unless there's a tie for last place, which is very, very unlikely to happen. So all I shall do is put a cross next to Dr Fiona Fawcett's name and leave the rest blank. (A cross is OK instead of a digit '1' if you're not bothering to include down-ballot preferences.) Dr Fawcett and Mr MacLennan were also the only two candidates to provide comprehensive answers to NoseyPARCA's 'cyberhustings' (see postscript).
So, for the last time, my decision is based on the following ranking, which also hasn't changed since last week:-
-=- The GOOD -=-
Fiona Fawcett (Con)
by far the most impressive; focus on (i) mental health and (ii) environment
Thomas MacLennan (Ind)
experienced; very clear focus on (i) spending and (ii) localism
Sarat Fanet (SNP)
solid track record since December; emphasis on community inclusivity
-=- The BAD -=-
Angus MacDonald (LD)
flip-flopped on Planny visit (laughable reason); hopelessly naive
Kate Willis (Green)
flip-flopped on Planny visit (no reason given); crazy views; dense
(I'm still the UGLY, of course.)
The highly personable Dr Fawcett remains in the top spot after (i) her terrific visit to Plantation the Friday before last (see <https://draytonmark.substack.com/p/making-friday-finer>) and (ii) a campaign visit to Inverlochy last Friday in the company of an equally amiable if rather more corpulent bloke calling himself Jamie Halcro-Johnston MSP (pictured). So, having done, it being election time, a fair amount of "ascertaining and co-ordinating**" the views of the community I represent recently, yesterday I took the opportunity to "express**" them to certainly the first member of Scotland's shadow cabinet that I've ever met. I nagged him about the Belford, the A82, STPR2***, and NPF4***, and I griped about a few other local issues, but we spent most of the time discussing innovative localistic approaches to civic empowerment. I later sent him a follow-up email so let's see what, if anything, happens next. (I'm not, of course, holding my breath: merely crossing my fingers - more in hope than expectation.)
[[ **see my somewhat notorious <https://draytonmark.wordpress.com/> ]]
[[ ***Lost on you? Throw them at <https://DuckDuckGo.com> along with 'Scotland' (say). ]]
Because Ms Fanet doesn't need my vote, then, as I said last time, Mr MacLennan's having NINETEEN times as much experience as ALL the other four candidates put together (!), combined with Dr Fawcett's outstanding mix of fine personal qualities and noble preoccupations (many of the latter shared with Ms Fanet, by the way), makes it a toss-up between the Tory and the Indy. I myself need no clothes peg to vote for a bloody good Conservative candidate (see yesterday's Wed-Head at <https://draytonmark.substack.com/p/wed-head-xxxiii-pt1>, although I know plenty of others who feel differently. If you simply cannot bring yourself to vote Tory, Mr MacLennan's your man. But if the election was tomorrow I'd vote for Dr Fawcett, and I hope many others will do the same in a week's time. (Flip me a text if you need a clothes peg.)
PS: Yesterday night was the deadline for responses to the NoseyPARCA cyberhustings. Mr MacLennan did not feel the need to qualify his answers, but Dr Fawcett was, I think it's fair to say, rather more cautious - guarded, even - writing that "These questions deserve an [in-]depth reply which I shall discuss on my visit. Short email answers can be glib and not address the issue at hand and lack nuance and meaning, but in principle, OK, here are a few basic answers."
Anyway, without further ado:-
-- Q1: Whereabouts within Lochaber do you live?
Thomas MacLennan's straightforward answer, "Fort William," was at least concise - if apparently contradictory with respect to his campaign literature which gave his address as 'Laundry Cottage' in Torlundy. Dr Fawcett couldn't actually answer the question because the presupposition ("within Lochaber") is false in her case: she and her husband live in Inverness or, as she put it, "I live in the Highlands and believe that if you have the drive intelligence and talent you can represent anywhere with aplomb, commitment and flair." She later explained in person that, if elected, she and the incoming Caol and Mallaig** Tory Councillor Liz Saggers would initially rent somewhere together and go from there.
**where there is no election on Thursday because three candidates stood for three seats on HRC.
I have resisted the temptation to comment on candidate's answers to Q2, Q3, and Q4, except to say that I regard it as no sin at all not to answer a question - as long as you address it. You might, for instance, reply with something like "I don't know yet, but I can tell you exactly what principles will guide my decision" or some such. To me that's just fine, that's an answer in kind, that's good enough. So I think that both Mr MacLennan and Dr Fawcett both gave satisfactory, convincing answers to Q's 2-4, as follows:-
-- Q2a-d: (a) How many hours a week do you work at the moment? (b) At what? (c) How many hours a week, if any, will you continue to work at that if elected? (d) How many hours a week will you work as a councillor?
Dr Fawcett:- "I am a housewife and work all the hours God sends! And by my calculation I have already worked three standard working lifetimes already in my role as a doctor and I firmly believe its not the hours you work, its what you put into the hours. Any professional will tell you that you work until the job is done, and done properly. I am fast, intelligent and quick to grasp problems and offer solutions, its what I am trained to do. I will not attend meetings that last longer than an hour because they are unproductive. All I can say is I will promise to give it my all and do whatever it takes to get things done because I don’t waste time, I use it wisely."
Thomas MacLennan:- "(a) None, [because] (b) I'm retired. (c) Sufficient amount of Hours to have been elected once before and then re-elected. (d) From experience no two weeks are the same, you're on call 24/7"
-- Q3: What will you have achieved by the end of 2022?
Thomas MacLennan:- "Honestly don't know, as I have no idea whats in HC's capital plan for Lochaber. Just 4 weeks ago I wasn't even going to be a candidate, but because all the experienced councillors have left, I at the last minute decided to stand for election. Simply because experienced councillors from elsewhere in the Highlands will grab available resources before new councillors have found how it works. Alternatively I could make a list of promises at this point, knowing that if I get in it'll be 5 years before you can do anything about it, I'd rather be honest."
Dr Fawcett:- "World Peace! I jest. Anyone starting out on this Council journey must lay strong foundations by taking the time and trouble to work the patch and talk face to face with people and actually understand the real problems they face and then lay out strong plans to solve those problems. Promising the earth when it can’t be delivered is another political fallacy that I won’t engage in. I personally would like to see a Community Gardening Scheme for all Council owned land to produce fruit and veg for locals and I want the Belford Hospital open with a 10% increase in care beds for the elderly. I want to see more specialist mental health services available locally. I want hidden quiet people to feel and be empowered by my advocacy and I want to increase by 10% the availability of affordable housing to rent. I want to see no litter in FW. The list is endless but it will be tempered by reality and frankly this is simply my list and I am not here to tell you what I want to achieve because what matters is what you the voters want me to achieve. You can set my priorities because you are the ones that matter."
-- Q4a&b: (a) Should Fort William, Caol, and Kilmallie have a joint Town Council? (b) Why or why not?
Dr Fawcett:- "A joint town council is a good idea in principle if all parties can work together in a positive and constructive manner for the good of the locale. It will be more powerful, represent more voices and have more clout.It is not a good idea if it becomes a stagnant talking shop. It must be dynamic, energetic and full of smart new ideas alongside a determination to succeed whilst being mindful and respectful of each areas individual needs and wants."
Thomas MacLennan:- "Everything has become remote and distant from local people, Instead of having 1 councillor with a small ward, you have 4 in a huge ward, in this ward there is a Community Council that can create a 4 hour round journey ! Police and Licensing Boards and Planning Committees no longer exist at a Lochaber level. So yes I want decision making taken back to a local more approachable and accountable level."
-- Q5a&b: (a) "Should all Housing Associations (alternatively: all social landlords) be added to Schedule Two of Part Three of the 2015 Community Empowerment Act which enumerates the the list of organisations - the so-called 'public service authorities' (PSAs) - to whom, under the Act, Participation Requests may validly be addressed?" (b) "Do you pledge to write an open letter to the relevant minister conveying and explaining your view?"
No candidate answered this question; neither Mr MacLennan nor Dr Fawcett felt that doing enough research to be able to answer confidently would be a good use of their time in the midst of a campaign: fair enough. (Dr Fawcett, for instance, wrote that she was "Not going to lie, I really don’t know the answer to this one, going to have to do the research [..], sorry.")
-- Q6a-c: "What was your reaction when you learned that LCoC had cancelled the Zoom hustings? Had you agreed to take part? If not, had it been your intention to take part?"
No candidate answered (b) or (c) and the only candidate to answer (a) was Dr Fawcett, with "Jesus H Christ! What is going on... I was so looking forward to it!" from which I think it's fairly safe to infer that her answer to (b) would have been 'yes' - presumably she was too pissed-off to bother. She did, however, bother to address the last question...
-- Q7: "Do you pledge to serve fully four years?"
...becoming, once again, the only candidate to do so - with the almost instantly dispatched one-word answer: "Unreservedly!"