MEDIA MISSES MASSIVE ELEPHANT

CRUMBRIA: 11.4.2026

WELL, wet my face with artificial tears.

The News & Shrug, Carlisle, has managed to drum up a 900-word human-interest story about the Council that was not lifted wholesale from a Council document.

Today’s tear-jerking exclusive informed readers that councillors in north and west Crumbria are facing rising levels of abuse, both in person and online.

It also referred, rather cryptically, to “heated outbursts” from the public gallery at recent Crumberland Council meetings “when controversial issues were being debated”.

The obvious missing detail is what, exactly, members of the public might recently have had strong views about?

Might it, or might it not, be in some way related to this…

On March 3, Labour-daft Crumberland Council voted to consign to the waste paper basket a petition signed by more than 1,100 people objecting to its pursuit of Council of Sanctuary status for the area.

That decision did not, of course, entitle critics to abuse or threaten councillors who are, with only one or two exceptions, a good bunch, whatever their stripe.

But it does shed a little bit of light on the public mood — which the alleged former newspaper seemed curiously reluctant to avoid.

In other words, 900 words on the public lashing out, without any effort to explain why the public’s urine might have approached 100°C.

The Chronic has said before that in these times of political rabies, council big wigs cannot make decisions like this and then expect to be greeted with bouquets from the public gallery.

Perhaps modern-day politics is not for them?

We were also relieved to learn that, despite the daily misery of this living hell, no councillor quoted in the article has yet felt strong enough to step down from their £14,500-a-year roles.

All the quotes in the article came from the Left-hand side of the Crumberland Council chamber, with no contribution from the Independents, or the Tories.

Perhaps they were unavailable for the therapy session with the local rag or are made of tougher stuff?

The News & Shrug also forgot to tell readers that some of the worst examples of councillor abuse is found in the comments section of a very big local newspaper group which tend to go largely unmoderated.

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