Titbits – Beards, budgets and a broken statue

■ Former schoolteacher and Tory parliamentary candidate Amy Gray gave Labour councillors a ticking off on Twitter after she attended a full council meeting last month. The ever erudite Cllr Harvey Odze announced he was about to quote Abraham Lincoln but was interrupted by a voice from the audience shouting “He’s got a beard too”. “Seriously?” tweeted an indignant Ms Gray, “Is this the level of debate here?”

■ The Abney Park Trust’s latest newsletter, ‘End of an Era’, announced that the Council was reclaiming control over the park and cemetery. It features an image of a broken statue, lying bereft on the ground. While the Town Hall’s cheery press release described a bright future, the Trust’s forlorn image perhaps spoke louder than words.

■ Hackney Council budget meetings have become so predictable in recent years that one suspects there must be a secret script that the principal actors have learned off by heart. Mayor Pipe freezes council tax yet again, and the Conservatives yet again lament the Council wasting money on the planning department, Hackney Today and speed-reducing sinusoidal road humps. So it was with bated breath that those present waited for Tory councillor Harvey Odze to come to their favourite part in the play, and on mention of the word ‘humps’ an excited Labour member shouted out ‘bingo!’ The chamber duly erupted.