Labour Councillor’s head secretly installed on John F Kennedy memorial

I hope readers will please excuse how incensed I feel on discovering that the Birmingham Labour Party have insisted, without discussion, that the head of former Councillor Mike Nangle is installed on the soon to be re-erected John F Kennedy memorial. Indeed, so incensed, I am tapping heavily on my keyboard as I type.

Readers of my blog will know that I led on the re-erection of this memorial – see past blogs at:

http://martinmullaney.blogspot.co.uk/2011/10/permission-sought-for-new-john-f.html

http://martinmullaney.blogspot.co.uk/2011/10/creation-of-birmingham-kennedy-memorial.html

http://martinmullaney.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/head-of-john-f-kennedy-is-back-on-his.html

The original memorial was created in 1968, but demolished in 2007 for a major road junction. Using the original full scale drawings, Oliver Budd has been carefully recreating an exact copy of the 1968 mural.

Before I got involved, the proposal was to have bits of the mural either above a shop front or on the end of Dubliner pub in Digbeth. There were also proposals to include modern day figures such as Bob Geldof, Mother Theresa and recently deceased Labour Councillor Mike Nangle.

A small group of us (representatives from the Irish Welfare and myself) got together to stop this stupidity and find a respectful location for the memorial and to keep the mural as per its 1968 design – NO MIKE NANGLE, NOBODY MODERN. Indeed, this decision not to include modern figures was agreed at a public meeting in the Irish Centre.

Even as Oliver Budd was creating the mural in recent months, I did suggest the idea of including Bobby Kennedy, since the Birmingham Irish Catholic Committee that funded the 1968 mural had asked Kenneth Budd at the last minute if Bobby could be included. He couldn’t in 1968, since the mural was finished. Both Oliver Budd and myself agreed that we would not include Bobby Kennedy since we wanted to keep the mural as per 1968.

So what do I discover now looking at Oliver Budd’s blog – MIKE NANGLE’S head included on the mural.

Why is Mike Nangle included? Yes, Mike was a lovely person (and may I add, many a pleasant pint of beer I shared with him in the Prince of Wales pub, Moseley), but he had absolutely nothing to do with the creation or restoration of the Kennedy memorial. There are far more relevant people who could have been included in the memorial - Bobby Kennedy? Father Maguire of St Catherine’s Church, Bristol Street who raised the money in 1968 to fund the mural? members of the Irish Welfare, who with me, worked to find a new respectful site?

This is a purely party political decision. A decision, done in secret, showing how THICK, PHILISTINE and UNETHICAL Birmingham’s Labour administration is!!!!!