Simon Harris #7 Twagic

[Blue bunny]

He even doubled down on using his son to guilt trip. bleep.

 

[Blue bunny]

He's just posted another essay. He's full on spiralling. He needs to step away from social media.

 

[lilykestrel]

I mean I'll take it that the Lib Dem leaflet could be construed that money that went to him came out of local gov money not central gov money. But ultimately the council did still pay him money that was given to them to use for their COVID response and it is fair enough to question whether that was the best use of that funding.

 

[mchops]

He has never been able to handle criticism, he's ego is extremely fragile for someone so untalented.

 

[Fred Santos]

The point is that the external funding could have been spent on things other than him. There was quite wide latitude to do so. For that reason, one way or another, money that ended in his pocket for posting from his shed in his underpands and Coca Cola T shirt, is money that could not have been spent on other, more useful and deserving things like, for example, disabled children.

 

[Also_smoke_and_mirrors]

He just digs a bigger hole. He's now just coming across like Schofield did when he referenced Caroline flack and demanded "is that what you want?"

ETA he doesn't even care about children in need have been left without the support they need. Even though he has a child who would be included in that demographic. Maybe that's what we should be telling your *checks notes- but doesn't really need to because he never stops mentioning it* autistic son

 

[furtherdownthespiral]

His flying monkeys will see no wrong anyway, the snivelling little shitehawk

 

[lilykestrel]

also what about the legal advice given that he keep comments off? if there's only been informal legal advice. could it have been ... nonsense

 

[CrackingOwlSanctuary]

Looks like it's finally sinking in that if he hadn't been a money grubbing grifter then none of this would have happened.

From FB 3 hours ago...

I know people keep telling me to ‘let it go’ Elsa-style, but Essex Liberal Democrats are now sending this campaign leaflet to homes all over the county. So, if I am going to be used as a ‘vote puller’ from now until the next local elections in 2026 or whenever they may be, I feel that it is only fair for them to answer a few minor, trifling questions that I have about their conduct. After all, why should I lie back and think of England while politicians have a good old time?

- On 10th December 2024 in Full Council at County Hall in Chelmsford, the Lib Dem Cllr Mark Cory said the following:

“No detailed documentation was prepared before those payments were put out to (social media company or) Simon Harris himself.”

The issue I have with this is that I am currently resting my left hand on a pile of SLAs (Service Level Agreements) or ‘contracts’ that make it perfectly clear what I was to be paid, what was expected of me, and what may happen if I decided to not fulfil my obligations.

There are in fact 25 of them covering the duration of time working with Essex County Council both before, during and after the pandemic, including agreements that cover the ‘onward payment’ arrangements that all parties have now agreed were ‘regrettable.’ These are even listed on ECC’s own website reporting of the situation. Maths has never been my strongest suit, but even I can figure out that there’s a world of difference between ‘no documentation’ and ‘25 documents.’ Why did Cllr Cory believe otherwise?

It’s also interesting that Private Eye Magazine have repeated this ‘no documentation’ accusation on at least one occasion. Their own journalist told me that ‘councillors’ had been speaking to them in the process of their information gathering. Now I’m not saying for one moment that a Liberal Democrat cllr has been passing inaccurate or misleading information to the press as that would be an incredibly serious state of affairs, but at the same time any information you may have about how Private Eye may have reached this conclusion would be very much appreciated. It could have just as easily been a Tory, Labour or Independent cllr after all.

It’s worth pointing out as well that this was the same Full Council where Cllr Mike Mackrory (Lib Dem) just applied the blanket term ‘dubious’ to describe my work as a whole.

I agreed to withdraw my formal complaint about this when ECC agreed to update the ambiguous wording on their website to make it clear that investigations had concluded into the matter because others had taken it upon themselves to tell Private Eye and others that the police were heavily involved, but the fact remains that the word was used to describe work that had been evaluated by Public Health, TheGovLab / NYU, NIHR, and even Meta themselves when I was invited to present some of the work to (then) Prince Charles in 2022. I’d appreciate Cllr Mackrory’s thoughts on this too.

- In March 2024, the Audit, Governance and Standards Committee of Essex County Council that includes ECC Lib Dem Cllrs asked me for performance statistics that don’t actually exist for a Facebook page, namely ‘number of unique visitors.’ I was also asked for ‘page visits’ which was a possible metric to provide.

The committee also confused a Facebook ‘page’ and a Facebook ‘group’ on at least one occasion, and more concerning was the fact that I was never invited to answer questions or give evidence to the committee, beyond the request for a few statistics that didn’t really represent the entirety of what Essex Coronavirus Action / Essex Is United achieved.

I was told all along that this committee would only be investigating ECC’s role and not the actions of Facebook admins, and yet opposition politicians grabbed every opportunity to perform a full-on professional character assassination of myself. Please explain how this was in any way fair or even democratic.

- Labelling myself merely as an ‘Internet prankster who was paid £500k without due diligence,’ even though this aspect of my online past had very little to do with my work at Essex County Council is a tactic that has been used by the ‘clickbait’ press to plant the seed in people’s minds that I have somehow ‘pranked’ a local authority into handing over half a million pounds for barely anything in return.

The Liberal Democrats know very well that not only did ECC get a significant amount of content creation and other associated activity in return, but also that more than £167k of any figures quoted was provided (regrettably) for onward payment to other individuals and organisations.

I know ‘Content Creator EARNS an average of £96k per annum for creating content over a four-year period including a pandemic when local authorities had to act at pace to deal with an increasingly concerning situation, with a significant proportion of this being funded by COMF which was a central government ‘pot’ specifically for tackling the pandemic as opposed to Simon Harris cynically grabbing wads of cash from a biscuit tin on a shelf at County Hall marked ‘Pothole Repairs’ doesn’t have quite the same oomph as a headline, but then again surely a political party has a duty to not mislead the public with context-free statements?

TRIGGER WARNING. The following section mentions suicide.

- Remember as well that I have seen some absolutely horrendous stuff said online about all of this, including at least one direct threat of violence that has been referred to Essex Police.

An element of this crowd also openly admits using forums that are dedicated to pushing online personalities towards taking their own lives. Surely contributing to this gross misrepresentation of my work has some sort of role in driving this behaviour, even in a small way.

If the unthinkable did happen in one form or another, and God-willing it won’t, would leafleting the whole county with this statement be looked upon in a favourable light? Again, your thoughts would be appreciated.

- As you are also aware, there were a number of people whose work with ECC was called into question over the pandemic. I accept that figures quoted for others weren’t on the same level as myself, but at the same time they weren’t insignificant either as they either approached six-figure sums or passed this level completely.

In December’s Full Council, Cllr Cory referred to this as ‘The Simon Harris Affair’ in a Hollywood-style attempt to make political capital, and there seems to be a real reluctance amongst the Liberal Democrats to publicly mention anyone else in these blockbuster pieces of political comms. Is there anything I need to know?

A copy of this post has been sent to Cllrs Mackrory and Cory for their attention. I will of course share any response to the questions I have asked, unless I receive a request to the contrary.

1 hour ago...

Sorry I need a favour. If any of you bump into my autistic son can you try not to let him know that I’ve let him down by getting contracted by ECC for social media work. Much appreciated.

He could have simply wrote:

Be kind, former prankster.

 

[Blue bunny]

I'm he'd got legal advice, I'm sure they'd have told him to stop the posting. He's just giving the other side more to work with.

He should let it drop and it would disappear. I don't know why he can't, most people would just lay low and hope it goes away but he can't stop shouting about it and draging his kids into it, to boot. I hope he can't see Facebook, nor any of his friends.

 

[Seaford Haggington]

also what about the legal advice given that he keep comments off? if there's only been informal legal advice. could it have been ... nonsense

No legal advisor is going to tell you to write endless screeds on Facebook.

 

[lilykestrel]

ETA

 

[Blue bunny]

The fact he is now doubling down on the fact he might commit suicide is vile.

 

[Also_smoke_and_mirrors]

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ETA

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I've tried to keep personal issues off my page but I just can't resist pasting them here so they get more views and comments. I'll even attempt to monetise my threats of suicide and my autistic son. I think I have more children but I can't remember them because the others don't give me the engagement on social media. Go on Luke, do an autism. I said that. It went viral.

Fixed the post for him.

 

[Blue bunny]

This is absolutely him in a nutshell.

 

[lilykestrel]

OK, I've done some memory refreshing on the (then) Prince Charles thing. So (then) Prince Charles wasn't just there as I said earlier (that was very dubious of me)

Making it sound like he was the main event on the day is a bit much given the other people who presented


Really rubs me the wrong way the way he acts like this was some sort of Meta stamp of approval when ultimately it's Meta making Meta look good for what happens on its platform

 

[jf99]

I'm he'd got legal advice, I'm sure they'd have told him to stop the posting. He's just giving the other side more to work with.

He should let it drop and it would disappear. I don't know why he can't, most people would just lay low and hope it goes away but he can't stop shouting about it and draging his kids into it, to boot. I hope he can't see Facebook, nor any of his friends.

Desperate to try and rebuild his character and back to his 'glory days'...it's clearly absolutely killing him not being able to go back on Twitter because he knows he'll be destroyed in the comments everytime he posts.

Its too late Simon, you're finished.

 

[lilykestrel]

"it's a complicated situation unfortunately"

that's a funny way of skimming over getting paid 6 figures a year (obviously not including the £150-odd-k that got paid out to subcontractors)

 

[Also_smoke_and_mirrors]

No one beats a tattle detective! Good work on finding the post. The best bit for me of a post about his great work on social media and includes a pic of senior royalty is that it mustered less than 500 likes and 15 comments

I have fewer than 300 followers on my instagram and I reckon I've had similar numbers on a pic of my kitchenaid

 

[lilykestrel]

the comments section is quite funny