Councillor Rosenstiel Should Resign

The Cambridge Evening News are running a story about Councillor Colin Rosenstiel, who is being hauled in front of the City Council's standards committee, after an incident in 2007 where Colin is alleged to have blocked an emergency vehicle from entering Midsummer Common to treat a seriously injured person. There is a full report on an investigation of the incident from the Standards Board for England here (large pdf file), which makes damning reading.

Colin has form for this type of behaviour - he was caught on camera remonstrating with a van driver obstructing a cycle lane.

I understand that the Council's Standards Committee has the power to suspend Cllr Rosenstiel from office for 3 months. Generally speaking I think it should be up to the electorate to remove a Councillor from office if they behave like a small child when they don't get their way, but in both the cases above Cllr Rosenstiel was attempting to take direct action on issues where he is among the most empowered people in the whole City to take action through the proper channels. He is a member of the Cambridge Area Joint Transport Committee, and an Executive Councillor on Cambridge City Council, the authority that controls Midsummer Common. That a leading Lib Dem Councillor needs to resort to bad tempered direct action is testament to his ineffectiveness. He has lost the ability to challenge the systems and make change happen, and should resign.