Earlier this week, Guido reported on the strange disappearance of the West of England’s newly-elected Metro Mayor. Since being sworn in on Monday, Labour’s new mayor Dan Norris hasn’t been seen in public anywhere – a bit odd given his promises to be ‘more visible‘ than his predecessor and to ‘get things done‘. Now that it’s the end of the week, and the Mayor still hasn’t been found, Guido’s decided it’s time to issue a missing person notice in the hope of assuring his safe return to his mayoral desk. Guido is told that the West of England Combined Authority is incredibly concerned, and that the Mayor definitely isn’t on holiday… 

Sheffiled Labour Group are to put forward a motion openly criticising Sheffield Regional Mayor Dan Jarvis after his failure to sign a deal with local councils, unlocking cash and powers for the region. Senior Councillor Mazher Iqbal even suggested Jarvis should lose his job.

“If I was not doing my job, I would expect to be sacked. I would expect my boss to say, you have been in post for six months, this is what we agreed – what have you have achieved?”

“If I had not delivered I would expect them to say clear your desk on your way out. That would happen in any other job. That’s how the world works.”

Jarvis, who has been in the job for more than half a year, is the only one of the eight directly elected metro-mayors to have failed to reach an agreement with the local authorities in his region. Almost £17 million is sitting unclaimed as he has presided over negotiation deadlock…

Could his failure and local labour’s annoyance be anything to do with the fact that Jarvis is the only metro-Mayor who is double-jobbing? Andy Burnham and Steve Rotherham both resigned as MPs when they became Mayors…

It seems the LibDem’s candidate for the first West of England Metropolitan Mayor is confident of victory. Stephen Williams lists the mayoralty as his current job on Facebook, despite the election not taking place until 4th May:

Easy to be mayor on Facebook isn’t it…