Well, would you believe it!? At tonight’s O&S meeting, Nigel Harrison put in a surprise appearance. Business Information Point (BIP) gave a presentation on why they are worth a grant from EDDC and several councillors asked questions regarding the type of businesses, number of start ups, etc that they dealt with, without a shred of deep questioning about value for money.

Then Cllr Newth commented that she had been in discussion with a Sidmouth business which was having difficulties. Within days of suggesting they contact Nigel Harrison, he had visited this business and given three possible avenues they could pursue. One could almost think … no … no … not an orchestrated presentation surely? (And one Sidmouth business which doesn’t seem to have benefitted is Trumpers).

Now, as seems he has been missing from any council meeting and not mentioned on any agenda for eighteen months or more (ever since the demise of the East Devon Business Forum of which he was the very, very busy Hon Sec), presumably this nugget of information was meant to demonstrate that he had been beavering away on behalf of local businesses. However, has anyone seen any reports or other evidence of his work output? What have we been paying him for? Now that the East Devon Business Forum is defunct, how has he been filling his time?

And is it a coincidence that he reappears on the day the EDBF TAFF is officially buried?