{"id":118480,"date":"2025-05-21T01:08:10","date_gmt":"2025-05-21T01:08:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/118480\/"},"modified":"2025-05-21T01:08:10","modified_gmt":"2025-05-21T01:08:10","slug":"politician-suspended-for-being-in-trigger-me-timbers-whatsapp-group-given-new-job-to-uphold-highest-standards-of-conduct","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/118480\/","title":{"rendered":"Politician suspended for being in ‘Trigger Me Timbers’ WhatsApp group given new job to uphold highest standards of conduct"},"content":{"rendered":"

The committee’s job is to promote and maintain high standards of conduct by councillors\"Ex-leaderEx-leader of Tameside Council, Coun Brenda Warrington with Andrew Gwynne MP back in 2021<\/p>\n

A suspended councillor, who was part of the widely criticised \u2018Trigger Me Timbers\u2019 WhatsApp group<\/a>, will sit on Tameside<\/a> council\u2019s standards committee.<\/p>\n

That group’s job is to promote and maintain high standards of conduct by councillors.<\/p>\n

But the authority’s Conservative group has now questioned why Coun Brenda Warrington has been appointed to the standards committee, given she has been suspended for her conduct by the Labour<\/a> Party.<\/p>\n

A former council leader, she was one of 11 councillors and two MPs suspended over the shocking messages leaked from the WhatsApp group.<\/p>\n

Named ‘Trigger Me Timbers’, it was made up of Labour councillors, members and activists from Denton<\/a> and Reddish<\/a>, as well as the local MP Andrew Gwynne. Its members remain suspended by Labour.<\/p>\n

Andrew Gwynne, MP for Gorton and Denton(Image: Sean Hansford | Manchester Evening News)<\/p>\n

Coun Dan Costello has suggested Coun Warrington is unfit to sit on the standards committee as she has failed to uphold proper standards herself.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the latest town hall meeting in Dukinfield, the Conservative councillor tonight (May 20) said: \u201cMany of you will remember Coun Warrington was the executive leader and her conduct in this very chamber was so bad it forced her own party to remove her from office. But that could be a matter of opinion.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat isn\u2019t a matter of opinion is that the councillor is currently suspended from her party. She is suspended for her involvement in the now infamous \u2018Trigger Me Timbers\u2019 WhatsApp group.<\/p>\n

\"ConservativeConservative Coun Dan Costello, speaking in Dukinfield Town Hall at full council(Image: Tameside Council)<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018Trigger Me Timbers\u2019 was a WhatsApp group where councillors, MPs, Labour activists and, most abhorrently, members of the public were mocked and abused.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe content of that group has been widely shared in various news outlets and I don\u2019t think anyone would describe it as anything close to high standards of conduct.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the transcripts from that group Coun Warrington has over 1,500 contributions. These contributions include descriptions of people as \u2018idiots\u2019, \u2018stupid\u2019, \u2018peevish\u2019 and even as \u2018bonkers\u2019.<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n

Although Coun Costello admitted there was \u2018no constitutional reason\u2019 Coun Warrington couldn\u2019t be appointed to the committee, he questioned why she should be.<\/p>\n

Labour\u2019s Coun Joe Kitchen, chair of council business, clarified those matters are currently being investigated and have not yet concluded.<\/p>\n

The meeting at Dukinfield Town Hall still approved Coun Warrington to be one of the appointments to the standards committee.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The committee’s job is to promote and maintain high standards of conduct by councillorsEx-leader of Tameside Council, Coun…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":118481,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8813],"tags":[748,1025,393,4884,2465,285,9031,1026,16499,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-118480","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-manchester","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-denton-and-audenshaw","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-manchester","13":"tag-politics","14":"tag-reddish","15":"tag-tameside","16":"tag-tameside-council","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114543152593278913","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118480","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118480"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118480\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}