NEW county councillor Nick Hards, pictured, must already be quite fed up with life at county hall.

But it’s not the fact that cuts are set to rise to total more than £200m which will be making the Labour councillor grumpy.

At a cabinet meeting on Tuesday, his colleagues managed to use three different pronunciations of his name during their exchange.

First, it was Arash Fatemian – a man who knows all too well what it’s like to have councillors mis-pronounce his surname.

After calling Mr Hards “Councillor Hands”, he quickly apologised, but matters were made worse when a cabinet colleague of Mr Fatemian called him Mr Hard.

Seemingly unfazed by the reckless disregard for such an important piece of information, Nick (The Insider doesn’t trust himself not to also make a boo-boo) carried on raising concerns about overspends and underspends. Good for him!

 

IT was at the same cabinet meeting that the usually articulate John Jackson, pictured, tripped over his words in a very ironic way.

The head of social services, known for his long, elaborate speeches to meetings, managed to slip up as he tried to say “articulate”.

He said: “The first point Councillor Price has made very artic....artic...effectively.”

The Insider is pleased to say Mr Jackson was well aware of the sense of irony, and had a good chuckle at himself.

It just goes to show you shouldn’t take yourself too seriously when you’re paid £128,000 of taxpayers’ money to look after every single old person in the county.

 

AS PM and Witney MP David Cameron, pictured, grapples with the economy, he also seems to be grappling with his use of social media. Or rather, whoever runs his Twitter account appears to be grappling.

Earlier this week, David tweeted his unfaltering support for the benefit cap – which is set to leave hundreds of families in Oxfordshire with less to live on.

He said: “@David_Cameron: rolling out a cap on Benefits today – @IDS_MP and I are determined to make work pay.”

Had the intern or social media bod in charge of the account done his or her research, it would have become clear that the account mentioned was not actually that of work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan-Smith, but a spoof account in his name.

Still, the odd left-leaning person might question if it is a spoof Twitter account with such entries as “A few laps of your moat will keep you cool and healthy, and won’t eat into that tight budget” and “Chin chin Dave. Round mine for a Pimms later?”