Category Archives: Local government

News from the first tier of local government

As some of our readers will know, I’m a Parish councillor in deepest Mid Suffolk, chairing my council as I have for most of the past eight years. Creeting St Peter is a “micro council”, as defined by the National Association of Local Councils (NALC), with a precept of just over £6,000 a year, and a professional staff of approximately 0.05 full-time equivalent. We don’t do “big stuff”, like providing services, but what we do is represent our residents and lobby principal authorities on their behalf. I like to think that we’re quite good at it, in our own modest …

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The ALDC Liberal Democrat Town and Parish Councillors Conference – at the coal face of local democracy

4 parallel white vertical lines on orange background ALDC logoSaturday saw the third annual ALDC online Conference for Town and Parish Councillors, an event which has developed as an opportunity to reach out to the Cinderella tier of local government, although we’re more likely to have the budget for a glass slipper than our principal authority colleagues do these days.

Opened by Sarah Green MP, Town and Parish Councillors from across England, including some pretty heavy hitters at the National Association of Local Councils (NALC), came together to discuss some of the big issues that face the sector – Local Government Reform, the accelerating devolution of valued local services to the sector – and how to use the opportunities of local power to promote the Party, build campaign teams and win elections at principal authority and Parliamentary levels.

Sarah spoke passionately about how success in elections for Amersham Town Council just before her famous by-election win laid the platform for the campaign that followed, establishing the Liberal Democrats as the best option to defeat the Conservatives, and how town and parish councillors across her constituency act as an “early warning system” for issues that affect residents.

The Conference then broke out into three sessions;

  • the impact of national change on town and parish councillors, with Justin Griggs from NALC;
  • social media best practice for town and parish councils, with Dan Purchese from parish consultants Breakthrough Communications; and
  • building the Lib Dems at a town and parish level, with Councillor Hannah Perkin (ALDC) and Councillor Sam Potts

Conference was fortunate enough to have Justin Griggs, NALC’s Head of Policy and Communications, to take delegates through both the key aspects of Local Government Reform but also to explain how NALC was responding to the various strands of current proposals.

After a critical break for refreshment, delegates came together for a roundtable on how Liberal Democrat Town Councillors have used the platform of their councils to make real change in their communities, chaired by Baroness Ros Scott in her usual ebullient manner. Ros has been NALC’s President for three years, having been a former President of ALDC, so she knows the sector well.

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7 May 2025 – today’s press releases (part 2)

  • Cole-Hamilton: Only the Lib Dems can get Scotland back to its best
  • Scot Lib Dems comment on SNP candidate list
  • Legal Experts express support for Assisted dying bill
  • Scot Lib Dems respond to Swinney independence comments
  • Labour steal Deputy Mayor appointment as part of a “grubby deal” for control of Oldham Council

Cole-Hamilton: Only the Lib Dems can get Scotland back to its best

Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton MSP has today said that only his party can deliver a fairer vision for Scotland and get our communities back on track, as he marked one year to go until the Scottish Parliament election.

Mr Cole-Hamilton is visiting a local business in Edinburgh Northern today with Sanne Dijkstra-Downie, the party’s candidate for the constituency. Edinburgh Northern is a key target seat for the party at next year’s election. At the 2022 local elections, Scottish Liberal Democrats won the area covered by the new seat by 29.3% to the SNP’s 25.0%.

The party is highlighting their priorities for the next election. This includes faster access to local healthcare like GPs and dentists, recruiting more teachers to put Scotland at the forefront of key industries like renewables and precision medicine and speeding up the delivery of important infrastructure, particularly the dualling of the A9 and A96.

Mr Cole-Hamilton said:

The SNP have been in charge for eighteen years and our health service, economy and education are all on their knees. They have let Scotland down.

When people look around at some of the alternatives, they feel frustrated. Labour were elected promising change, but they have clobbered small businesses and care providers with a cruel jobs tax. The Conservatives are lurching to extremes and abandoning the centre ground.

Only the Scottish Liberal Democrats have a vision for getting Scotland back to its best.

We want a Scotland where people get the local healthcare they need, when they need it. We want to give our children a world-class education and a thriving economy where the government looks after your money and works with its neighbours. We want a Scotland where our rural communities are listened to, not talked down to.

If Scots back us, we can defeat the SNP’s Kate Forbes in the highlands, win constituency seats in areas like Edinburgh and East Dunbartonshire and elect more Liberal Democrat candidates on the regional lists in every corner of Scotland who will be strong local champions delivering on the issues that matter most.

Scot Lib Dems comment on SNP candidate list

Commenting on the SNP releasing their candidate list, Christine Jardine MP said:

If only the SNP government were always as good at recycling as they are with their candidate list. We’d have no difficulty hitting our climate change targets.

Stephen Flynn has obviously decided that he’s bored of staring at the back of Ed Davey’s head each week and decided to try his hand in the Scottish Parliament. Given some of the language his supporters have been throwing around, I’m not sure that is a prospect his female colleagues will relish.

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ALDC by-election report – 24 April 2025

Thursday 24th April saw four principal by-elections (each of them with a Lib Dem candidate), including a Liberal Democrat defence.

Congratulations are due to Cllr Tom McCann and the West Berkshire team, who held Thatcham North East, despite an increased field. Both Labour and Reform were new onto the ballot, and their combined support was much more than the dip in the Lib Dem vote share.

West Berkshire District Council, Thatcham North East

Liberal Democrats (Tom McCann): 690 (41.1, -14.8)
Conservative: 428 (25.5%, +0.1)
Reform UK: 367 (21.9%, new)
Green Party: 127 (7.6%, -11.0)
Labour: 65 (3.9%, new)

Liberal Democrat HOLD

Meanwhile, there was a near miss in Arun, where there was a Lib Dem/Reform battle to gain from independent in Marine ward, whose other councillor is a Liberal Democrat. Commiserations to Paul Wells and the team, who were pipped by just ten votes.

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Making Labour Councillors more comfortable

Labour Councillors in Merton have come up with a way of cutting down on scrutiny from opposition councillors – led by 17 Liberal Democrats. Last week’s Council meeting saw Labour force though a whole series of changes to the constitution which will drastically affect the ability of Opposition Councillors to hold them to account.

The draconian new rules:

  • Limit accountability on key issues by halving the number of questions to Cabinet Members.
  • Reduce the publication of key information on the administration’s performance and whether it’s meeting its own promises, by abolishing ‘strategic theme reports’ and questions.
  • Stifle debate on issues residents care about by limiting opposition motions. For smaller groups – like the Conservatives – that’s to fewer than one a meeting. Independent councillors will rarely, if ever be able to propose motions.
  • Gag minority political opinions. Again, smaller groups – like the Conservatives – will see their speaking time in debates limited.
  • Rig the rule’s in Labour’s favour by fixing it so that Labour councillors get more speaking time in debates, and giving the Labour Leader of the Council unlimited interventions.
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How can Town Twinning be “resurrected” in the UK?

As a Polish born Councillor, I have always wanted to show my beautiful nation to some of my Council colleagues. Although Poland has become a popular tourist or a city-break destination, I think that still many of us have incorrect perceptions of the country of my birth. Since 1989 and the collapse of the Berlin Wall, and in particular since the beginning of the centre, Poland has changed beyond recognition. Membership of the EU since 2004, high levels of growth, investment and productivity, and a strong economy helped Poland to establish itself as a key decision maker in Europe, and a country that many look up to.

At the end of February, I was absolutely delighted that, thanks to an invitation from Mr Łukasz Kuźmicz, the Mayor of Syców, the Mayor of Welwyn Hatfield, Councillor Frank Marsh, and I had an amazing opportunity to visit the South-West part of Poland.

It is fair to say that we were truly overwhelmed with our trip so far; incredible hospitality, well run and organised Council, fantastic staff at local primary and secondary schools, and students with fluent English. The list goes on! I was so impressed with the Polish “can-do” attitude, willingness to cooperate and just constant drive to make things happen.

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Is Angela Rayner talking about a revolution… in hyper-local government?

There are times, few and far between perhaps, when you suddenly find that you might get a bunch of things that you’ve been campaigning for a long time to get. You lobby Ministers and opposition politicians and you keep at it, even if the responses aren’t at all positive. And then, something changes…

Angela Rayner’s speech to the Local Government Association Conference last week was, perhaps unexpectedly, one of those moments for the sector I now hold a leadership role in, the National Association of Local Councils (NALC). In her speech, she announced a plethora of changes which, if genuine, will give powers back to local government that have been grabbed by the centre over nearly a decade of Conservative administrations.

Multi-year funding settlements, better support for local authorities in financial difficulties, it all sounds very promising, even if the proof of the pudding might have to wait until Wednesday’s Budget.

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Welcome to my day: 21 October 2024 – you’d wonder why anyone would be a councillor…

As I may have noted before, I’m a parish councillor in a small, but perfectly-formed, village in Suffolk’s Gipping Valley. And, generally, the role isn’t that stressful. After all, my council provides no services of a life or death nature, nor do we provide services which impact hugely on people’s lives, like education, social care or housing. But, even here, there can be contentious issues which impact on us. Planning applications for example, and whilst we have no decision making powers there either, as a statutory consultee, our residents expect us to represent their views to the powers that be. They believe, not unreasonably, that the powers that be must listen to us – if only that were true. And discussions can get a bit heated, even when party politics isn’t in play.

But I’ve been, on the whole, pretty lucky. I’ve received very little hassle, and all of that has come from outsiders. But I was reminded at the weekend that, that is increasingly not true of my fellow councillors at all tiers of local government. A report issued by the Local Government Association on Saturday noted that, in a survey of its members, 22% of respondents stated that they had received death threats or threats of violence against them.

And it’s not just the public who can make life difficult or impossible for an individual councillor. Opposition councillors and, even more depressingly, members of your own Party can be the source of behaviour that is designed to humiliate, embarrass or even frighten you. Too many of us have witnessed that, or been the victim of it.

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We should allow Ukrainian refugees to stay

It has now sadly been over two years since the latest phase of Russia’s war against Ukraine.

I was living in Kyiv back in early 2014 when the conflict began after Russia invaded Crimea and East Ukraine. Since then, the UK has rightly been one of Ukraine’s strongest allies, providing economic, military, political and diplomatic support. This has also very much been a cross-party endeavour, which I strongly welcome.

There is though more that the UK and our allies – particularly the USA – need to do to now ensure that Kyiv has the military means to defeat Moscow.

Refugees

Likewise, there is more …

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ALDC’s by-election report – 30 November 2023

There were 3 principal Council by-elections this week with Liberal Democrat candidates – and there was so much to celebrate in all three.

There were an additional 2 by-elections on City of London Council but these were only contested by independent candidates.

The only place to start is North Yorkshire Council with a historic Lib Dem gain from the Green Party in Sowerby and Topcliffe ward. Congratulations to Councillor Dan Sladden on an extraordinary victory that is remarkable for a number of reasons.

Not only did we get a brilliant 42% of the vote, we did so from nowhere having not stood in the ward in the previous local election! It is also only the third principal council seat that we have gained in a by-election from the Green Party since 2002. For so many reasons this is a historic result so once again we want to say thank you and well done to Councillor Sladden and North Yorkshire Liberal Democrats.

North Yorkshire Council, Sowerby and Topcliffe

Liberal Democrats (Dan Sladden): 764 (42%, new)
Conservative: 460 (25%, -23%)
Green Party: 306 (17%, -35%)
Labour: 250 (14%, new)
Yorkshire Party: 35 (2%, new)
Official Monster Raving Loony Party: 20 (1%, new)

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Young Liberals’ Local Elections campaigning and successes

In May, we at the English Young Liberals got massively stuck into campaigning for the local elections! Proving ourselves to be a massive driving force in the locals, we held multiple action days in twenty different locations across the country, with many often happening on the same day. We’d like to thank all the local parties in supporting us setting up these action days, and to give a huge thank you to every Young Liberal that turned up and made the action days a success!

As well as campaigning, we also saw at …

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ALDE Party Congress 2023 – the local government cut

In addition to all the MEPs, Prime Ministers and Grandees there were also quite a few local Councillors like me in attendance.

The Committee of Regions continued to focus on Local Government issues by mounting a couple of specific interest Fringe sessions.

One regular event is entitled the Liberal Mayors Summit, and despite the poor attendance of Mayors and Group Leaders from the UK ,even when we were in the EU, I’ve fortunately managed to sneak in on a couple of occasions. There were about 20 attending this year, from metropolitan areas across the EU, with representation from well-known cities like Warsaw, Stockholm, St Omer, Bucharest, Split, Budapest, Vienna and smaller less well-known ones from across the EU states. It was good to realise that the Liberal influence is present in so many local authority areas.

The main guest was the very popular Margrethe Vestager, Executive Vice President of the European Commission who had delivered a speech about plans to regulate IA.

The agenda included issues about SMEs, and combatting gender-based violence but the item which generated most contributions and took up the majority of time was about The European Year of Skills. Every attendee around the table had prepared a contribution on this subject and I found there was such resonance with issues our own towns and cities are experiencing, I thought it would be of interest to our colleagues here in the UK.

As the discussion went round the table, we heard from every representative about problems that their authority faced in planning for the future. These were an ageing population, a lack of well qualified staff and skilled personnel to fill vacancies, while experiencing an incoming surfeit of unskilled migrants. An interesting example was given of an authority above the Arctic Circle in the North of Finland, which had recognised that it needed to bring in new people if its business and activities were to thrive.

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Lib Dem Cheltenham launches free leisure passes for food bank users

Health and wellbeing is top of our party’s agenda. All of our local campaigners have a strong message on NHS services.

While leading campaigns about treatment, we must also pursue innovative approaches to measures that prevent ill-health. Liberal Democrat-led Cheltenham Borough Council is partnering with the NHS and local food banks to do just that. It’s a part of our response to the cost-of-living crisis.

I’m a strong believer in the power of physical activity to transform people’s lives. It has made my own life immeasurably better, despite an unexpected arthritis diagnosis at age 29. Whether it’s regular walking, having a swim, lifting weights, doing water aerobics, or going to a HIIT class, physical activity is proven to help people improve their health and wellbeing. In fact, it can be a ‘miracle pill’ for mental and physical wellbeing, as argued in the recent book by Guardian journalist Peter Walker. Sadly, the cost of living crisis means that so many people across Cheltenham have had to make sacrifices. In a town that many characterise as wealthy and prosperous, we have more than 600 families registered with local food banks and more getting help in other ways. Often, it’s nice-to-have activities like leisure centre trips that are sacrificed when people can’t make ends meet. That can have a big knock-on impact, not just now, but for people’s long-term health. People who lead sedentary lifestyles are more likely to suffer ill-health in the short and long-term, storing up problems for our NHS.

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Lib Dems enjoy not feeling sad after election.

It’s just past 2am the 5th May and we’re already seeing some impressive results coming in for Lib Dems all over the country! In many places even where we aren’t winning we’re seeing good increases in vote shares even in the face of lower turnouts which really speaks to the hard work being done by activists all over the country. The BBC is reporting we’re up 2% in their key wards overall, 3% in high remain voting levels and 0.5% in high leave remaining areas with 189 of 792 counted

While a lot of counts aren’t happening until the morning we at LDV at far too excitable/masochistic/nerdy to wait that long so join us in celebrating some of our early wins!

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Liberal Democrat Councillor speaks out about stalking experience

Brent Councillor Anton Georgiou spoke to the Kilburn Times and the Local Democracy Reporting Service recently about his experience of being stalked and called for better support for victims of stalking and especially those in public life.

Councillor Georgiou spoke candidly about his experiences – from receiving threatening messages and constant phone calls to his stalker sending him feces, emails containing pictures of himself covered in ejaculate and death threats. He talked candidly about the impact the messages and calls had on him personally and professionally as well as on his family and how this only increased when his stalker told him he’d moved to London from Ireland and how Anton could “run into him at any time.” leaving him afraid to leave the house.

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Met police found to be institutionally racist, misogynistic and homophobic – Now what?

The Baroness Casey Review into the Met Police makes for very grim reading for all Londoners. The contents outline some horrific attitudes and behaviours towards minorities, women and LGBTQ+ people across the city it polices as well as within its own ranks. Baroness Casey has simply held a mirror up to this organisation and stated very clearly this has to change.

What makes reading the report even more depressing is that these same issues within the Met were identified back in 1999 in another independent review – the MacPherson report. This report only arose from years of campaigning by the Lawrence family seeking justice for their son Stephen. Stephen Lawrence was murdered in a racist attack in Eltham in 1993. The Macpherson report concluded the investigation into Stephen’s murder was “marred by a combination of professional incompetence, institutional racism and a failure of leadership”

I grew up in Lewisham in a ‘tough neighbourhood’ not far from Eltham within miles of the racist attitudes that prevailed at the time. My local pub, the Golden Lion, was the scene of the unsolved Daniel Morgan murder in 1987. Daniel’s family still wait for a justice that may never come and can only take some comfort the  Independent Panel enquiry they campaigned for established the Met was “institutionally corrupt” and  Britain’s biggest police force engaged in “the denial of the failings in investigation, including a failure to acknowledge professional incompetence, individual’s venal behaviour, and managerial and organisational failures”

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Your Parish and Town Councils need you!

ALDC are often reminding us that we should run candidates everywhere in local elections, and far be it for me to disagree. But it isn’t always easy – not everyone wants to be a councillor, and in years like 2023 with the prospect of a Conservative collapse in the Districts, there is a risk that even supposedly paper candidates may get elected.

But let me introduce you to a world where elections are usually uncontested, and where not every seat is filled.

The National Association of Local Councils has published its review of the 2022 elections at Town and Parish Council level and, whilst it was a relatively “off year” for the tier, with just 10% of local councils holding elections, just 11% of those elections were contested, representing 888 of the 8,068 council seats up for grabs. Worse still, 1,639 seats remained vacant after the elections, or 20% of the available places.

As liberals, that tends to offend, especially given our general view that citizens should be engaged and consulted by those who represent them. Indeed, the laws that determine how local councils are elected permit co-options within thirty days of an election where vacancies remain unfilled, a recipe for affirming undemocratic local cliques.

For many small Parish Councils, the lack of power is a contributory factor – how can you entice people to sit in meetings every two months where most of the issues are dealt with at higher tiers of local government? – but even towns with five figure populations and significant budgets struggle to find sufficient candidates.

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1 July 2022 – today’s press releases

  • VAT cut: Ministers need to stop dithering and act now
  • Suspending Chris Pincher should never have taken this long
  • Concern Over Cardiff Council Plans to Tackle Begging
  • Southwark Liberal Democrats Demand More Ambition in Plans to Tackle Air Pollution

VAT cut: Ministers need to stop dithering and act now

Responding to reports the government is considering cutting VAT, Liberal Democrat Treasury Spokesperson Christine Jardine said:

Families across the UK are facing a cost-of-living emergency. Ministers need to stop dithering and act now.

Liberal Democrats have been calling for an emergency VAT cut for months. It was a key part of our successful by-election campaign in Tiverton and Honiton. Families need it, businesses need it, and voters clearly support it. So why haven’t Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak done it already?

The sad truth is that we have a Government has no plan and a Prime Minister too busy fighting with his own party to help the British people.

Suspending Chris Pincher should never have taken this long

Responding to the news Chris Pincher has had the Conservative whip suspended, Liberal Democrat Chief Whip Wendy Chamberlain MP said:

It should never have taken Boris Johnson this long to act and withdraw the whip.

Once again it seems Johnson has had to be forced into doing the right thing

There can be no more cover ups or excuses. If this investigation confirms these serious allegations, Chris Pincher will surely have to resign.

The Liberal Democrat Voice team have recently started to receive more press releases from Council Groups around the country, perhaps a sign of greater confidence and ambition, and we’ll try to publish some of them going forward…

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East of England – let joy be somewhat unconfined…

Greetings from an election-free Gipping Valley, where it gives me great pleasure to report on events in the East of England. In truth, you can pretty much divide the region into two halves today. In Norfolk and Suffolk, only the county towns saw election action, and Bedfordshire sat this one out altogether. That left Cambridgeshire, Essex and Hertfordshire to fight, and the results have been pretty good.

We’ll start with Essex, which saw gains in Brentwood (2), Colchester (2), Rochford (2), Epping Forest and Southend-on-Sea, as half of the councils were up, which indicates that progress is being made. The Conservative/Independent coalition running Colchester is expected to be replaced with a Liberal Democrat/Labour coalition of partners, with the Liberal Democrats holding one more seat than Labour. Will Quince, no replacement for Bob Russell in truth, should be looking over his shoulder for next time, although the split opposition might be his salvation.

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“Democracy Made in England – Where next for English Local Government?”

In less frenetic times, this report would have grabbed headlines – but attention has already been cornered by outrageous events in Ukraine. Those distractions are, no doubt, mightily convenient for the current cabal who pretend to power in Whitehall.

The report should be required reading for all Liberal Democrat candidates for local Elections next May. There is only one name on the report’s cover – lead author, Michela Palese, Research and Policy Officer, Electoral Reform Society. At first glance you will see this is not the outpourings of some single tortured soul, but the collective views garnered from a cast of hundreds drawn from across the political spectrum.

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Liverpool loses World Heritage Status accolade

The loss of World Heritage Status for our City, even though it was expected, is a huge blow to our international prestige and will, without a doubt, affect our tourism and inward investment.

When, under Lib Dem control, we received the status in 2004 it helped our work, alongside winning the European Capital of Culture, in changing round the national and global and view of our City. Until these two things happened, we were just Beatles and Football globally and a poor man’s version of Coronation Street within the UK. People shunned our City for visiting, living and investment and the people of Wirral demanded a CH post code and not an L one!

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Helping us protect biodiversity with the help of a Lord or two

We really should make use of the peers who have local government experience in the Lords more, so I decide to.

We have a site in Kingston where biodiversity is being destroyed. Seething Wells Filter Beds is a ‘Site of Importance for Nature Conservation’ and Metropolitan Open Land where nature had flourished after Thames Water left in the late 90s, but now the private owners are spraying pesticides, draining the standing water, cutting back grasslands and trees. They have even resorted to using goats to munch though all the vegetation on site! And as a council we are pretty powerless to stop them!

Sound familiar?

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The most important elections you have never heard of

Today, Liberal Democrat Councillors in England and Wales will be getting an e-mail to vote in the elections for a number of positions on the Liberal Democrat Group on the Local Government Association (LGA). These include the Leader of the Liberal Democrat Group (also a Vice Chair of the LGA), Deputy Leader and a number of members of LGA Boards. A full list can be found here.

All of the positions receive an allowance, ranging from £36,769 for Group Leader to £2,919 for Board members.

The most interesting and important contests to my mind are those for Group Leader and Deputy Leader.

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Tales from a Small Parish – David vs Goliath…

Welcome back to Creeting St Peter, a small Parish in Suffolk’s Gipping Valley…

One of the more visible aspects of small parishes is the role of statutory consultee for any planning applications in, or affecting, the Parish. More often than not, councillors are asked to consider extensions, occasionally an outbuilding for a farm. They generally aren’t very controversial, and as planning controls have been relaxed in recent years, there are fewer of them it seems. And, as a councillor, you probably don’t need much in the way of technical skills to take a view on whether or not the Council should take a view.

There is training available if you’re lucky. In our case, the District Council offers the occasional half-day course, and the County Association of Local Councils also offers both support and seminars offering some basic awareness. But, for the most part, councillors in small parishes don’t take up the offer.

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How we championed a growing anti-discrimination campaign and made our council a more inclusive employer

In November’s Full Council, Hull City Council (HCC) unanimously passed a motion calling for a proactive, zero-tolerance anti-discrimination policy and backed a campaign for the law to be changed to make this mandatory for all organisations.

In the summer, the former president of Hull University Union founded a campaign called @MakeDiversityCount following her experience of racism in her role – and how the university was not equipped to deal with it. Her story and subsequent petition calling for all organisations to have a clear, robust and effective policy prompted me to investigate the situation at HCC, which she was pleased to support.

I did some research and discovered a number of potential failings at the council. Despite pockets of good practice, the evidence suggested many did not feel comfortable speaking up: lack of awareness of the reporting processes and the fear that they would not be taken seriously were among the suspected reasons for this. This simply wasn’t good enough.

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Why you should think of trying to become a Liberal Democrat Councillor

London Region have recently been running a series of Zoom calls for people who are thinking of running for their Council in the 2022 elections. I have taken part in a couple of these and it has made me think about what I enjoy being a Councillor and why I would recommend others think about doing so.

I have been a Councillor for the Dundonald Ward in Merton since May 2018 – the ward runs from Wimbledon to Raynes Park along the railway line and it is characterised by terraced houses occupied by middle class professional families many of whom are from the EU. It won’t be a surprise that it voted strongly for Remain.

It’s a great place to knock on doors and talk to people – particularly in the daytime (I am retired) when a surprising number of people even before the lockdown work from home and often have more time to chat. I have had fascinating conversations about PG Wodehouse, the merits of working for different French banks and the details of train operations on the District Line. People occasionally even want to talk about politics!

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Tales from a Small Parish: welcome to Dibley?…

For those of you who live in urban conurbations, your concept of a Parish Council is possibly associated with the TV series “The Vicar of Dibley”. Funny really, because the Vicar usually works with a Parochial Church Council, a very different animal indeed. But 30% of England’s population is covered by Parish Councils which, for the most part, operate under the radar of political activists…

I moved out of London more than a decade ago but hadn’t been here for very long before a vacancy arose on the Parish Council and, well, …

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My experiences of being a woman Councillor of colour

I am very proud to say that I was elected as a Liberal Democrat councillor in 2017 to serve the residents of Cyncoed and Lakeside at Cardiff County Council. Cardiff, capital city of Wales, is very cosmopolitan, a city that celebrates its diversity, but still fails to represent its population in the make-up of the council chamber and the workforce within the council.

I had stood in local elections before in a different area and did notice the ballot papers that came in with crosses next to my ward colleague names and not mine and still this time same occurred on some ballot papers, but luckily I secured just enough votes to become the third and last candidate to be elected. When you see such ballots, many questions and answers come to your mind, why did they not vote me? They don’t know me personally so is it my name, the origin of the name, my faith or the colour of my skin that they considered more than anything I had to offer?

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Over 100 East Midlands Councillors sign letter calling for halt to Unitary Council plans

Over 100 Liberal Democrat councillors from across the East Midlands have signed a letter to the Secretary of State for Local Government, Robert Jenrick MP, calling for a halt to controversial Government plans to abolish Borough and District Councils across the region and replace them with larger Unitary authorities.

The letter, signed by 118 Councillors, was jointly authored by Lib Dem Hinckley and Bosworth Borough and Leicestershire County Councillor Michael Mullaney and Leader of Chesterfield Lib Dem Councillors Paul Holmes.

Michael Mullaney said;

Abolishing Borough and District Councils and creating huge unitary authorities would be disruptive at anytime. But to be considering this

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A letter from Caroline Pidgeon AM to the Mayor of London

Dear Sadiq,

Re: Concerns for London’s Charity Shops

As we know, many businesses and organisations are facing unprecedented challenges in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. I wanted to write to you about some specific concerns I have for charity shops, a staple of our high streets in London.

Charity shops provide essential revenue for charities in London and across the UK. They are important for all charities, but particularly important for those smaller charities who rely heavily on the income from their charity shops. Furthermore, charity chops provide an affordable place for many people to shop in London and are a lifeline for many in terms of purchasing goods they would otherwise be unable to afford.

An often-underrated benefit of charity shops is also that they are a greener and more environmentally sustainable way to shop – promoting the reuse of items, whilst providing a profit for good causes.

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  • Tristan Ward
    “Let’s start by arguing that the economic benefits of the Single Market far exceed having to accept freedom of movement into the UK, and take it from there....
  • Chloe
    'Needless to say the poorest in British society paid the price for this' I remember canvassing , the poorer the area the less interested they were. Membership ...
  • GWYN WILLIAMS
    A balanced and fair assessment of the Senedd campaign. Unlike in Scotland, Wales has not as yet polarised into for and against Independence camps. The Welsh Lib...
  • Jana
    The logic of this article is that we should be rejoining the Single Market. That is different from signing up to complete political Union by joining the EU. ...
  • Pawel Urbanski
    Good piece, Tom. I would just split it into two things 1/ The principle: someone living off their assets should not pay less tax than someone living off a wage...