Liberal Democrat councillor Zoe Franklin is clearly a talented, caring and committed local servant. Her blog tells us that she’s someone who cares deeply about child poverty, the cost of childcare, and she likes to keep residents informed about what’s happening. It’s a great shame, then, that she’s standing down as councillor for the Stoke ward in Guildford.
She’s written on the Guildford Dragon about why she’s made the decision not to run again for election. The toll the job takes both personally and financially just got too much. Her story of how she became involved sounds very familiar:
I only agreed to becoming a councillor reluctantly. Originally I had said no but gradually, persuaded that it would enable me to serve my local community, “to make a difference”, I agreed.
I had been assured that being a councillor only takes up as much time as you allow it to but I quickly learnt that while that statement is technically true – for me it wasn’t.
Becoming a councillor opens your eyes to a whole raft of issues that you never even realised were there and once the job gets under your skin your desire to serve your community means you will find yourself allowing more and more time for council work – not because you have to, certainly not because you’re paid to but because you want to.
But there is a price to be paid:
With a sport-mad seven-year-old, and a four-year-old who’d really rather be doing something completely different to his brother, there are new demands on my time as both my husband and I support them in their endeavours.
My eldest son has daily reading and homework too which we struggle to get done once we’ve picked up daddy from the station, then I’m out the door to one meeting or another, two or three nights a week.
There’s also the simple fact that being out that many nights a week, plus weekend events, has presented challenges for my marriage. The evenings and weekends are on top of the daytime hours I put in.
And not just in terms of time:
In order to carry out my role properly I easily clock up 10-15 hours per week on casework, council meetings, events and meetings in my ward, reading and email. That’s the equivalent of a part time job – but for the privilege I get an allowance of about £4,700.
In recent years I have been a chairman of a scrutiny committee. This has given me an additional allowance of £2,500 but with it has come additional work. For me there has never been the option of working a properly paid part time job, if I did I would have to cut back significantly on council work and I wasn’t prepared to do that.
Over the past seven years the cost of living has gone up but my husband’s wage has not kept up. My allowance is not able to fill the gap, so I just have to go back out to work to help make ends meet.
It’s worth noting that if Zoe were the only earner in the household, then being a councillor may not have been obtainable for her at all.
If we want a diverse range of people making decisions about the services we use – and that would ideally include people who actually use all the services – then we need to make sure that it’s practical and affordable for a diverse range of people to stand and survive as councillors.
I was shocked to see that the councillors’ allowance was so low. In Scotland, councillors receive a salary which is currently £16,560. For all people complain about politicians, people who have a good, dedicated local councillor will know how the whole community benefits from that.
What do you think and how do you think that we should best support local councillors in terms of both remuneration and workload?
* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
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25 Comments
I’ve always felt councillors should be paid more – you have to do the campaigning as well as the work – but don’t they also get a pension? So we shouldn’t forget about that.
I don’t think there is enough good people entering or staying in politics and I think it is because the package isn’t attractive enough.
Look at the result as well. The next parliament is going to be chaos and it can’t just be blamed on the bankers.
They don’t necessarily get a pension, though I believe it is possible if the council agrees it. And they might well have arranged their working lives to accommodate their political ones and not have the lifetime earnings, and thus that pension either, when the time comes.
The remuneration is better than it was when I started, but that’s not saying much.
Hi
In scotland members allowances are set nationally as they are in London for all 32 boroughs
Across England each council has an independent panel that recommends allowances to the council. These recommendations are subject to council approval. The Guildford BC allowance is average for a district ( second tier council) in the southeast. Councillors are often reluctant to approve increases in allowances due to council cuts, media response and the views of the public. Also many councillors in more affluent areas are not dependent on the allowance as an income. The allowance and hours puts off people who work or have families and leads to a profile where the average age of councillors is over 60 and often retired
For info I chair a number of these Panels
Sorry I should have added councillors since 2014 are no longer entitled to join the LG pension scheme and all accrued benefits are frozen for councillors who had previously joined the scheme
Councillors are the unsung heroes of democracy.
MPs and Lords and the other big cheeses in all political parties get adulation and preferment. They often benefit financially after they have ceased their elected role with appointments, sinecures, writing contracts and media fees.
Councillors by and large just “get by”.
One of the finest councillors I have ever known has just stepped down in our Borough after decades of work for her local community. She was regularly re-elected with large majorities by the voting public in her ward, who knew they were on to a good thing. She was a credit to the Liberal Democrats and we were very lucky to have her as one of ours. She will not receive the attention or praise that she deserves. She could have spent all those hours over all those years making a small (or probably a large) fortune but she chose to work in her community to the benefit of all.
It would be nice to think that the top of the party understand the sacrifices that councillors make.
It would be nice, but… .. .
My sympathy goes to Zoe and all councillors in her position. Surely it is time for a minimum salary/allowance to be set nationally. It could then be adjusted locally to take account of local circumstances. Setting a level of remuneration for local councillors is often a difficult thing to do. Something indeed which many of us shy away from!
Democracy isn’t a cheap option and if we are serious about encouraging more women and candidates from other under represented groups to take part, we have to acknowledge the financial and time burdens that councillor roles put upon those elected. If we don’t, we will have only those who can afford to stand, are retired, or are supported by third parties such as trade unions standing for election. Is that really how we want our democracy to develop?
Zoe, like every Lib Dem councillor has my greatest respect. The work she has done for her community is immense and worthy of praise. Councillors can no longer get pensions, Eric Pickles took that away last year and most people don’t realise how much you have to do or how little allowance you get.
One thing this doesn’t mention is the time needed to get yourself elected every four years on top of all the rest. In a seriously contested ward like Zoe’s this probably triples your workload for a period of three to four months every four years. That is a breaker for many, and especially now as you can’t rely on a nice warm feeling about Liberal Democrats nationally to give you a helping hand anymore. The demands on Lib Dem councillors are immense and the damage done to our councillor base over the last five years has been catastrophic. Those who put themselves forward to support the party, its values and their local community by standing as councillors deserve our total respect. Sadly some senior figures just take them for granted.
I don’t think Labour or Conservative councillors do the huge extra amounts of work that our councillors do. Our councillors do this work to differentiate themselves from Labour and Conservative councillors as an election USP. However it increases the risk of financial and mental burn out.
I big thank you to Zoe for all the sacrifice’s she has already made.
I don’t think anything will compensate for missing so much time with young children and partner. How many people end their days saying “I wish I’d spent more time stuck in meetings” I have known many relationships crack under the strain of council and party commitments, which inevitably given the lack of safe seats and endless leafleting are worse for Lib Dem Councillors.
The Council allowance scheme should cover child care costs, and caring for other dependents for those who for example have elderly parents.
The issue of allowance is tricky. To some people they are a lovely bonus on top of their multiple pensions, to others they don’t cover the loss of income to their day job. I personally believe that there should be clear national guidance on the level of allowances and how they should be calculated.
The way allowances are treated as income for benefit purposes is a scandal and something the Lib Dems could have sorted but typically those at the top don’t seem to have a clue or a plan. There are a whole range of issue which ought to be tackled to renew local democracy but despite all the talk of localism, precious little has improved and much has been made worse.
Councillors did previously get a pension (in England at least) however councillors are no longer allowed to join local government pension schemes (as of last year). Whilst annoying, it’s not the end of the world for me as my main job is pensionable but for people whose only income is from the council and can’t get another job as a result of their council work it’s been an appalling decision. The general public probably believe councillors are overpayed already so it’s an easy thing for government to do, but in reality costs very little in the grand scheme of things.
“The general public probably believe councillors are overpayed already” I have met members of the public who think Councillors are paid the same as MPs and others who think they should be paid nothing, mostly though they are open to reasoned compensation. A national guidance on allowances would help. There are many safe councils where controlling groups vote themselves large increases – Surry and Wiltshire spring to mind and others where the Tories in particular keep allowances low to prevent the opposition being effective by excluding those on lower incomes or in work.
Loads of people still think Councillors should not get any recompense and look totally surprised when the hours and responsibilities are outlined. Lot of education still required..
The comparison between Scottish and Guildford Councillors isn’t quite accurate though as the services run by scottish Cllrs are much more wide ranging than those of a second tier English district which doesn’t handle (for example) education and social services.
It now seems that in many parts of the country serving as a councillor has in effect become a full-time job, whereas thirty years ago most councillors would have combined their council activities with a full-time occupation, though admittedly with day-time, rather than evening, council meetings, county councillors were often either retired or stay-at-home married women with working husbands. I know that in a large metropolitan area such as Liverpool this was much more difficult as councillors often were perceived as in effect general social workers, but in shire districts it was perfectly possible to combined a full-time occupation with even Chairing a council committee. The irony is that the discretionary powers of councils then were far greater than today, particularly in the area of finance. We also know that the country is in general far more prosperous than it was thirty years ago. The question I therefore have to ask is whether councillors have in effect usurped what should in fact be the role of council officers and employees, and that the distinction which ought to exist between operational activity and strategic oversight has been lost. The public rightly complain that too few MPs have any experience of working outside politics, and this undermines the quality of their decision making, but if being a councillor is to become a full-time paid job, often acting as a quasi-social worker, is this really ultimately serving the best interests of local democracy?
This is sounding like an argument for setting the level of allowances nationally, to free local councils from adverse publicity associated with voting through increases. It seems essential that there not be financial bars to people becoming councillors. It also mucks up the relationship of councillors and paid staff if councillors are making major financial sacrifices and the she senior staff are (in effect) much better paid.
Mark Argent 23rd Apr ’15 – 7:28am
“…. It also mucks up the relationship of councillors and paid staff if councillors are making major financial sacrifices and the she senior staff are (in effect) much better paid.”
This is an extremely good point.
It is years since I stepped down as leader of a London Borough council (with a population, budget and powers as many and varied as most of Scotland’s local councils, Hywel).
I never received allowances in total in a year above £6,000 before tax and national insurance was deducted, there was no pension entitlement. As I did not inherit wealth, win the Lottery or marry a rich Amercian heiress, a full-time daytime job was essential to meet even my family’s very modest expenditure. Even by 1997 prices £6,000 a year was only about enough to pay a fraction of the mortgage on a small semi-detached house in this area.
So I sometimes have to rub my eyes when I read of the salaries of senior council officers.
The differential between the top officers’ salaries and councillors allowances is staggering.
Some of the chief officers act as a sort of ersatz councillor. They have the power, the status and they have magnificent offices, a taxi born life-style and generous expenses to cover trips and meals in addition to these mega salaries.
They do no more than the people in the same jobs thirty years ago – in fact nowadays running a social services department for example ought to be a lot easier now that so much has been cut and or privatised.
So why are they getting salaries which are so much greater than they used to be?
In areas with elected mayors it is even worse, with the role of councillor diminished to that of a member of the former community health councils — ie you have no power and very little influence.
All this whilst the salaried officers of the council stride the world with their six figures salaries, lavish expenses and luxury lives.
Compare this to the hard pressed councillor’s life-style.
Then remember that the chief officers are supposed to work for the councillors, to respect them and to understand them.
No good for accountability, financial prudence or democracy.
Zoe will be a real loss to Stoke ward.
During my telephone canvassing for the Guildford team her name comes up regularly and even voters who are not definitely supporting the Lib Dems recognise the hard work she does in the area.
I have managed to persuade a couple to vote for her successors purely on the record of a dedicated Lib Dem councillor.
There should be national rates, linked to attendance and case / committee work time, that adequately compensate those who carry out this vital work. Without this good people of all parties will be less likely to be able to put themselves forwards for election. It appears she has done a great job and will be missed.
As an aside my Grandmother was born and lived her entire life in Stoke / Bellfields, my Mother lived there until marriage and even myself and my brother were born there in the maternity hospital which then became a cancer screening centre. The services took me to the other end of the Country where I stayed but it’s sad to see someone who clearly cares about an area I have an attachment to having to give up…
Graham Evans
if being a councillor is to become a full-time paid job, often acting as a quasi-social worker, is this really ultimately serving the best interests of local democracy?
When the council where I was a councillor switched to the mayor system, that was really all the job of a councillor was, a sort of badly paid quasi-social worker. The flow of information that used to come from the committee system was cut off, so I could no longer do an effective scrutiny job. It was really embarrassing to find that with so many of the things my constituents were asking about, they assumed as a councillor I would know what was happening, but I didn’t.
When I was first elected it was sort of do-able alongside my full time job as a university lecturer. Back then if you weren’t career minded it was a fairly relaxed and secure job. However, putting my energy into being a councillor rather than doing the research work that pushes you up the academic career ladder really damaged my long term career. I estimate that the small amount of money I got in allowances is more than wiped out by the loss of income due to losing promotion chances. However, the increasing pressure to meet research targets and threat of being sacked if you aren’t doing it means I had to give it up.
I suspect similar applies in many other occupations. How can people be engaged in voluntary work and be involved in “Big Society” when the culture of targets and job insecurity which we are told is essential in today’s society means none of us can be a little relaxed and coast along in our day jobs? We now have to work until we are exhausted, no time for anything else.
Me
means I had to give it up.
I mean being a councillor, not being a lecturer.
I am so sorry Zoe is standing down. She will be missed and I hope Guildford treats her well. Her constituents are likely to contact her still when things are truly difficult. I still have calls for Martyn who died in 2007 and I sort out a handful of messed up hospital discharges every year, because they know I will suggest some sensible links to make.
I am in two minds about how the level of basic allowance is set. Panels listened to my arguments early on about the need for some correlation between payment and workload. The Council I served on had more trouble getting their head round it ( as did the then CE). Some Councils were prepared to do a slightly fiddly calculation.
I watched idiot Labour Cllrs being made Chairmen just for the cash and remember a really good Labour Cllr giving up because he needed to earn real money for his family.
We need to improve financial and non cash support. Maybe we ought to look, too at the extent to which hours and Council cycles are set to suit Cheif Officers.
Even in Scotland, the amount isn’t considered to be a full time wage. I tried to balance it with a full-time career and family, but just couldn’t make it work and stood down after only one term. Having to do this effectively means that you’re not able to take on any additional responsibilities; meetings and site visits tend to happen during the day, so more time off work is needed; and evenings are taken up with meetings in the ward.
Personally, I think it’s about time we bit the bullet and had full-time, salaried Councillors at around about the £25,000 mark with additional responsibility points after that. Had the salary in Scotland been about this level, it would have been possible for me to do it full time (just). It would allow a much more balanced demographic of councillor, not just in sex and race but also in age (the majority of Councillors in Scotland are still over 60, and many have very little understanding or interest in the needs of young people and families.)
Councillors do need to paid a fair sum. The public do not understand what we have to do. We are always at the end of the phone. It was very hard at times to switch off and have a social live as well. It must be very hard if you are a cabinet member as well.
Some members of the public were very surprized when my wife answered the phone and that they were phoning my home and not my office. As well as payment, I think that we need more support when trying to do case work, it was very hard at times when dealing with certain officers. All said I do miss in a perverse way my time on Southampton City Council.
the starting point has to be a job description, on the basis of that it can then be decided what the rate of pay should be. to save the angst it could be set at a particular point on the Hay scale, or some other comparator, say teachers or police pay. Clearly we cannot set allowances nationally as the job varies from one authority to another . but until the impasse is broken the Party should stop extorting levy money from underpaid councillors.
I agree there probably should be a national rate. What seems to have been overlooked in the discussion hereis that there is a clear difference in the level of allowance paid for Unitaries (and Counties, with their heavy service commitment eg Education, Children’s Services etc,) and the Districts, such as Zoe has been on, which is generally thought to be much lighter in load, with generally smaller wards etc. So that has to be taken into account.