It is ironic that with the recent removal of the Conservative Council Leader and appointment of his Labour successor the vote was effectively swung by the votes of the “Independent” councillors representing Thorpe and the Liberal Democrats recently elected to represent West Leigh and Eastwood.
I would question whether the residents of these wards would approve of their elected representatives supporting a left wing Labour administration - certainly the support for Labour candidates in these wards would not suggest that this was their wish.
The reality is that the election results were not a vote against the Conservative run council. As all who knocked on doors in the campaign know the vote was driven by Brexit and frustration at the inability of Westminster to resolve matters. This led to some councillors being elected on this national issue rather than local concerns.
Following his election Conservative Tony Cox issued a clear and sensible 10 point plan for immediate implementation including: extra Community Special Constables, the reintroduction of the 1 hour town centre parking band, the removal of parking charges in the roads around the High Street for a 2 hour visit, the removal of unnecessary yellow lines to increase parking provision, the improvement of parking provision in the vicinity of the seafront, access for all the Town’s children to good or outstanding schools, the introduction of measures to enhance the ability of backbench councillors to put forward policy, action to improve enforcement on dog fouling and an investigation into reducing carbon emissions from the council vehicle fleet.
These ideas were popular and deliverable.
On his election Cllr Ian Gilbert has announced his priorities which include (according to the Echo) more social housing, the introduction of registration of private landlords, improved street lighting, more 20mph schemes, a parking review and the provision of further multi storey car parks, improving recycling, promoting ethical employment practices and more apprenticeships, improving children centres, providing extra care beds and health centres, and supporting the retention of Southend Hospital.
Much of this is not particularly controversial however the problem is that they are either simply restating policies which already exist (e.g apprenticeships, Southend Hospital and recycling), are potentially controversial and will take years to deliver (e.g landlord registration, parking reviews, multi storey carparks and 20 mph schemes), are extremely expensive (e.g social housing, children’s centres and health centres) with no indication on how they will be funded, or are in the control of others (e.g employment practices and Southend Hospital)
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With apologies to the late Harold Macmillan for slightly misquoting him this new Administration can best be described as being driven by a mixture of deliverable and original ideas – the problem is that none of the deliverable ideas are original and none of the original ideas are deliverable.
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