Posts Tagged ‘Worthing’
Adur results 2008
Posted by: Gav in Gavin Ayling's blog on May 2nd, 2008
The bottom line is that the Conservatives retained all their seats and with the postal votes counted it’s a reasonable turn-out and satisfying majorities in every ward.
Congratulations to the successful candidates and thanks to the electorate for not subjecting us to nuisance politics.
The numbers in Worthing are similarly reassuring with the Conservatives picking up one seat and the Lib Dems retaining their tally.
School closures tomorrow
Posted by: Gav in Gavin Ayling's blog on April 23rd, 2008
The National Union of Teachers strike tomorrow will affect some West Sussex schools including some in Adur. Check out the list on the West Sussex County Council’s website: List of schools affected
A varied week
Posted by: Gav in Gavin Ayling's blog on January 24th, 2008
What a wonderfully varied week this past one has been when it comes to local politics.
On Monday I attended a party committee which concerns itself with the organisation at a very local level of the party machine. The people who do all the work to support the three of us at that meeting who are elected by the general public (two District Councillors – Debbie Kennard and myself – and the County Councillor – Clive Williams).
Tuesday was a Council committee meeting of the Housing and Central Services committee. And an entirely frustrating rubber-stamping exercise it was. All of the decisions we had to make were no-brainers: Increase Council home rents because the government’s slapping us with a negative subsidy or (you’ll love this) burn our reserves and increase them by even more next year? I think you’ll agree there’s no choice.
And the same was true of all the other agenda items – we had a choice but it was a non-choice.
But the variance came into play tonight with two of Adur District’s and Worthing Borough’s joint committees meeting one after the other. At these meetings we discussed the budget for the shared services (the refuse and recycling collection service and the joint management structure) as well as a report on coastal erosion.
The first item was great news. The Councils have saved, already, £67,000 through being able to buy fewer vehicles because of shared efficiency and we effectively did not have to pay for the new bins because of savings due to economies of scale in the procurement process as well. We have also saved £32,000 in the nine months to the end of the financial year that the service has been running just because of the increased quantities of recycling that are now being collected!
But I cannot be all positive. There was something much more important that came out of this evening’s meetings. The first meeting was of the Joint Overview and Scrutiny Committee and the Worthing Liberal Democrat members did not have a single negative comment to make about the services or the savings. They did, momentarily, suggest that Worthing’s Council tax payers are being subsidised by Adur (which isn’t true), but they could not see anything wrong with the savings etc. being made.
It didn’t stop them making a fuss though. And when it came to voting on the recommendation before them, they decided to abstain even though they did not disagree with the recommendation and, as I say, could not find anything negative to say at all.
As a result of this experience I want to make a plea to the residents of Adur and Worthing who may be reading this: Please don’t vote Lib Dem in May – if they win seats the members elected will just be a nuisance and if they win one of the Councils they won’t do a better job because they cannot see anything being done that they would do differently!
Vote Conservative at the local elections in May 2008 and ensure that your Councils continue to run smoothly and efficiently despite the government’s obsession with attempting to run the country’s Councils remotely.
Benn to challenge Tim
Posted by: Gav in Gavin Ayling's blog on September 25th, 2007
I don’t doubt Tim’s seat is safe: he’s been a brilliant MP to almost everyone who has contacted them and, when he disagrees, he tells you so and why.
But it is interesting that Emily Benn will stand against him at the next election (BBC).
Emily’s blog and Tim’s website
Maybe I’m age prejudiced, but I now know what I didn’t know at seventeen and, frankly, I wouldn’t want seventeen-year-old me to represent anyone. Won’t Emily feel the same in eleven years?
And won’t she be too young if we have a snap-election? Is Emily to dictate Mr Brown’s decision!?
Worthing Consultation
Posted by: Gav in Gavin Ayling's blog on September 17th, 2007
Tonight there was a consultation held at the Shoreham Centre. I have loads to write, and there are people to mock, but it’ll have to wait. I left the house at 7.25am this morning, returned just now and I haven’t yet had dinner. Oh, and I’ll be leaving tomorrow at around 7.45am with a Council meeting in Worthing straight after work, so that will be nice.
Still sign the KWASH petition if you haven’t already.
Tories on Hospitals
Posted by: Gav in Gavin Ayling's blog on August 20th, 2007
The local campaigns to save major hospitals have been going for quite a while now. KWASH, for example, which aims to save Worthing and Southlands Hospitals — and particularly Worthing’s A&E, Intensive Care and Maternity functions — has been running for over a year.
So some may ask why it has taken until now for David Cameron to call for the protection of these massive NHS assets: BBC News.
But I think he’s right.
If he’d mentioned it when the campaigns started the media and the public would be bored and cynical. By mentioning it now, when the decisions are nigh, he’s able to gain nationwide support, raise the profile of the pillaging Mr Brown’s government is undertaking, and actually run a risk of getting the great apathetic public to be motivated for once!
…
And how can I let this go without pointing out that this isn’t happening in Scotland or Wales. Oh no! This is happening in England where a significantly smaller amount of tax is spent per person. Upset by that? Join the CEP.
Worthing and Southlands Hospitals
Posted by: Gav in Gavin Ayling's blog on July 27th, 2007
The PCT proposes that Worthing or Chichester’s hospital loses its Accident and Emergency and related facilities. It also proposes that Haywards Heath’s hospital be closed.
Our MP, rightly, asked the Parliamentary Undersecretary for Health Services whether she thought this was fair. Tim said:
Last week, the Worthing Herald reported that Worthing’s accident and emergency department had 1,258 admissions. That equates to 65,500 people visiting every year. Under reconfiguration proposals—not scare stories—the PCT proposes to close that accident and emergency department, and it expects people to join the car park that is the A27 and go to either Chichester or Brighton. How many of those people does the Minister believe are timewasters who do not actually need an accident and emergency department in the hospital of the largest town in Sussex?
They say ‘honourable’ but they cannot mean this response from Ann Keen (Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Health Services), Department of Health):
The hon. Gentleman raises an important issue on accident and emergency services, but how could I possibly know who was attending the accident and emergency department without looking at the figures? I would expect the local management and the local PCT to do that, and I would expect the local MP to conduct a responsible consultation to ensure that patient care is delivered appropriately in accident and emergency department. That is why reconfiguration of the health service can be good for patients, as I am sure he would agree.
That was taken from They Work For You.
Support KWASH
Oh, and why on God’s green Earth would you vote Labour and live near here?
The State of English Politics
Posted by: Gav in Gavin Ayling's blog on July 17th, 2007
Adur District Council and Worthing Borough Council are embarking on a pioneering method of governance which will involve our two Councils sharing one Officer Management structure and sharing the provision of services between the two.
The process was initiated when Worthing’s Council was run by the LibDems and is continuing now that the people of Worthing have seen fit to give the Tories a go. So it should be plain-sailing. We should be finding it easy — two Conservative Councils working together. And it is and we are.
But it’s new to me — in Adur we have one LibDem and two Independents. The LibDem has never spoken at Full Council and the Independents are reasonable people who vote according to their beliefs; normally with the ruling Conservative administration. What’s new for me is having an opposition.
Tonight’s meeting was the first Joint Committee of the two Councils that wasn’t the cabinet of Worthing and the Policy Committee of Adur (SEMS). And because of political balances requirements, it was the first committee I’ve had which had an opposition present and able to vote. Tonight’s meeting was on the Redundancy Policy.
The reason I am telling you all this, other than for general interest, is to point out a couple of odd things:
- This isn’t political point-scoring, but the LibDems really didn’t seem to understand the Officers’ report
- Worse, when it was obvious they’d missed the point of it, they didn’t ask for clarification from the presenting Officer
- Worse still, when it came to voting on the Recommendations, the LibDems voted against or abstained despite having, apparently, no objections to the subject matter and having mooted no alternatives during debate
One has to wonder why they bothered? Their number are too few to change the result without winning the argument, but they didn’t bother to tell the Conservatives what their apparently better idea was. I suspect, though this is me being cynical, they just want to be able to say they were against it if the merger of services goes belly up and redundancy payments are more expensive than we expect, but in whose interest is that?
This and another incident recently at Adur make me ask, out loud now: Do people really know what they are voting for?
I am more worried now than I was last year that I was elected unopposed. It shows a complete apathy on the part of every person in Buckingham Ward who does not normally vote Conservative. But there are other cases where I am sure Councillors would not be returned if their record was scrutinised or if a single member of the public attended a Full Council or Committee meeting.
My concerns over the ademocratic nature of devolution (which has deliberately excluded England),the EU and other issues are going to fall on deaf ears all the time people are voting, year in, year out, for Councillors who don’t work for the people or who are not up to the job. The position of Councillor is similar to the management board of a reasonably large company — we have the Directors reporting to us and we make the important strategic decisions as well as setting policies for the Directors and their reports to act upon. And yet the people who are most affected by Councillors actions are apathetic. They allow sub-standard democracy.
So this is a call to the people: pay attention and watch your Councillors, MP, MEPs and AM (Wales/Northern Ireland) or MSP (Scotland) — it is very, very important.
I may have mentioned this after last Thursday’s meeting but I think it’s worth mentioning as this post is turning into a rant: A member of the public asked what the Council was doing about the proposed closure of two of West Sussex’s three Accident and Emergency facilities. The question was asked in an accusatory way as if all the work on KWASH was being done by someone else. The question was asked as if by being Councillors we weren’t already doing our civic duty to some extent and as if, maybe, it would be helpful if the people did a little more themselves.
That’s unfair: amazing numbers turned out to encircle the two Hospitals with protestors, but it was Councillors and our, apparently tireless MP, who were doing the work there too. It’s such an important issue but I have not been contacted by a single constituent about it — not one.
Pointless Council Meetings
Posted by: Gav in Gavin Ayling's blog on July 13th, 2007
Today’s Council meeting was little more than a waste of two hours.
Most of the time was spent with questions being asked by the apparently-obstructive members of the Liberal Democrats from Worthing who did not appear to have anyone’s interests at heart — just a desire to make the cabinet members work harder.
And our own Council had a thorn in its side with irrelevant questions being asked by one of our number (who shall remain nameless) who claimed to have read the report but continued to ask questions which were clearly answered in the report.
And how many members of the public were there? Two. But frankly I am glad of that because it was an entirely embarassing show because, actually, no-one had a concrete problem with the proposal to start the process of merging services provided by Adur and Worthing Councils, but they all felt they ought to have a debate.
Yawn.
Simultaneous Executive Meeting
Posted by: Gav in Gavin Ayling's blog on July 10th, 2007
There is a very important Council meeting of Worthing’s Cabinet and Adur’s Policy and Strategy Committee on Thursday. I implore anyone interested in local government to attend that meeting. Just turn up at the Adur Civic Centre at 6.50pm and walk to the left of the digital information sign.
We are discussing (and ultimately deciding) whether to recommend to Full Council to start the process of merging services provided by Worthing Borough Council and Adur District Council.
