Posts from — February 2010

The news from the Walled Garden this week just didn’t seem possible four years ago…

I’ve written before about the amazing efforts of a volunteer group of locals who set out determined to restore an historic and very lovely Walled Garden at Elford to its former glory of over 200 years ago.

At that time a grand Hall stood over the gardens area but the whole estate was bequeathed to the care of the City of Birmingham many years ago and fell into disrepair. The Hall was pulled down 50 years ago and the Walled Gardens have deteriorated badly ever since.

But five years ago a handful of local people from Elford Village decided enough was enough and something needed to be done. That ’something’ was a plan to restore the Walled Garden and remaining Gardener’s Cottage.

And after a bit of help from me along the way in dealing with Birmingham City Council, and a rollercoaster ride, the group are now proud holders of a long peppercorn rent lease for the Gardens and a big fat cheque after a successful Heritage Lottery application.

So an amazing boost to the enormous and stunning work the volunteers have been doing to the Gardens and Cottage over the last year or so. Birmingham are fully on board, the Elford Walled Garden is fast returning to its former glory and the £250k funding will mean a significant speeding up towards something very special indeed. 

A wonderful example of a determined community (and lots of them now) pulling together against the odds and my heartiest congratulations to all concerned.

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I’ve said many times before that one of the things I most enjoy is promoting the importance of democracy.

And each year the County aims that at young people by organising a growing number of events for schools, mainly primary, to give the kids an idea of why it’s important and what it means in reality.

Local Democracy Week from Staffs CC on Vimeo.

I didn’t do quite as many of those events last year as I normally do because of time constraints and one of the schools in my patch that we couldn’t fit in then were so keen they were happy to do it recently instead. Just on that, I think what the County are doing on this is great but in my view it should be more than just a couple of weeks a year. I’m encouraging that and I know they are looking at some sort of expansion to the programme.

Anyway, 30 youngsters from Manor Primary in Drayton Bassett between Lichfield and Tamworth came up to County Buildings a couple of weeks ago and what a fabulous bunch of youngsters they were… a credit to their school and parents.

We did a question and answer session to kick things off and then the kids split into four teams to represent political parties. They each set budgets for a variety of services and soon learned that there’s limited money and lots that needs doing.

After each team set their budget by prioritising which services were most important and therefore should get more money it was debated by all the ‘parties’. The debates were of excellent quality and it’s clear there were some budding public speakers in the making… and I mean that.

In the end every individual had a personal secret vote to decide which of the teams’ budget made most sense and which team had put up the best argument to vote for them. An excellent couple of hours and the teachers and parents who viewed appeared genuinely surprised saying that some youngsters who were normally pretty quiet really came into their own.

The final show of hands which was to find out how many children understood better how democracy and politics work in our country was unanimous.

Several dozen schools took part last year and I’m hoping the short clip of the recent event with Manor Primary will encourage even more Staffordshire to take part this year.

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What right to impose this when they’ve NOT been elected and have limited public accountability?

As someone who takes our democracy and the electoral accountability which goes with it very seriously I’m furious that Staffordshire Police Authority, which is not electorally accountable, have set a local tax increase only fractionally under the government’s legal maximum. If it wasn’t for that legal limit I’m sure it would have been even higher.

At the County, we’ve sweated blood to keep the council tax rise under inflation and the lowest increase in Staffordshire since 1993. Just 1.9% despite the problems we inherited from the previous Administration.

At the Police Authority, unelected magistrates and unelected ’appointees’ can impose local tax on the public in Staffordshire and there’s nothing that we, even with our winning electoral mandate, can do about it.

Setting tax without public accountability is unacceptable in 2010.

The first thing to be clear about is that the Police Authority IS NOT the police. They are different and seperate.

Police are operational and get on with the job of policing and the Police Authority sets local priorities and the budget and precept (the police bit of the council tax bill). The Police Authority is a bit like a normal council except that there’s no democratic public election. It’s a bit of a Club and most have been on it for years and years.

The only sign of any democracy are a few Staffordshire County Councillors and Stoke City Councillors who sit alongside the appointees/magistrates. But they include County Councillors from the old Labour Administration which was swept from power in June.

The fact is that because of a complicated formula which includes Stoke, decided nationally many years ago, the electoral mandate achieved after June’s Conservative landslide in Staffordshire means nothing as far as the Police Authority is concerned. It’s even more extraordinary because even Stoke is now Conservative led and that makes no difference either.

So, I’m bemused when I look at the electoral map how the tax setting and leadership of Staffordshire Police Authority is in the hands of unelected individuals and the few remaining Labour politicians.

The result of all this is that despite elected Conservatives opposing the recent tax rise at the Police Authority it was voted through by unelected appointees, the magistrates and opposition Labour politicians.

Oh, and by the way, they stuffed a cool couple of million pounds back into their coffers instead of using it to keep the local tax down.

Take a look at the electoral map and tell me please how Labour County Councillors hold the balance of power with unelected people. Democracy in Action… I don’t think so!

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I normally enjoy opposition ‘Questions’ in the County Chamber but I enjoy some more than others!…

There are just 3 Labour County Councillors left in Staffordshire since June’s election.

It must be tough for them to get used to being a minority (very) party after nearly 30 years of uninterrupted control in Staffordshire. The atmosphere in County Buildings has changed dramatically in the last few months since Labour lost almost 90% of their Seats but it’s pretty clear that all four opposition parties are at sixes and sevens.

As someone who is passionate about democracy that really does sadden me because I believe tough challenge and alternative views make for better decision making… that challenge really isn’t happening.

But a recent County Question by Peter Beresford (Burton upon Trent), one of Labour’s stalwarts during their previous ‘reign’ who’s still there, was very odd indeed and rather confirms my earlier comments. It basically asked me how I was coping with the difficult financial position that the previous Labour Administration had left in my Social Care and Health Department. 

The process works with written questions being submitted by Members a few days before debates which are then answered verbally in the Chamber by the Cabinet Member responsible… me in this case. The Member who submitted a question then has the chance for one off-the-cuff verbal question which the Cabinet Member then answers without prior knowledge. The advance written question is usually only a set up for the much tougher and highly political supplementary.

However, as you’ll see from the clip, Mr Beresford suddenly realised his written question was highlighting financial failings under the previous Labour Administration and tried very hard to bury it as fast as he could without asking his extra question. But it’s so unusual not to get a supplementary question that the County Chairman, who presides over Chamber sessions, was taken by surprise and asked me to answer anyway. My questioner’s face was a picture when he realised what had happened. It was a chance to good to be missed for me. See what I mean about sixes and sevens!

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