Cllr Owen Lister - Competence Of Councillors

Recent correspondence in the Evening Advertiser regarding the competence of councillors, most recently the letters from David Roon and G.Laserton in the 5^th. February edition, about the failures of the Council and of Councillors fails to take account of a basic tenet of our democratic system  namely that the majority view shall prevail. This is after all the system that applies from Parish Council to Parliament. If things go wrong it is the majority who were in control at the relevant time who are at fault.

In Swindon there are now 8 Lib/Dem councillors, 23 Conservative councillors and 28 Labour councillors, which means that unless Conservatives and Lib/Dems vote together, the Labour majority prevails. The situation is complicated by the Cabinet system under which the Council operates, for the Cabinet meets either weekly or fortnightly whereas the full Council only meets bi-monthly for 8 months and monthly for the final 4 months of the Civic year. The Cabinet thus wields very considerable authority, for it is composed of 8 Labour members plus 1 Conservative and 1 Lib/Dem member, which ensures that Labour can get its own way most of the time.

G.Lasertons statement that the Conservatives had their time in office and quickly gave it back is fundamentally untrue for while the minority Conservative administration which took office after the Labour Party effectively resigned in September 2001 held sway in Cabinet, their decisions could always be overturned in full Council, which met monthly for the last 4 months of that Conservative administration. It was for this reason that the Labour Party was able to take over the administration whenever they wished to do so, and this is precisely what they did in May 2002.

By resigning from office following a damning OFSTED Report in September 2001, Labour also sought to duck their responsibility for the highly critical Joint Review of the Social Services department that was on the way, as well as the Councils Performance Assessment which put it 13^th. from the bottom of the list of all Unitary Authorities, and left it to the minority Conservative administration to start clearing up the mess.

With the aid of Tribal looking after Education and under the watchful eye of Mr. Tony Allen from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister some improvements are now taking place. Were it not so the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister would have taken over the running of the Council in its entirety.

At the end of January this year, Stratton St. Margaret made its decision and elected Ray Fisher, the Conservative candidate by an overwhelming majority. Unfortunately though the Conservatives took the major part of the vote in May 2002, this was not reflected in the Councils political make up. These are the sorry facts, and it remains for the electorate to decide in May 2003 whether they wish to suffer a further year of Labour incompetence, characterised by a failure to tackle essential things first.