In Council – December

In Council – December

I expected an almighty battle today.  An item on the full council agenda concerned the amendment to the council’s constitution which effectively shut the door on most cooperation with spokes from the other parties.  “What the hell is a spoke?” I hear you cry.  Let me explain.

As you might know appropriate councillors are picked by the leader of the council to be ‘cabinet members’ who lead on specific areas of policy like Cllr. Mac McGuire for Highways and Access or Cllr. Martin Curtis for Children.  In turn, the other parties may choose to pick their own members to ’shadow’ the controlling party’s cabinet in those roles.  These are called Spokesmen, or “spokes” for short.

Until recently, Cambridgeshire County Council had a fairly cordial relationship between the Conservatives who control the council and the opposition spokes.  A spirit of cooperation included meetings and briefings for the opposition spokes, something which did not have to be done but was anyway out of courtesy and respect.

But politics can get pretty mean at times and the relationship has soured a little.  Conservatives accuse the Lib Dems of abusing the privelige afforded them to take confidential information and spin it, spill it and misuse it.  Lib Dems counter that this is ‘their job’ and that their actions are being misrepresented.  Alongside the ongoing argument about Policy Development Groups (we think they should be private, the Lib Dems think they should be open to the public – I blogged about this argument previously here) the whole thing has gotten pretty bitter.

So today it all spilled out into the full council meeting when changes were proposed to the constitution that cut the Lib Dems off from most of the areas that the controlling party was not obliged to continue.  The Liberal Democrats stamped their feet and shook their hands and thundered mightily about it (metaphorically speaking) but the deed was done. 

My personal take on it is that they brought it entirely upon themselves.  Yes, it’s their job to oppose and you would expect them to do so.  But if you are being granted the courtesy of special briefings and then you misuse those briefings for political gain you really should expect to reap the consequences of your actions.  The sad thing is that its only one or two excitable mavericks that do this.  The rest of them are perfectly reasonable and honourable.  Far be it from humble me to suggest anything to Lib Dem leader and bigwig Cllr. David Jenkins, but if I were going to I’d say: “Put them on the naughty step.”
   
The presumption that anybody was trying to “gag” the Lib Dems is ridiculous.  Such a thing would be like trying to hold back the tides.   It’s a sad day really as the cooperation between the parties was a good way to work and valuable for democracy.  The lesson here is very much “once bitten twice shy.”  If you keep playing up, sooner or later people will tire of your behaviour.

With that over and done the only other bone of major contention was the grandly named “Strategy for the transformation of Adult Social Care – Shaping Our Future” which dealt with the councils future plans around the important issues of Adult Social Care.  I won’t try and go into the whole strategy document here but I was again surprised at the manner of opposition from the yellow benches.  They didn’t disagree with the aims of the strategy, their criticism was a very personal one – that they didn’t feel the leading party could carry it out.

Now purely aside from the fact that this was just plain rude, how on Earth can this be considered a valid reason to object to a raft of proposals.  There is no doubt that this document contained some very challenging goals.  But do you know what?  I’d prefer some tough targets which require heroic effort to meet than a bunch of half-hearted bleats that challenged few and inspired nobody.  The Liberal Democrats did not object to the policy ideas themselves, they just wanted to have a pop at their opponents.  Obviously, I do not share their assessment.  But even if I did I’d still encourage the grand clear vision over the easy ride. 

During lunch I sat next to the Labour councillor Tariq Sadiq and we had an interesting discussion.  Where our politics may be quite different we found some very common ground when Tariq told me he would soon be a father for the first time.  Such fantastic news obviously led to me giving him the ‘benefit’ of my own experiences.  As I said to him: “Nothing will change your life like this.”  Which is, of course, absolutely true. 

After lunch there was a carol service in the main hall of the council buildings.  Animosity was put aside and we all shared the season of good will  in fine voice.  Or in my case – croaky voice.   Moody expressions turned to smiles.  Sullen exchanges into pleasant ones.  And so concludes the last full council meeting of the year.  It’s been an exciting roller-coaster ride so far and you know what – I’ve got a feeling it’ll be even more wild next year.  As I said after I was elected back in June – I’m ready.  Bring it on!