National award for controversial temporary council officer

THE work of West Somerset Council’s controversial temporary chief officer Dr Jack Neal has been recognised with a national award from the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives (SOLACE).
Dr Neal’s appointment hit the headlines because he was costing £3,500 a week at a time when the council was already in a financial crisis after Independent councillors took control from the Conservatives at local elections.
The council had lost its chief executive and deputy chief executive in quick succession after the coalition of Independent councillors began running the authority.
Dr Neal, aged 61, who lives near Honiton, Devon, was given a temporary contract to try to turn around the management of the council.
Now, his work has been recognised at the prestigious SOLACE interim manager of the year awards, held in Claridge’s Hotel, Mayfair, London.
He received the runner-up award in the strategic management category.
West Somerset economic development portfolio holder Councillor Michael Downes said: “It is no mean feat given that we are a small council and the winners came from larger London authorities.
“I am delighted that the work he did with us has been acknowledged.
“He has fantastic management skills and I am pleased these have been recognised on a national scale.”
Adrian Dyer, who has since become the council’s chief officer with the title executive director, said: “I am absolutely delighted for Jack.
“He is an inspirational manager and excellent problem-solver who is not phased by anything.
“I have learned a lot from him, and the council as a whole has seen marked and lasting improvements thanks to his help.”

• Our photograph shows Councillor Michael Downes (left) and Dr Jack Neal. Photo submitted.

'Too many Vicky Pollards in Somerset' say Conservatives

SOMERSET has more ‘Vicky Pollard’ (pictured) young people than almost anywhere else in the country, it has been revealed.
The ‘Little Britain’ television comedy character typifies NEETs - young people ‘Not in Employment, Education or Training’.
Now, Government figures have shown in Somerset the number of NEETS - or Vicky Pollards – rose by 167 per cent between 2003 and 2007, the third-highest county increase in the country.
Nationally, the increase in NEETS was just 12 per cent during the same period.
Somerset County Council Conservative group leader Councillor Ken Maddock said there was no sign on the horizon of any improvement.
Councillor Maddock said: “These figures show there is a problem facing young people nationwide.
“But it is much, much worse in Somerset.
“And that is before we entered the recession.
“Now that the boom has turned to bust, we will pay a huge price for failing to fix the roof when the sun was shining.
“The county council needs to look urgently at measures to help these young people.
“If we fail, we shall be wasting the talents of the next generation.
Somerset cannot afford to let that happen.”

£60 on every Somerset council tax bill 'pays for Lib Dem borrowing'

HIGH-spending Somerset County Council was today criticised for locking itself into uncompetitive borrowing rates for years to come - just as the Bank of England cut rates to their lowest ever level.
The Liberal Democrat-run county has long-term high interest rates on more than £300 million which it has borrowed to fund its spending spree in recent years.
The average rate was about 4.3 per cent - which previously looked good, but not with a base rate now down to just one per cent.
Conservative group finance spokesman Councillor David Huxtable (pictured) said the council could now borrow at rates of less than one per cent.
Councillor Huxtable said: “We have been warning the Lib Dem administration about their huge borrowing and now it has come back to bite them.
“The difference in rates could mean the council paying up to £11 million over the odds this year alone.
“This would put an extra £60 on the council tax for every hard working family in Somerset.”
Somerset Conservative group leader Councillor Ken Maddock said: “The Lib Dems have slipped up big time here.
“They have trebled borrowing in the last six years. Who do they think they are - Gordon Brown?
“We need to act like a responsible council - not like a dodgy hedge fund.
“The Conservatives would reduce Somerset’s dependence on debt and borrow less.
“This is as important to a county council as it is to everybody’s personal finances.”

Conservatives call for county to freeze council tax bills

CONSERVATIVE councillors at County Hall are calling on the Liberal Democrat administration to freeze the county’s council tax.
The Lib Dems, who run Somerset County Council with support from Labour councillors, have doubled council tax bills in the past 10 years.
Now, the Conservative opposition group is lobbying for a freeze on council tax, against a background of the county council having received a record grant from Government in this financial year.
The county’s budget is due to be finalised next month, with council tax bills going out in early March.
Currently, a further 3.5 per cent rise is anticipated which would add £35 on to the average band D bill.
Conservative group leader Councillor Ken Maddock said: “People are hurting now, so they need help now.
“We are all having to tighten our belts and the council should be no exception.
“They cannot just go on pretending that the credit crunch never happened.
“They should freeze the council tax now.”

• Our photograph shows Councillor Ken Maddock with Conservative MEP candidate for the South West of England, Zehra Zaidi (left), and Somerton and Frome Conservative Parliamentary candidate Annunziata Rees-Mogg. Photo submitted.

'Skulduggery' allegation after voters fail to turn out for by-election

A FORMER Minehead town councillor who unsuccessfully tried to reclaim his seat in a by-election which attracted possibly the country’s lowest-ever turnout, is calling on the Electoral Commission to lobby for a change in the law.
Tony Berry is a past-chairman of Minehead Conservative Association and also formerly the finance chairman of Minehead Town Council.
His defeat in a town council by-election in October has exposed a loophole in English electoral law which he claimed allowed for the result of a local election to be manipulated to the disadvantage of candidates who were not rich.
Mr Berry stood as an Independent candidate in the by-election, which was won by a 19-vote majority by a Conservative candidate in a poll which attracted just 233 votes out of 3,165 eligible voters - a meagre turnout of only seven per cent.
He blamed town council ‘skulduggery’ for the poor voter turnout, as the council failed to issue polling notices, failed to publish notices of election in the ward, failed to advertise the election in local newspapers, and failed to use its website to advertise the by-election.
Mr Berry said the decision not to issue polling cards was taken by the town council clerk - whose husband was agent for the Conservative candidate - and who failed even to notify him of the decision.
The result was that many voters either did not know the by-election was taking place, or thought they could not vote without a polling card and stayed at home.
Now, Mr Berry has been horrified to discover that there is no statutory public organisation which can investigate and ensure local elections are run fairly.
Local electoral procedures can only be challenged by those rich enough to be able to go to court and use the judicial processes.
Mr Berry has raised his concerns about the conduct of the by-election with both the Electoral Commission and the Audit Commission, and he has received confirmation that the town council breached Electoral Commission guidance in several respects in its conduct of the October by-election.
He is now calling on the Electoral Commission to lobby for it to be given statutory powers to investigate electoral skulduggery and to be able to re-run elections where wrongdoing is proven.
Mr Berry said: “I am not casting any aspersions on the successful candidate in this by-election, but I have no doubt the result would have been greatly different had more people come out to vote.
“I only found out by accident two days before the by-election that polling cards had not been sent out, despite it being normal practice to do so, which did not leave me much time to get around 3,000 people to tell them they could still vote and where to vote.
“I do not want the by-election re-run. What has happened is history now. But I do want to see fairness in local elections and it should not matter whether you are rich or poor, if something underhand goes on then there should be an authority which can put matters right.
“I think most people would have believed, like me, that the Electoral Commission was created to ensure that all elections are carried out fairly, so I was extremely surprised to find it is a watchdog without any teeth at all and they can only offer ‘advice and guidance’ on local elections.”
Mr Berry has also written to Minehead’s mayor, Councillor Simon Stokes, asking him as a matter of urgency to ensure the council adopts a formal set of procedures for running elections to include all the guidance points issued by the Electoral Commission.

• Our photograph shows Tony Berry studying some of the correspondence from the Electoral Commission. Photo submitted.

LETTER: MP criticism of county council 'is political strategy'

Dear Editor - I found your front page report on Ian Liddell-Grainger’s views (£74m venture, The Post April 24) where he implies by implication that the county council is being profligate with ratepayers’ money, very much part of a pattern; perhaps even what passes for a strategy of his.
He appears to be trying to undermine ratepayers’ confidence in the county council’s ability to manage the funds with which they are entrusted.
I am unsure why he has chosen this particular avenue of attack unless it is to associate the county council with the financial catastrophe that was the Conservative-run West Somerset District Council.
I think most people can spot the difference.
It is particularly ironic because during the entire, disgraceful period of the mismanagement of funds and priorities by the Tory-led district council, I cannot recall a single printed criticism by Ian Liddell-Grainger of the district council’s performance.
Had he done so, the outcome might have been very different.
The award-winning and innovative financial team at SCC belongs to all of us and has been independently audited as being a lynch pin of one of the top performing local authorities in the entire country.
I am all for constructive criticism by our Member of Parliament, but let us not begrudge success for political reasons.
Ian Galloway
Somerset county Councillor (Minehead ward)
Glenmore Road
Minehead

Our man 'Deadly' Dudley chosen for by-election challenge

THE Post columnist Dudley Seale has been chosen to fight the Alcombe East by-election for a seat on West Somerset Council.
Mr Seale, who is also a Minehead town councillor, will stand for the Conservatives.
He is one of four candidates contesting the vacancy created when former Minehead and Alcombe Mayor Nick Messarra stood down last month.
The others are Tony Bowden (Lib Dem), who has made several unsuccessful attempts at winning a seat in Watchet, Ron Bridlefor the Labour Party, and retired Minehead Town Council employee Sandra Slade, who is standing as an Independent with town and district Councillor Terry Venner acting as her agent.
The by-election will b e held on Thursday, May 1, and anybody living in the ward who is registered to vote will receive a poll card in the weeks running up to the ballot.
Polling will take place at St Michael’s Church, Alcombe, between 7 am and 10 pm, and the count will take place at the church immediately after the close of the poll.
Anybody wishing to have a postal or proxy vote must apply by 5 pm on Wednesday, April 23.
To register for a postal or proxy vote contact Electoral Services Officer Elisa Day on 01984 635272.
A vacancy in the ward for the town council will be decided by co-opting a candidate, possibly as early as next week, after nobody called for a by-election to be held.

'Tories in turmoil' claim by ex-chairman

ALLEGATIONS of turmoil within the ranks of Minehead Conservatives have surfaced in the wake of last year’s co-option to the town council of Mandy Chilcott.
Former town councillor Tony Berry (pictured, right), an ex-chairman of the Minehead branch, said the organisation was in disarray, with the past four chairmen all resigning because of lack of support.
As well as himself, the other chairmen to have departed were Phil Cross, Terry Venner, and Phil Greatorex.
Mr Berry told The Post: “They are all hard working people but they have all left because of the in-fighting and due to certain individuals.”
Speaking for himself, Mr Berry said matters came to a head after he was put forward as the Conservatives’ preferred candidate to fill a town council vacancy in Alcombe East ward.
Mr Berry, who was previously chairman of the council’s finance committee, said the names of two other unofficial candidates were subsequently put forward, whom he believed were encouraged by the Bridgwater constituency association.
They were Norman Hercock, who was already a district councillor, and Mandy Chilcott.
Town councillors then voted to co-opt Mrs Chilcott, with at least two Conservatives councillors supporting her.
Mr Berry told The Post: “I was let down by my colleagues after the branch had decided I would be the candidate.
“I was upset and disappointed. I do not like to talk about it because it is a smack against the Conservatives, but I feel it is the only way to make people realise what is going on.”
Mr Berry said he had not received any reply from the association when he queried what had gone on, and he believed two other people had also written to the association without a response.
“I have been waiting three months for Bridgwater to reply to correspondence about it,” he said.
“The Minehead branch has been in limbo. Nothing has been going on, no fund-raising or anything.
“I spent ages getting it going again when I was chairman, and now I have been kicked in the teeth by my colleagues.
“As soon as another vacancy comes along, I shall stand. I shall probably stand as an Independent, but I shall always have leanings towards the Conservatives.
“If I could move to a different branch of the Conservatives, like Watchet, I would probably do that.”
The Bridgwater constituency agent, John Cole, was asked by The Post if he wanted to respond to Mr Berry’s comments but had not done so by the time the newspaper went to press.
The Minehead branch was reconstituted at a meeting last week, when former Minehead Deputy Mayor, Stephen Dear, was appointed chairman, and former mayor and district council chairman Ann Foxhuntley became vice-chairman.
The Post understands that the branch has also reinstated renegade Conservative John Malin as a member.
Dr Malin caused fury within the party at the last Somerset County Council elections in 2005 when he quit the party and stood as an Independent in Minehead against sitting Conservative councillor Colin Hill.
Consequently the vote was split, causing Mr Hill to lose his seat, which then gave the Liberal Democrats a one seat majority over the Conservatives at County Hall.
His reinstatement now is seen as an attempt to lobby for the official Conservative nomination for next year’s county council elections.

Under-fire Conservatives step down in council financial row

THE leader and deputy leader of the minority Conservative group on West Somerset Council are quitting their political positions amid a row over the authority’s financial crisis.
The Conservatives lost control of the council in last May’s elections when Independent candidates backed by the Liberal Democrat-founded pressure group Direct won more seats.
Since then, Conservative leader Councillor Christine Lawrence (pictured, right) and her deputy Councillor Roger Webber (pictured, below) have been accused of allowing council finances to spiral out of control.
It resulted in both the council’s chief executive Tim Howes and deputy chief executive Rod Latham receiving huge pay-offs from the new Independent administration to leave their jobs, which plunged the authority further into the fiscal mire.
Council leader Councillor Keith Ross was forced also to abandon the much-vaunted New Horizons healthplex scheme in Minehead because there was no money in the kitty to fund the district’s share of the costs – even though work had already started.
New Horizons, which was a partnership with Somerset County Council, Somerset Primary Care Trust, and the West Somerset Community College, included a modern replacement for Minehead Hospital – and now the PCT has been unable to guarantee that it will still be delivered.
The council’s deputy leader, Councillor Simon Stokes (Labour) later called on Councillors Lawrence and Webber, who was the finance portfolio holder until May, to accept their share of responsibility for the crisis and to resign.
Now, former headmaster and chief executive Councillor Tim Taylor, who was elected in May to represent Crowcombe and Stogumber, is to succeed as Conservative group on February 1.
Both Councillors Lawrence and Webber will continue as district councillors.
Councillor Lawrence, who is also a Somerset county councillor for Dunster, said: “I have enjoyed serving the community and I am proud of the projects we were able to deliver during my term, especially the groundwork for the new hospital.”
She said she wanted to devote more time to resolving issues in her Minehead north ward and to her responsibilities as a county councillor.
Councillor Lawrence said she originally intended to hand over to somebody else after the council’s annual meeting ion May, but thought it sensible to allow a new team to be put in place beforehand.
Councillor Taylor said: “West Somerset owes them an enormous debt of gratitude and I am sure this will become more obvious over time.”