Council Intransigence

COUNCIL INTRANSIGENCE

Written for the Blog by a Preston resident

I was recently asked in a comment why I hadn’t resolved my issues with the parish council before now.

I have approached the council on a number of occasions looking for a resolution to the issues, the more notable are, on 14/10/10 very near the start of these difficulties, I wrote to the council,

‘The entire difficulty surrounds the lack of consultation and the withholding of information. This position in my humble opinion is due to the activities of a few councillors who are operating their own agenda from within the council chamber. A bullying tactic is being employed to silence requests for information that as a parish resident I am fully entitled to request and have access to…….’

‘Should the council continue to withhold information and resist disclosure there will be a prolonged period of friction and distrust between residents and the Parish Council, this is certainly not in the best interests of our Parish…….’

It was very clear to me that without some sort of discussion and resolution between council and residents the situation could only deteriorate and create bitterness and ongoing conflict. In my opinion all efforts from both sides should have been applied to end the difference in views and reach a consensus that was acceptable to both parties.

Because one of the main stumbling blocks to agreement was the lack of consultation on the project of a new community hall, I offered to conduct a village wide consultation (obviously without charge) to gain verifiable and documented views and opinions on the subject.  Although I was promised that the proposition would be put before council for consideration and a decision, that was never done and we heard no more about it.

The council was very clearly unwilling to engage and work with residents to resolve the issues and have a documented account of the views of residents relating to the community hall despite concerns relating to potential cost and long term debt to the village, which would have affected all residents of Preston probably for a couple of generations. These very legitimate concerns were clearly of no interest to the council and the opportunity of hearing the views of residents on the subject was dismissed out of hand, it wasn’t even worthy of consideration by the council.

Due to the intransigence of the council the situation did indeed deteriorate and to this date there has been no dialog or resolution.

We did have great expectations of the new administration following the Local Elections of May 2011. I wrote to the Parish council on 12/05/11 following the inaugural council meeting of the new term. In my opinion this was an ideal opportunity to take a fresh look at the issues, resolve them and finally put and end to them. In my letter I wrote, after suitably congratulating new councillors on their election success and the new chairman on her success I wrote,

‘I would very much like to put the difficulties of the past few months behind us and support the new council in moving forward. In order to do that there are a couple of outstanding issues which in my view need to be addressed, these are;’

I listed the outstanding items, the main one of which was the withholding of information on which I would have been happy to accept the councils assurance that measures would be put into place that ensured such a position would not reoccur in the future, I wrote,

‘I do hope the above issues can be resolved in a business like manner, leaving the road ahead clear and void of unpleasant issues’

The response from the council was one of continuing the policy of the previous administration and continuing the conflict. They had clearly discussed the matter with the old councillor’s and agreed to simply continue their position of dismissing our concerns out of hand without balancing that opinion with those of residents, our positions had once again been set by the council.

There has been two occasions where I have seriously considered taking legal action against the council and legal advice was sought. I eventually came to the conclusion that it would not be overly productive of me to spend money on taking the council to task along a legal route.

I further wrote to the Parish Council on 27/06/2011, ‘I had sincerely hoped that the conflict with the out-going administration would end when a new and more open administration was installed, further, I have no wish to be involved in an on-going dispute with the Parish Council’

The council did offer to meet and try to resolve the issues if possible, due to a family bereavement I was not able to respond speedily as other personal items had priority at that time.

On beginning to recover from that sad event I wrote to the Vice Chairman and asked if I could accept the offer and gave a short list, I believe of three items that I was particularly looking forward to resolving and the whole thing could then be ended.

The council’s response was that the offer had been unilaterally removed from the table by the council, without any notification and would not discuss any issues, we were back to square one with the council continuing their attempts at bullying and intimidation.

I have tried to resolve the issues from the very beginning but the council simply continue to employ a tactic of intimidation and bullying to silence any descent, I simply will not bow to such tactics and so we are still in the same position that we were in October of 2010, I find that to be sad and unhelpful.

So why do I continue to pressure the council on the same old subjects?

The previous administration was controlled and run by three or four councillors who dictated policy through assisted by the co-option of councillors that were openly willing to support their actions without question in return for being left to do ‘their own thing’, this arrangement worked very well for at least 13 years. Though it never worked very well for the interests of Preston residents.

It is well documented that the council has literally wasted many, many thousands of pounds of residents money with absolutely no return or benefit to the residents of Preston.

The controlling councillors from the previous administration are still in place and at some point will once again take the reigns, this is a worrying prospect and should be of concern to all Preston residents.

Not only was a great deal of money wasted but those same councillors display no regard for the laws that govern our local councils and to this day continue with that attitude.

How long will I continue to oppose them? For as long as it takes to get a fair and equitable resolution.

Although some residents have given up, quite understandably in my opinion, I shall not!

Someone has to oppose them. 

I meant to include an extract from a letter sent to a senior council member on 29/06/2012, from which there has never been a response, the member involved will recognise it I'm sure.

'Finally, if at any time you wish to explore the grounds for ending this impasse in confidence I will give you my absolute assurance of confidentiality'