On The Labour Gravy Train

[Mrsspagnoli57]

Have just had a council election flyer through the letterbox from the local Labour party. Three wards to be contested on Thursday as well as the General Election. In one ward we have Grandmother and grandson, in another son in law of grandmother, and his wife (her daughter) is the prospective Labour parliamentary candidate!!! Talk about keeping it in the family!! I thought it was the Tories who practised cronyism? (Said she tongue in cheek)

[baza]

Relatives of Kinnock?

[New Judge]

It is not the Labour gravy train but the local council gravy train you are talking about. There is actually no need for local councillors at all. Many things administered by local councils have no right being in their remit (Education and Social Care immediately spring to mind). All local services and amenities should be run by a paid executive answerable to the Local Government minister and they should be run in accordance with the National government policies.

Local councils were fine when they were run by local residents and businessmen in their spare time who simply received their petrol money for their trouble. Now they are nothing but an expensive racket frequented by busybodies like those you describe.

[Mrsspagnoli57]

I called it the Labour gravy train merely because they were Labour candidates NewJudge. I agree with you though.

[ichkeria]

That is a ludicrous and unfair slander on local councillors of all parties who give up their time to serve their communities and keep local democracy alive against central authority

[New Judge]

Yeah...right.

[ichkeria]

There may well be councils full of the er sort of paid executives you seem to favour New Judge - our own local council had an appalling example of the sort of unelected overpaid bureaucrat who gives local government a bad name - but the elected local councillors here ARE mostly so far as I can see part timers who give up their spare time or take sabbaticals. Hardly a gravy train for them.

[New Judge]

Local councillors used to give their time freely, ichkeria. That was the principle upon which people elected them and on which they stood. Their duties were mainly served out of normal working hours so the job was done, unpaid, in their spare time. Furthermore, generally they did not interfere too much in people's lives. That is not the case now. Here’s some details I picked at random (for Bristol City Council):

“Bristol city councillors receive an allowance for time they give to serve the community and to cover their expenses.”

The basic allowance is £11,530 and is payable to the 70 councillors of Bristol City Council.”

In addition to this “basic allowance” (which is equivalent to working 35 hours a week for 52 weeks of the year at the minimum wage) more than half the 70 councillors qualify for “special responsibility” allowances (SRAs). Typically these take their remuneration up to around £28k to £30k. A couple of councillors take in excess of £40k and one takes £66k. In addition to these allowances arrangements are also in place to provide “pensions” for former councillors

These people are not serving the community for simple reimbursement of expenses. The payments for those with SRAs are comfortable “salaries” which many of their constituents would be more than happy to earn and even those on the basic allowance are “earning” as much as those on minimum wage.

Many years ago my friend’s father was a local councillor in London. He received a few pence per mile for driving to meetings and a couple of pounds for a fish supper if the meeting ran late. I stand by my contention that local councils have, since those days, evolved into a vast expensive and unnecessary racket. Council taxpayers are being fleeced into providing comfortable salaries for people who are making decisions over the provision of facilities and services which should not be devolved to a local level. Local government is not really necessary. It needs to be considerably diminished and the range of services controlled by it severely curtailed. Emptying the dustbins and putting books in the libraries are about all that needs determining locally and even that is not really necessary.

[penelope2]

Applause, applause, applause to New Judge.