Jul 2008 24

What is a councillor worth?8

What price would you pay for your local councillors elected to your local district, borough, metropolitan or county councils?  A few points that we’ve noticed here bring us to ask this question.

The first issue must be the shocking increases in councillors’ pay.  Windsor and Maidenhead Council this year increased their pay by 91%.  We fought a long running battle with Bournemouth Council against their plans to increase Cabinet pay by 32% as well as offering a sweetener of a 17% pay increase for backbench councillors.  Other councils have voted themselves shocking increases the rest of us just don’t see. 

Second, the debacle over MPs expenses has brought mass public disdain over ‘snouts in the trough’ behaviour from elected politicians.  As public servants, employed by British taxpayers, do they get the right to line their pockets with our money?  It’s a far step removed from the ideas of voluntary, public service.  Councillors used to be paid an attendance allowance granted when they turned up for meetings.  Investigations into MEPs expenses, however, has shown that routinely politicians check in and check out, having declared their attendance and qualified for their attendance allowance – a shocking technicality robbing the taxpayer through abuse of the system.  Already councillors can claim breakfast, lunch and dinner allowances.  They get free blackberry’s, laptops and other luxuries on the taxpayer’s dime.  Yet with this subsidised communications equipment, when was the last time you heard from your councillor?

Finally, as I noted last week, councillors have very little power to overturn or even check decisions made by officers.  That officers at Thurrock Council could arbitrarily employ more staff for the public payroll, despite the objections of the elected councillors, shows that the current diffusion of authority in Town Halls leaves councillors with little power to shape their boroughs.

Obviously there are problems, the results of which cost the taxpayer dear.  Councillors have little power to stand up against Development Corporations, QUANGOs, Regional Assemblies and even central Government despite being the locally elected voice.  Unable to block unpopular decisions and powerless against central Government, are we just paying a high price – thousands of pounds per councillor – for an expensive caseworker, who usually can’t do much about real matters that affect taxpayers?

A democratic deficit is oft mentioned when discussing the value we get from MEPs and MPs.  It’s time we started looking at the scandal going on right under our noses: an elected position, powerless, yet continuously voting for higher and higher salaries costing the council tax payers hundreds of thousands of pounds a year. 

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  • Chris Whittington

    Worcestershire County Councillors manage to extract more than £750,000 between them. Some of their councillors are also District Councillors for which they get more allowances. Elected to ‘cabinet’ gets more allowances. Sit on quango, yet more.
    Become councillor, keep nose clean, make right noises, end up on quango boards as parttimer and £75K pa is yours. Vote every year for an increase. Sit on the officer and management and quango pay boards and they’ll sit on yours.
    For list of WCC allowances:
    http://worcestershire.whub.org.uk/home/wcc-mas-councillors-advert_2006-07.pdf
    Interesting to see what they cost across the country.

  • Ian P

    It goes right to the top as well. I understand that it used to cost about £250K/year in expenses to run the House of Lords. Now, with all Labour’s jobsworths in place, it’s costing £10MILLION!

  • Rosemary

    Why is it, with laptops, telephones etc, that you can never find one when you need one

  • Mike Cross

    As a manager in industry for 38 years and now retired I am amazed at the uselessness of many of our elected representatives. I wrote to IDS (an excellent, competent, caring and decent man!!) about the outright theft within and without government, knowing full well that much of the theft was by greedy silver spoon tories. Many of their changes are based on what IDS researched. I believe we need to redefine and redesign the whole system. None of them have job descriptions, accountability, reporting responsibility, there is no real pecking order. I believe that councillors should be responsible to MPs who are responsible to a tax payers alliance management committee. The MEPS are a complete waste of time and money and the we need to get out of the EEC NOW. Here in Wales we have MPs,AMs, MEPs (Glenys Kinnock is ours!!), county councillors, community councillors, town councillors….what a bloody joke. The primary purpose for the whole system is the old boy network and the gravy train. They are all part of trusts, quangos, police authorities and so it goes on like the story of the fleas…we never could afford it and it must be stopped. when you hear them addressing each other as my HONORABLE etc it is enough to make you sick. The irony is that they do believe that having the odd surgery and raising a few questions to ministers justifies their lifestyle and remuneration. Most of them haven’t got a clue about a real frontline job at that sort of level. It would frighten the hell out of them!! I must mind me blood pressure else Brown will get what’s left as death duties!! Ironic that the Scots may help us get rid of all these bloody Scots in the labour party, they can have home rule and pay their own way at last

  • colin

    if as you councillors have little or no influence then why have them? Why do we have 3 councillors per ward? one sufficed for at least one hundred years,so get rid of 2/3 and dispence with the chief executives.

  • http://www.5estate.blogspot.com roy morrish

    As the last Cllr in Devon who did not claim any expenses OR allowances, I feel qualified to say that to most Cllrs getting their snouts in the trough is the number one priority. Where did the Volunteering ethic go?

  • peter newman

    Shoot them all

  • peter newman

    Shoot them all