Rishi Sunak and the Conservative Party.

[jfollows]

Councils haven't been splashing their money around since the austerity drive ten years ago and counting.

Councils have been finding that the demand for, and cost of their statutory functions (particularly social care) has been increasing substantially. Fundamentally, this is what these problems generally boil down to.

My local council has just voted to increase the salary of its "Chief Executive Officer" from £160,000 to £190,000. That's more than the prime minister's salary for a job which is really just the hired help, it doesn't come with responsibility and accountability in the way that a real CEO in industry would have, and the most recent one left recently (for more money at another council) without actually being put on paid leave of absence for months which happened to some of her predecessors. It's unfortunately become "baked in" to local authorities now to pay so much for this non-job, and it's just one example of the contempt with which they treat our money. Many councils are now in hock to a group of people who set their own salaries and flit between councils at our expense.

To me, this is actually off-topic because it doesn't matter what hue of local council you have, they're all at it.

However I think Starmer needs a manifesto policy to "do something" about local authority finances, he can't please everyone and shouldn't try too hard to do so, but I think plenty of people from all sides of the political spectrum realise what a mess local authorities now are in, some of it their own making but a lot of it thanks to central government.

 

[takno]

My local council has just voted to increase the salary of its "Chief Executive Officer" from £160,000 to £190,000. That's more than the prime minister's salary for a job which is really just the hired help, it doesn't come with responsibility and accountability in the way that a real CEO in industry would have, and the most recent one left recently (for more money at another council) without actually being put on paid leave of absence for months which happened to some of her predecessors. It's unfortunately become "baked in" to local authorities now to pay so much for this non-job, and it's just one example of the contempt with which they treat our money. Many councils are now in hock to a group of people who set their own salaries and flit between councils at our expense.

To me, this is actually off-topic because it doesn't matter what hue of local council you have, they're all at it.

However I think Starmer needs a manifesto policy to "do something" about local authority finances, he can't please everyone and shouldn't try too hard to do so, but I think plenty of people from all sides of the political spectrum realise what a mess local authorities now are in, some of it their own making but a lot of it thanks to central government.

In what sense is this not like the CEO role in the private sector? Well, apart from the salary, where getting somebody to run an organisation the size of a local authority for £190,000 would be more or less impossible.

 

[A0]

You could well be right, I'd not disagree with you on Tamworth or on Altrincham & Sale West, however I fear that Tatton will remain Conservative much though I'd like to see the back of Esther McVey. However I hope you're right. More likely that Macclesfield will go Labour I think.

Macclesfield don't think so - it stayed blue even through the Blair years. The highest vote share Labour have ever mustered in Macclesfiled (since 1979) was 36.8% in 2017 - about 15% behind the Conservative candidate and the Lib Dems are nowhere.

 

[jfollows]

In what sense is this not like the CEO role in the private sector? Well, apart from the salary, where getting somebody to run an organisation the size of a local authority for £190,000 would be more or less impossible.

There's no responsibility or accountability, and they're just doing some of the work the elected councillors don't want to do. If they mess up, they move on. Yes, that happens in the private sector as well, but most of what they do involves line management and running a few committees, for which there may be a call but not at the sort of salary they get away with. John Redwood, with whom I rarely agree, warned against this contagion more than ten years ago. Yes, local authorities are large and complex. But we elect people to run them, not to hire in others to do their work. Ultimately it's the lack of accountability that annoys me more than the money.

I admit that the PM's salary is artificially depressed, but saying an appointed CEO of a single local authority should be paid more than the PM doesn't fit well with me.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Sep 2023 ==

Macclesfield don't think so - it stayed blue even through the Blair years. The highest vote share Labour have ever mustered in Macclesfiled (since 1979) was 36.8% in 2017 - about 15% behind the Conservative candidate and the Lib Dems are nowhere.

The dreadful Nicholas Winterton, who then installed his wife in Congleton. I grew up with him as my MP.

 

[takno]

There's no responsibility or accountability, and they're just doing some of the work the elected councillors don't want to do. If they mess up, they move on. Yes, that happens in the private sector as well, but most of what they do involves line management and running a few committees, for which there may be a call but not at the sort of salary they get away with. John Redwood, with whom I rarely agree, warned against this contagion more than ten years ago. Yes, local authorities are large and complex. But we elect people to run them, not to hire in others to do their work. Ultimately it's the lack of accountability that annoys me more than the money.

I admit that the PM's salary is artificially depressed, but saying an appointed CEO of a single local authority should be paid more than the PM doesn't fit well with me.

Attempting to control public sector salaries by keeping down the salary of the PM is pointless, especially since the low salary pretty much ensures the top job itself is often taken as either positioning for future money-grabbing, or some kind of vulgar charity effort by already-rich people.

In terms of LA CEOs, the pay they are on is usually somewhere around SVP or EVP in equivalent orgs, and the level of responsibility is generally higher than those. The only thing causing problems with accountability is the fact that they can just walk into another job, and that's a factor of shortage in the number of qualified people willing to do the job for the money. The most effective way to deal with that is by increasing the salary until you can compete with the private sector.

In terms of it actually being the councillors job to do all the executive leadership, they are largely doing it as a spare-time job with unimpressive allowances, and it's important that they are reasonably representative, and not elected for their management background. In previous eras the lack of qualified and experienced leaders has led to problems including bullying councillors treating authorities as their own personal fiefdom, high levels of graft in the second-level leadership positions, and arbitrary or illegal decisions being made and exposing authorities to legal liability such as massive equal-pay claims. Professional leadership is not a net-negative in these organisations.

 

[43096]

The dreadful Nicholas Winterton, who then installed his wife in Congleton. I grew up with him as my MP.

I thought it was her who wanted the MP role - so she could keep an eye on what he was up to at Westminster.

 

[A0]

The dreadful Nicholas Winterton, who then installed his wife in Congleton. I grew up with him as my MP.

One of the more independent minded MPs - apparently the late Brian Redhead (who lived in Rainow which was in the constituency) voted for Winterton because of his independent minded streak and made a comment on his ballot paper to the effect he was voting for the man, not the party. Redhead was widely believed to have Labour sympathies and before his broadcasting career had worked for the Manchester Guardian.

 

[ainsworth74]

Yes, local authorities are large and complex. But we elect people to run them, not to hire in others to do their work. Ultimately it's the lack of accountability that annoys me more than the money.

But then we surely need to remunerate them properly otherwise, even more than it is now, it will become the sole preserve of the retired or the independently wealthy! Looking at my own local Council the figures for 2021/22 show that the basic allowance for a councillor was £10k. The leader of the council got an extra £22k so they were on around £32k. If we ditch the Council Managing Director (which is what they call their CEO) who seems to be on around £140k that means that we'd have someone getting around £32k in charge of a Council with a budget of a couple hundred million. You're not going to get many people who are able to give the time and effort required to run something as complex as a Local Authority when most of them are getting £10k and the highest remuneration is £32k. Certainly not many people of working age with the skills that the job would require. Considering the denigration that councillors get (see this thread even!) does it seem a vote winner to propose increasing the amount we pay councillors?

I'm not saying that empowering local councillors to have more direct control over the Council and therefore direct answerability to the local electorate is a bad idea. But, circling back to my point in post #4,079, we desperately need to look at what local government is for and how we run and, crucially, fund it.

 

[simonw]

Whereas the Tories might counter that by saying Councils, just as in every other walk of life, be that government, business or personal, need to match their spending to their income, and not splash money around as if there was no tomorrow.

And all the opposition would have to mention to shut them up is "Woking".

If you want an example of Tory mismanagement then look no further than Woking. Over a Billion in debt on an income measured in tens of millions

Still, at least you can see Woking from the Shard:

The fall of Woking: what happens after a council goes bust

Woking declared itself bankrupt in June. Now, residents want answers as care, arts and leisure facilities face funding cuts

www.theguardian.com

 

[Thirteen]

The PM's salary in the UK is a lot lower in comparison to other countries.

 

[Gloster]

Personally, I think that Thurrock is an even worse case than Woking. Both have been making very poor and risky business deals, but Woking looks like straightforward incompetence, while Thurrock looks like unchecked…

 

[yorksrob]

My local council has just voted to increase the salary of its "Chief Executive Officer" from £160,000 to £190,000. That's more than the prime minister's salary for a job which is really just the hired help, it doesn't come with responsibility and accountability in the way that a real CEO in industry would have, and the most recent one left recently (for more money at another council) without actually being put on paid leave of absence for months which happened to some of her predecessors. It's unfortunately become "baked in" to local authorities now to pay so much for this non-job, and it's just one example of the contempt with which they treat our money. Many councils are now in hock to a group of people who set their own salaries and flit between councils at our expense.

To me, this is actually off-topic because it doesn't matter what hue of local council you have, they're all at it.

However I think Starmer needs a manifesto policy to "do something" about local authority finances, he can't please everyone and shouldn't try too hard to do so, but I think plenty of people from all sides of the political spectrum realise what a mess local authorities now are in, some of it their own making but a lot of it thanks to central government.

The Chief Exec of a local authority is an important role, but you're right that there needs to be some wage restraint in filling these positions.

I still stand by my observation that simultaneous rises in cost of providing, along with demand for key services is the key issue.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Sep 2023 ==

One of the more independent minded MPs - apparently the late Brian Redhead (who lived in Rainow which was in the constituency) voted for Winterton because of his independent minded streak and made a comment on his ballot paper to the effect he was voting for the man, not the party. Redhead was widely believed to have Labour sympathies and before his broadcasting career had worked for the Manchester Guardian.

Wouldn't that have counted as a spoilt ballot paper ?!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Sep 2023 ==

Well, here's one example of a Council splashing money around; A few years ago Oxford City Council widened the pavement in the High Street to give more room at the bus stops there. Unfortunately this narrowed the road so much that when buses stopped there the road was effectively blocked and the city centre was gridlocked. So they had to reduce the width of the pavement again, the differing road surface where this was done is still visible.

Well, I daresay trying to fit buses, cars and pedestrians into a city not designed for them was probably an impossible task.

 

[ainsworth74]

Wouldn't that have counted as a spoilt ballot paper ?!

Not necessarily. The legal definition of a ballot that must be rejected comes from the Representation of the People Act 1983 in Paragraph 47 of Schedule 1 which it states:

47 (1) Any ballot paper—

(a) which does not bear the official mark, or

(b) on which votes are given for more than one candidate, or

(c) on which anything is written or marked by which the voter can be identified except the printed number on the back, or

(d) which is unmarked or void for uncertainty,

shall, subject to the provisions of the next following paragraph, be void and not counted.

(2) A ballot paper on which the vote is marked—

(a) elsewhere than in the proper place, or

(b) otherwise than by means of a cross, or

(c) by more than one mark,

shall not for such reason be deemed to be void if an intention that the vote shall be for one or other of the candidates clearly appears, and the way the paper is marked does not itself identify the voter and it is not shown that he can be identified by it.

So as long as who they intended to vote for was clear and the way it is marked does not identify the voter then it should be counted. The Electoral Commission publish a leaflet with loads of examples of rejected and allowed ballots (scroll down to page 11). You really don't need to just put an 'X' in the box as long as your intention is clear. There is an alleged example of someone who put "wank" against all the candidates apart from one where the voter put "not wank" and that was counted as a valid vote for the candidate they marked as such!

 

[yorksrob]

Not necessarily. The legal definition of a ballot that must be rejected comes from the Representation of the People Act 1983 in Paragraph 47 of Schedule 1 which it states:



So as long as who they intended to vote for was clear and the way it is marked does not identify the voter then it should be counted. The Electoral Commission publish a leaflet with loads of examples of rejected and allowed ballots (scroll down to page 11). You really don't need to just put an 'X' in the box as long as your intention is clear. There is an alleged example of someone who put "wank" against all the candidates apart from one where the voter put "not wank" and that was counted as a valid vote for the candidate they marked as such!

That sounds like a fun trip to the polling station !

 

[simonw]

Not necessarily. The legal definition of a ballot that must be rejected comes from the Representation of the People Act 1983 in Paragraph 47 of Schedule 1 which it states:



So as long as who they intended to vote for was clear and the way it is marked does not identify the voter then it should be counted. The Electoral Commission publish a leaflet with loads of examples of rejected and allowed ballots (scroll down to page 11). You really don't need to just put an 'X' in the box as long as your intention is clear. There is an alleged example of someone who put "wank" against all the candidates apart from one where the voter put "not wank" and that was counted as a valid vote for the candidate they marked as such!

"Spoilt" ballot papers ie those without a clear x in the box against a candidates name are out to one side and then reviewed. Rarely are there enough that there inclusion of exclusion will change the result, but there will still be a review and the candidates may be consulted.

 

[ainsworth74]

That sounds like a fun trip to the polling station !

Certainly cathartic

"Spoilt" ballot papers ie those without a clear x in the box against a candidates name are out to one side and then reviewed. Rarely are there enough that there inclusion of exclusion will change the result, but there will still be a review and the candidates may be consulted.

Indeed, all seems quite sensible really and as you say the number of ballots effected is unlikely to change the result. But I've always thought it shows a great deal of good sense that the requirements are considerably laxer than you might think in terms of what counts and doesn't count as a valid vote.

 

[Busaholic]

One of the more independent minded MPs - apparently the late Brian Redhead (who lived in Rainow which was in the constituency) voted for Winterton because of his independent minded streak and made a comment on his ballot paper to the effect he was voting for the man, not the party. Redhead was widely believed to have Labour sympathies and before his broadcasting career had worked for the Manchester Guardian.

Redhead was an interesting man, but I wonder why he acted like that. Firstly, he knew as well as anyone that all votes are cast for a person, albeit one with a descriptor, not a party, and secondly, did he expect someone to check his ballot paper number against the polling station data to ascertain who had made the comment? If the latter, I suspect he was correct.

 

[Gloster]

Redhead was an interesting man, but I wonder why he acted like that. Firstly, he knew as well as anyone that all votes are cast for a person, albeit one with a descriptor, not a party, and secondly, did he expect someone to check his ballot paper number against the polling station data to ascertain who had made the comment? If the latter, I suspect he was correct.

I wish I could remember where I read it many years ago, but Brian Redhead did mention (or somebody else recalled him mentioning) that at some point in his broadcasting career someone in the political world made a comment on the lines of, ”We know how you vote, Mr Redhead.” I can’t remember the exact phrasing, but it was rather more direct than hinting that he was an X supporter. I think it was a Conservative in the 1980s and Wikipedia suggests it may have been Lawson or Lilley.

 

[jfollows]

I wish I could remember where I read it many years ago, but Brian Redhead did mention (or somebody else recalled him mentioning) that at some point in his broadcasting career someone in the political world made a comment on the lines of, ”We know how you vote, Mr Redhead.” I can’t remember the exact phrasing, but it was rather more direct than hinting that he was an X supporter. I think it was a Conservative in the 1980s and Wikipedia suggests it may have been Lawson or Lilley.

The one I recall is recounted in his obituary at https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-brian-redhead-1409045.html

After Nigel Lawson's 1987 budget Redhead interviewed the Chancellor and challenged him over unemployment. Lawson dismissed the criticism as that of 'a lifelong Labour supporter'. Redhead asked for a minute's silence 'while you compose an apology for daring to suggest you know how I exercise my vote, and I shall reflect on the death of your monetary policy'.

The same obituary goes on to observe

A similar clash occurred in 1991 with Peter Lilley, then Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, who said the economy was 'regaining the ground we lost under the party which you support, Brian'. When Redhead replied that it was his own business how he voted, Lilley accused him of being better at handing out criticism than taking it.

 

[nw1]

The one I recall is recounted in his obituary at https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-brian-redhead-1409045.html

The same obituary goes on to observe

Indeed Wikipedia (unreferenced) seems to suggest he may have been a soft Tory; while Wikipedia isn't necessarily accurate I seem to remember a similar suggestion from years ago.

The Lilley quote says far more about Lilley than it does about Redhead. A man who I have had a very low opinion of since the age of 20 and nothing I've seen or heard has done anything to improve that.

 

[AM9]

He was the MP for the St Albans constituency when I mover here. At the 1997 election he skipped to the new Harpenden & Hitchin seat, - there wasn't much disappointment here, despite getting Kerry Pollard until 2005.

 

[nw1]

He was the MP for the St Albans constituency when I mover here. At the 1997 election he skipped to the new Harpenden & Hitchin seat, - there wasn't much disappointment here, despite getting Kerry Pollard until 2005.

Indeed. A man who, IMO, did more than any other to demonise the unemployed. The Brexiter with a second home in France.

Oh, and the man behind two of the worst live vocal performances of the 90s, both given at the Conservative Party conference.

After 2005 you of course had, for 14 years, the "joy" of Anne Main, another right-wing Brexiter. Is it any wonder St Albans went against the grain in 2019 with such a history of dire Tory MPs?

 

[Busaholic]

Indeed. A man who, IMO, did more than any other to demonise the unemployed. The Brexiter with a second home in France.

Whereas Lord Lawson made his principal residence in France. Obviously a man of principal rather than principle. The best story about Lilley is the one concerning the inability of anyone to contact him for several hours after a terrorist incident in his constituency late on a Saturday evening, this at a time before mobile phones were common.

 

[The Ham]

Can't comment on specific cases, but this may be one where the government has given a council some money that's ringfenced for a specific purpose.

Another option could be that it was developer funding.

 

[Enthusiast]

The Brexiter with a second home in France.

What's wrong with that?

Where does the notion come from that people who voted to leave the EU dislike Europe or its individual nations and people?

I can't speak for all of them but most of my Leaver friends and acquaintances having nothing generally against individual European nations and people. I personally spend quite a bit of time in EU countries. I have some very good friends there (of local origin) and enjoy my time in a number of places. It isn't "Europe" of which I have a dislike, it is the institution that is the European Union. I see no conflict between wanting the UK to be outside of the European Union and having a home in Europe.

 

[takno]

What's wrong with that?

Where does the notion come from that people who voted to leave the EU dislike Europe or its individual nations and people?

I can't speak for all of them but most of my Leaver friends and acquaintances having nothing generally against individual European nations and people. I personally spend quite a bit of time in EU countries. I have some very good friends there (of local origin) and enjoy my time in a number of places. It isn't "Europe" of which I have a dislike, it is the institution that is the European Union. I see no conflict between wanting the UK to be outside of the European Union and having a home in Europe.

It seems like an odd choice in those circumstances to make it much more difficult to actually spend time living in that home, and make it effectively impossible for non rich people to follow you in buying property or living in Europe. The important point here is that it isn't somebody who just voted leave, it's somebody who spent years arguing and campaigning for it

 

[DynamicSpirit]

It seems like an odd choice in those circumstances to make it much more difficult to actually spend time living in that home,

Some people do actually vote or campaign based on principle and on what they believe is right for the country, rather than on pure self-interest! Although I take your point that it would certainly be unusual for someone to vote for something that is likely to cause them significant personal harm.

and make it effectively impossible for non rich people to follow you in buying property or living in Europe. The important point here is that it isn't somebody who just voted leave, it's somebody who spent years arguing and campaigning for it

This seems to me to display a lack of understanding of the motives of Brexiters. I'm pretty sure that virtually no-one campaigned/voted for Leave out of some (malicious?) desire to prevent UK citizens from living or buying properties in Europe. People voted to leave because they wanted to end the situation where huge numbers of people were moving from the EU to the UK, contributing to a massive housing crisis in the UK and making it very hard for many British citizens to get decent work or a place to live and where the UK Government couldn't legally do anything about it. Unfortunately we live in a World where almost anything you do politically will have unintended side-effects, and making it harder for the small minority of UK citizens who wanted to move abroad to do so was an unfortunate side-effect of solving a much bigger problem. Presumably, in the eyes of people campaigning for Brexit, creating a small problem was a small price to pay for solving that much bigger problem.

 

[najaB]

…contributing to a massive housing crisis in the UK...

Though, that crisis is more due to a succession of governments failing to prioritise housebuilding than it was due to inward migration (from the EU or elsewhere).

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Though, that crisis is more due to a succession of governments failing to prioritise housebuilding than it was due to inward migration (from the EU or elsewhere).

That's why I carefully phrased my comment as 'contributing to'. I think you are right that Governments failing to prioritise housebuilding is a major factor behind the crisis. But at the same time, the vast sudden influx from the EU and the way it happened very quickly with very little warning from the mid 2000's onwards would have been very tough for any Government to plan for and I think would likely have caused infrastructure/housing pressure even if the UK Government had been much more on top of the housing issues.

 

[nw1]

What's wrong with that?

Where does the notion come from that people who voted to leave the EU dislike Europe or its individual nations and people?

I can't speak for all of them but most of my Leaver friends and acquaintances having nothing generally against individual European nations and people. I personally spend quite a bit of time in EU countries. I have some very good friends there (of local origin) and enjoy my time in a number of places. It isn't "Europe" of which I have a dislike, it is the institution that is the European Union. I see no conflict between wanting the UK to be outside of the European Union and having a home in Europe.

Well, for a starters, the UK is in Europe, as I keep saying. So are Iceland, Norway, Switzerland, Serbia and Albania, amongst others. It is geographically illiterate to claim that countries not in the EU are automatically not in Europe. So by definition, everyone with a home in the UK (or Serbia or Switzerland, etc) also has a home in Europe. "Europe" is a geographical concept, and has a different meaning to "the EU".

But more to the point, it's hypocritical and smacks of "I'm all right Jack".


== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 12 Sep 2023 ==

This seems to me to display a lack of understanding of the motives of Brexiters. I'm pretty sure that virtually no-one campaigned/voted for Leave out of some (malicious?) desire to prevent UK citizens from living or buying properties in Europe. People voted to leave because they wanted to end the situation where huge numbers of people were moving from the EU to the UK, contributing to a massive housing crisis in the UK and making it very hard for many British citizens to get decent work or a place to live and where the UK Government couldn't legally do anything about it.

So why does the UK have to be different? Why are France and Germany not so motivated to block people from other parts of the European continent from living there? To me it's just UK exceptionalism.

I think this "contributing to a massive housing crisis" is just an excuse made up after the fact by Brexiters to justify their views, and try and make the liberal left sympathetic to them. I really can't see that EU citizens are the single most important factor in this. What proportion of UK residents are EU citizens? Isn't it 1 in 20? Scarcely a huge proportion. High property prices and high rents are far more significant, I suspect.