Residents of Bradley Stoke are invited to have their say at the Annual Town Meeting on Wednesday evening (12th May) at the Jubilee Centre, Savages Wood Road (7:30pm start).
The meeting will receive summary reports from the Chair of Council (Cllr Mark Forsyth), the Chair of the Finance & Leisure Committee (Cllr Ben Walker) and the Chair of the Planning, Environment & Amenities Committee (Cllr Morgan Baynham).
Members of the public will then have the opportunity to put questions to Councillors in an open session.
The Chairs’ full reports are contained in the Annual Report for 2009/2010, which should by now have been delivered to all households in the town. [Ed: Other arrangements have presumably been made for getting the report to the eight Councillors, from the total of 15, who are not resident in the town!]
A section towards the end of the Annual Report details the attendance record of Councillors during the past financial year. Top marks go to Cllr Ben Walker (Conservative, pictured right) who has attended an astonishing 22 Council and Committee meetings, making him the only representative with a 100% record.
Residents in the Manor Farm ward may be concerned to learn that their elected representative, Cllr Sandra Hobson (Liberal Democrat), has attended just two of the 17 meetings at which she was expected over the past twelve months.
All those attending Wednesday’s meeting are invited to join Council members and staff for light refreshments after the proceedings.
I do not think that your comment about 8 town councillors who don’t live in Bradley Stoke is fair to make. All this does is to repeat Cllr Jon Williams rant.
If you go back three years to the last local election the Libdems didn’t fight at least seven seats. They did fight all South Glos seats – which carry a salary – but not the Town Council which is totally unpaid. If it wasn’t for these councillors large parts of Bradley Stoke would be unrepresented.
So please don’t be so biased and report all the facts – not just snippets to continually get at the Conservative unpaid councellors who cared enough to stand.
Darius, I wasn’t making a political point – note that I didn’t say which party or parties the eight out-of-towners belong to.
Full credit to the Councillors for standing in the first place and for working without financial reward but I just don’t think it’s a healthy situation for the town.
We need to get more townsfolk interested and involved in the running of our Town Council, an aim to which I hope The Journal makes a useful contribution.