A REPORT ON MY FOUR YEARS AS A COUNCILLOR – By Richard

The work of a Councillor comprises the work you do for Sutton as a whole on Sutton Council and specific work for residents of the Ward.

 

I have been the Vice-Chair of the Housing, Economy and Business Committee and “lead Councillor” on trading standards and on revenues and benefits. The two most challenging pieces of work I did were the re-design of the Council tax support scheme and the re-design of the Council’s committee system.

 

The Government “localised” Council tax support (the system of support payments to the most needy) by axing the national scheme. It invited local authorities to set up their own scheme but passed down to Councils only some of the funding. This cost Sutton £1.1 million. The challenge was to devise a local scheme which, while inevitably less generous, protected the vulnerable. The scheme I devised, which was ultimately accepted, provided support to those in most need and protected from cuts in benefit the elderly, the disabled, lone parents and families with small children. There were difficult choices and it was one of the most difficult projects I have undertaken in 40 years work in public administration.

 

The revision of the Council’s committee system I worked on was designed to take advantage of provisions in the Localism Act that made it possible to move from an “Executive” system to a “subject committee” system I considered more democratic. I led the group considering options and developed a scheme that was the basis for the system Sutton now has adopted.

 

I also did a lot of work on a scrutiny of the Council’s policies on homelessness. This issue concerned me as I felt that some of the policies being recommended to us by Conservative Councillors would have increased homelessness, and the scrutiny activity demonstrated this.

 

I have also been a member of the Audit Committee, the Scrutiny Committee, the Standards Committee, the Development Control Committee and the representative of Sutton on numerous external bodies and boards, such as the Downland Project (which organises volunteers to, for example, clear scrubland in local woods).

 

When I was elected I obtained an exercise book (I do not trust computerised systems) and wrote on the cover “Casework.” Item number one was an issue raised by a resident of Copse Hill about a tree in the road demolished by a car. I got it replaced. My most recent entry in the Casework book (a disputed parking ticket I got rescinded) is item number 413, but this does not quite do me justice as some of these entries are multiple issues and some issues I was able to resolve almost immediately without resort to the “Casework” book.

 

There are some issues affecting the Ward as a whole that I have worked on that give me particular satisfaction – including the extension of the “no drinking zone” (controlling the drinking of alcohol in a public place) from the town centre to cover most of the Ward, the improvements to the Devonshire Avenue Nature Area while retaining its central purpose as a nature reserve, the safety improvements to the Grange Vale bridge, opening the side entrance to Sutton station (work now underway), getting more trees planted, helping found the Sutton South Hello! Project to tackle social isolation, getting funding for measures to combat speeding in Cavendish Road and Cedar Road, and securing 780 local jobs through the Subsea7 project (jobs are gold dust). The regular surgeries we have held have convinced me that there is a real issue for people in their 50s made redundant from work in getting back into the labour market, and the really big difference you can make to an area is ensuring there are local jobs.  There are very few Councillors in Britain who can claim they have been instrumental in getting so many jobs for their area, given the massive competition between local authorities for such job-creating inward investment.

 

There were also many things I did for individual residents. Some of these projects gave me great satisfaction – such as getting a disabled parking bay moved so that it was not under a tree and thus the disabled resident did not get her car covered, every day, with droppings. For another resident, I got her over £2 000 in a compensation payment through pursuing her case. Some of the issues I dealt with, particularly those involving anti-social behaviour, were difficult and sometimes harrowing.

 

The background I brought to my period as a Councillor was that I am a retired civil servant who was, at one time, Chair of the Board of a European Agency (the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work, based in Bilbao, Spain) and at another time Chair of the Channel Tunnel Safety Authority. After a long career in public service at a European and national level it was a priviledge and a pleasure to use the skills I had obtained, in the service of my immediate, local community. My wife Gloria and I have lived in our Ward for 26 years and both our daughters went to local State schools. I like Sutton, which has a pleasant suburban atmosphere, low crime, good schools, affordable housing and low unemployment. I have been motivated by a desire to play my part in keeping its many benefits. And the values I bring to being a Councillor are those of a concern to use the skills I have acquired in life to benefit the disadvantaged in society – in society as a whole and, in my work these past four years, in the immediate community around me. And I have still managed to find time to play the trumpet in a Sutton-based concert band, playing last year in a concert at Christchurch for the 125th. anniversary of the church, and playing Christmas carols at the Friends’ Meeting House for the past two years.