On a hot night eleven councillors, 20%, were absent (see Addendum).
What did they miss? Not a lot. There were no motions, which shows a tragic lack of ambition by the Conservatives. David Taylor, a Conservative, wrote in the Havering Daily,1 that spending £300,000 on the ULEZ High Court case was a good idea. This might have drawn a crowd especially as it involved slashing councillor allowances.
Question Time was the only event.
Martin Goode (54 minutes)2 probed the Leader about agency staff. His answer possibly gave a hostage to fortune. Christine Smith (1:13) asked an important question about measles. Gillian Ford said Havering was better than London but worse than England, which sounds pretty bad. David Taylor (49) promoted *Faith* groups who provide services to the community. He asked for a meeting. Perhaps the Leader will chat with other volunteer groups who patch up LBH’s social services, at no cost to the borough.
Dilip Patel (1:07) stood in for Jason Frost and posed a killer supplementary question to Oscar Ford. Cabinet members read prepared answers but do they understand what they’re reading? The critical question about how many child-carers there are was fundamental to Ford’s answer. He didn’t know. He hadn’t done his homework.
I take a jaundiced view of eulogies but Stephanie Nunn was a warrior. She overcame her distress (5 minutes 45 seconds) announcing the death of Barbara Matthews. She carried on orchestrating speeches – not all of which were of the highest quality.
Addendum: Absent councillors
Joshua Chapman, John Crowder, Philippa Crowder, Sarah Edwards, Brian Eagling Jason Frost, David Godwin, Robby Misir, Sue Ospreay, Philip Rock and Natasha Summers
Notes
2 Annotator Player (sonicfoundry.com) All times are in brackets and refer to this webcast
Politics in Havering 