Oakham Town Council Co-opting

This Wednesday Oakham Town Coucil meet at 7.30 pm at the offices of Victoria Hall, High Street Oakham.
The Agenda at this meeting includes:

Co-option of New Member for Oakham North West. This fortunate person has to work alongside Cllr Lucas and Haworth.

Cllr Lucas spoke to the Rutland Times and mentioned democracy what a joker!

Oakham Town Council does not understand the meaning of democracy. Co-option is not democracy.

The stumbling block to democracy is when the council post a small notice saying 10 residents need to call for a election if not we have the right too Co-opt. People don't see the notice.

In future I think the Council should write to all electors of a ward informing them of a vacancy and setting out instructions.

I speak to people in the ward I live and mention there is a vacancy in our ward caused by the resignation of Mrs Fillingham their response is who? and they can't think of ten people they can approach to call an election and rather more bizarrely most think Oakham Town Councillor and Rutland County Councillor are the same. Many don't know where the town council office is.

Proactive is the new word  used at Oakham Town Council, lets hope they don't forget and get out and involve the community open the doors to the once exclusive club. Work with the Town. When a resident complains about the loss of heritage dont get the Clerk to write and say its not a Town Council Issue.

Would it not be better to just ask for candidates to come forward? rules can be changed as you know, you revoke standing orders when it suits you.

The Council will also consider the report from the internal auditor and to discuss and decide on the recommendations contained in the report. I am surprised they are not kicking the public out at this point. Although I am sure the good relationship the Clerk has with the Auditor there won't be any issue, if there is they wont read it out.

They will then discuss how to deal with the tendering of the new Grounds Maintenance Contract.

They will move onto discuss the Town Council Budget for 2011 -2012

I expect to see cuts to cover the Clerks huge pay increase, next year the clerk will receive an increase whilst most people won't,  his contract automatically gives him a increase plus one extra increment for a qualification he has. This will take him above the scale of recommend pay for Clerks according to a document the council gave me. So as a town we have one of the smallest populations and one of the highest paid Clerks in the country. Yes he is  a nice man. But you don't reward people for being nice.


The last Item is the Toilet Cleaning Contract this is when the public are kicked out, I don't know why they bother . The Clerk told me the details breaching rules. I  am sure they will award the contract to his favoured existing contractor. Why have they allowed him to re tender a higher fee after he made a mistake and tendered a lower fee. This was accepted by the full council it stinks of corruption and if his new fee is lower than the other company questions should be asked. I hope the contractor puts in a higher fee and the Council awards the contract to the new company. The existing contractor clearly wants to continue and had discussions with the Clerk. The other tenderer should be asking questions of course they may not know the reason behind being asked to re tender. The existing contractor also reduced his hours last year and did not reduce his fee.

Councillors should remember who runs the council its you not the Clerk. But if your happy to let him continue to embarrass you, the ignore it. Just don't forget how some of you felt over Tesco and that was his fault.
A Clerks Job is to advise not take control.

I would be happy to do the job for around £17,000 a year. That's a huge saving for the Tax Payer and would make my life a lot more comfortable than existing on my begrudged £65 a week!

I wish more people would speak out about this they  tell me oh he was only a book shop manger once.
I was a shop manager once so that's my qualification.