Tunbridge Wells Tories

A cornucopia of stories about Tunbridge Wells Conservatives in this week's Courier.

It all starts so well with a piece about the government post of our splendid MP, Greg Clark.

Unfortunately (for the Tories) after that it is downhill all the way.

Let's start with Councillor Colin Bothwell who managed to hand out prizes of bottled beer to two children aged 13 and 15 at a fete. Really an innocent mistake, but why apologise profusely to the parents? If anyone is to blame it is the organisers of the event who put the prizes into his hands.

We move on to the new Mayor of Tunbridge Wells, Councillor David Jukes. Councillor Jukes probably is the first Mayor of Tunbridge Wells not to live in the Borough. He has moved to East Sussex. The Mayor is the leading citizen of Tunbridge Wells and is second only to the Queen in precedence in Tunbridge Wells. I don't think the nation would be enamoured if the Queen decided to up sticks and live in France.

However the real fun surrounds events at the mayor-making, otherwise known as the annual council meeting. Councillor Sean Holden (Con) who has been a thorn in the side of colleagues had the temerity (as did Councillors David Neve (Lib Dem) and Councillor Linda Hall (Con)) to raise issues of a 'political' nature. I believe they were entitled to do so under the Council's standing orders. When I was a councillor I joined forces with Councillor Ian Carvell to ask a number of questions at the mayor making meeting.

According to the Courier the mayor became irate saying:

I have been told not to say anything political and I don't think you should either.

Very odd: The Mayor as leading citizen is expected not to make any political comments during his year of office and at Council meetings should do likewise. The Courier informs us that the Leader of the Council, Councillor Roy Bullock, apologised to the assembled members of the public and dubbed Councillor Holden's behaviour as disgraceful. It reads like the workings of a totalitarian state where criticism and debate is stifled. Looks as though the knives are out for Councillor Holden and I don't rate his chance of being a Conservative candidate next time his seat is up for election. Methinks Greg Clark is going to have to work very hard in Tunbridge Wells to bring the local Tory establishment up to speed on his Party's thinking on local government.

Finally, the Courier carries a story about the Tunbridge Wells Borough Council's Transport Strategy. The personae includes the aforementioned Councillor Holden ably assisted by Councillor Brian Ransley (Con) and Councillor David Neve. Worth a blog on its own (see next blog), but again indicative of the strains within the Conservative group on Tunbridge Wells Borough Council.