“I enjoy solving problems“

What Steven asked Habib Tejan, Conservative councillor for St Mary's Island

As part of our ongoing mission to interview all of Medway’s councillors, this month we speak to Conservative councillor Habib Tejan, the chair of the Business Support and Digital Overview and Scrutiny Committee. They met at the Ship and Trades next to St Mary’s Island and discussed what brought him to the UK, how he became a Conservative, and if the financial sector can now be trusted…

Cllr Habib Tejan

Which ward are you the councillor for?
St Mary's Island.

Why are you the councillor for that ward?
Interesting question. I've lived in St Mary's Island since 2004. I moved in with my wife and my two young kids at the time. We wanted somewhere where the children felt safe, happy, and we wanted a comfortable area. St Mary's Island was in the early stage. I visited one of my cousins on the island. I thought I love this place. I thought it's a nice place and we finally moved in just before Christmas. My wife worked in London, and at that tim,e I worked in Maidstone. I was all around the country as well. It was just quite convenient. You take them to school, you go to work, and you get them to an after-school club and pick them up. It was all around family life.
But how did I become a councillor? I work in financial services. We had the financial crisis. I had sadly got made redundant. I was a manager in my firm at the time. I had to give most of my colleagues the sad news, and then eventually I had a meeting, and so I knew. We had started to work for ourselves, set up a partnership in Essex in Lakeside. We set up a finance brokerage and we started working together, but he and myself didn't get on much. I walked away from the business and I started volunteering around the community, St Marys Island in particular and through the voluntary role, I got invited to join the Conservative Party. I carried on volunteering, just giving back, keeping myself busy. I got asked if I would like to stand as a councillor, which I wasn't too sure about at the time, to be honest with you. I'm going through this transition, my kids are young, will I be able to give it all the commitment? I thought about it. I thought it’s about time to serve when you've been called upon. I put myself forward, went through the process, and got elected in 2015.

When you were first elected, it was River ward. Now you're the councillor for St Mary's Island. What's the difference for you as a councillor between the two?
The role is the same. River ward was quite a lot more diverse area. It involved Rochester, the Riverside development, passing through Chatham and Brompton and then, of course, St Mary's Island. You are dealing with a variety of issues from all across the community. I had several PACT (Police and Communities Together) meetings that you had to attend. The issues are slightly different. The issues you had to deal with as a ward member in Rochester were slightly different from the ones you pick up in parts of Chatham, Brompton or even on St Mary's Island. I would say the role was slightly different in terms of some of the stuff you had to deal with. Of course, on the whole, the process is the same. Residents will come to you with issues. There's not much difference apart from every part of Medway, it's a slightly different sort of problems you will be picking up.

What political parties have you been a member of?
Just the Conservatives. I've never joined any others.

Why join the Conservatives?
Seeing what a wreck Labour had left, you're thinking this country needs some fixing. Unemployment was high. Of course, there was a global crisis, but the whole management of it, and the big institutions were being bailed out, and individuals like us were left high and dry. There was no one you could turn to. And I told them, I'm going to support what we need under an alternative government. I'm going to support a party that will bring about financial stability and create that security we're looking for.

In that time, the Conservative Party have had a number of leaders. Who would you say has been the best leader nationally?
We have so many different leaders. It's too early to judge our current leader, because she hasn't led the country. But I think Sunak did a good job during his time.

You're now the chair of the Business Support and Digital Overview and Scrutiny Committee. What does that entail?
It's a vast department within the council. Almost all of the council's 140 services. It's the front-facing department of the council, from HR to IT to customer service, cabs, and everything falls within that directory. Fraud, counter-fraud, and benefits.
It's the actual community service, and being in the scrutiny role is just ensuring that what we've got on the table, serving you, is what we do. You ask this question, you make sure you scrutinise what delivery is going on and how the council is delivering the service. As the chairman of the scrutiny role, you’re chairing the meeting as well, so you're making sure that colleagues, people coming with different ideas and different viewpoints, are able to get those, able to drive the policy forward because that's the work of scrutiny. To be able to pick things up and make recommendations to the executive.

We've passed the halfway mark for the current administration, and from a business support and digital overview perspective, how would you rate the council currently?
In terms of service delivery, we've got, for example, Medway 2.0. It's not where it should be. I don't think our residents are getting exactly what they expect to have from that. People have to, in this digital age, still pick up the phone, rather than just put everything online and upload it. They're still not getting the service they require. They are complaining. That's a lot. Yeah, don't think expectation has been met. We're having the savings that we expected to get from that. There's nothing that can say yes, exactly this is the financial savings we've made, and this is the improvement. It's a journey that is coming in the right direction. The hard-working staff, they're doing a good job, they make a difference at work and are so amazing. I don't want to put them down. You've got some amazing staff, council staff who are innovative, who come up with different ideas on how to make things better for us. But I think it's a little bit too slow.