Voice of the Leader

Medway Council Leader Vince Maple on transparency, Kent's new Reform administration, and upcoming summer events

Editor’s note: Each month, we present a guest column from one of Medway’s elected representatives, rotating between our MPs, council and opposition leaders, and the Police and Crime Commissioner. Today, we welcome Medway Council Leader Vince Maple, who talks about democratic transparency, Kent County Council’s new Reform administration, and upcoming summer events in Medway.

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Voice of the Leader

by Vince Maple, Leader of Medway Council

It’s always good to start with recognising success in Medway so a huge congratulations to the Local Authority team for multiple nominations for the Kent Press and Broadcast Awards – we are lucky in Medway to have not only a multi award winning independent reporting outlet, we have a Medway specific Local Democracy Reporter, a TV channel in KMTV with an associated Digital Local Democracy Reporter, a radio station in KMFM, a newspaper in the Medway Messenger, and of course wider regional media outlets covering Medway.

As an administration, we value these outlets as they share both the positive news of what is happening and, of course, hold us to account. We said before the 2023 elections if given the chance to serve we would have an administration with honesty, integrity, accountability and compassion and those media outlets give us one such method of accountability.

We have also increased the ways local residents can interact with their councillors – whether that is introducing Medway Matters Live where residents can ask questions of the Chief Executive and I, publishing our nationally recognised One Minute Medway making sure residents are regularly informed, participating in the Medway Question Time sessions hosted by Local Authority, or the most recent addition of public questions directly at cabinet meetings.

These things matter because democracy isn’t simply rocking up every few years to put a cross in a box – it should be a constant, ongoing process and I’m incredibly proud of the progress we have made to open up democracy.

Of course, there has been some other democracy happening elsewhere which is worth spending a few sentences on. As readers will absolutely be aware, Kent County Council has had a change of leadership since my last column. Although as a unitary authority, Medway residents are not directly impacted, of course they are potentially impacted in many ways. Not least there will be many Medway residents who work for KCC. As I mentioned at our recent cabinet meeting the letter sent to KCC by three signatories, two of whom have nothing to do with KCC, had a tone which was both pretty disrespectful and bullying – in my view it was disgraceful.

There will be a number of areas where of course Medway and Kent do have to work together, whether that it is the Integrated Care Partnership, the Kent & Medway Economic Partnership or others. I start from a point of trying to work with anyone to get the best outcomes for Medway residents but I am concerned we are seeing meeting after meeting cancelled by the new Reform administration.

The summer is always fantastic in Medway and the line up we have for 2025 is incredible.

One of the outstanding additions this year are the improvements at the much-loved Strand – whether it is the improved signage, the brilliant upgrades tennis courts or the free splashpad – all delivered with zero cost to taxpayers with great partnership working with the Lawn Tennis Association and positive use of Section 106 contributions.

We also have the Love Gillingham weekend taking place in July with both the Medway Mile and the Love Gillingham day taking place in the heart of Gillingham.

Once again we have the summer reading challenge open to our youngest Medway residents – get to one of our many libraries across Medway to find out more.

At the Guildhall you can meet both our newest arrival Grip and some of their flock.

We also have Armed Forces Day taking place once again in partnership with the Historic Dockyard Chatham – tickets are still available here. Whilst you are in the dockyard do pop down to see the brilliant LV21 which has been welcomed home to Medway.

Of course, this year’s Armed Forces Day will be particularly poignant as it takes places with the backdrop of the VE80 commemorations. I was particularly proud of how the community came together to reflect and remember the 80^th anniversary of VE Day. My thanks to everyone who took time to make our commemorations such a success. I’ve had many residents share with me their pride on how that day was approached here in Medway. One highlight for many was the poignant Peace Poem, created by the people of Medway, delivered by poet Dan Simpson at the foot of Rochester Castle .

Our Labour and Co-operative administration continues to make good progress across the programmes and projects we are delivering, of course always paying close attention to our Financial Improvement and Transformation (FIT) plan. That was developed as a result of working with sector experts in local government finance CIPFA, who have delivered two reports on the situation here in Medway – both of those can be found on the council website and show we are making good progress from the “grave situation” we inherited from the previous administration. What we haven’t done in bring in random people with no experience of local government, some of whom are doing the hokey cokey of being in, out, in (at time of writing) – certainly not the way of dealing seriously with local government finance and service delivery.

We have also had our annual council and I want to thank Marian and Douglas for their term as Mayor and Deputy Mayor – they had over 400 civic visits between them. As we promised in opposition we have reinstated the points system to ensure that the role of Mayor doesn’t automatically go to the administration and I wish Trevor and Wayne a successful year.

Finally, I often have people saying how positive delivery of a council service has been, with so many teams and individuals going that extra mile. If you have experienced that I would encourage you to make a submission to the Make a Difference awards, which recognises hard working Medway council officers. nominations close on 27^th June. It is funded by sponsors so no cost to tax payers and is a great opportunity to say thank you to our brilliant officers who, every single day, make me proud to be Medway.

Cllr Vince Maple is the Leader of Medway Council and Labour councillor for Chatham Central and Brompton.