Voice of the Opposition
Opposition Deputy Leader Cllr George Perfect on the economy, council cuts, and road repairs in Medway
Editor’s note: Every quarter, following a full council meeting, we publish exclusive columns from Medway Council Leader Vince Maple and Conservative Leader of the Opposition Adrian Gulvin. However, Cllr Gulvin is currently recovering from surgery, so Deputy Leader Cllr George Perfect is stepping in to write the column this time around, and we wish Cllr Gulvin a speedy recovery.
Voice of the Opposition
by Cllr George Perfect, Conservative Deputy Leader of the Opposition at Medway Council
April is always an important month. It’s the start of the new tax year and the local authority financial year. The last few years have been tough with record high inflation and increasing energy bills, brought about by Putin’s barbaric war in Ukraine coupled with the impacts of the pandemic. However, as we now move into Spring, the UK is making real progress. This month national insurance has fallen, the state pension has increased by 8.5%, the high-income child benefit charge threshold has been raised, and 15 hours of free childcare a week for parents of 2-year-olds has been rolled out. This is while inflation has fallen to 3.2% which will lead (on current forecasts) to interest rates falling later this year.
At the Medway Council meeting last week, I contrasted the leadership of Medway’s Labour and Co-Operative administration and that of the Conservative-led government in Westminster. Whilst the Government delivers for working people, Labour in Medway continue to play politics on every issue and fail to listen to the people of Medway. Council tax in Medway is up 5%, free swimming has been taken away from children and OAPs, parking charges are up, and £300,000 has been carelessly removed from the road repair budgets. We showed the administration at the Budgetary Council meeting how with careful savings, free swimming could have been delivered, which was voted down. On Thursday, my colleague Cllr Filmer showed the administration how real progress could have been made on tackling Medway’s 2000 potholes, which was again voted down. These two examples aren’t the only ones that demonstrate how this administration is out of touch. Last year, we gave the administration countless opportunities to stop their red route in Rainham, which 64% of respondents went against, and again, this was voted down at every opportunity by Labour.
That’s why we weren’t surprised to hear Medway Labour’s lack of support for the national insurance cuts delivered in the Spring Budget, nor their lack of support for the extra £12.5m delivered to support Medway’s roads through the Government’s Network North programme. A programme which has seen funding diverted from the cancelled HS2 project to smaller ones across the country, undisputedly good news for Medway. Instead of backing our proposal to return the money taken out of highways in their budget, the administration decided to play politics once again, writing a highly charged letter to the Minister for Roads and Local Transport. The administration failed to grasp, however, that the Minister is a good friend of Medway and visited in January to discuss this and very similar issues. Good leadership means accepting responsibility, as the Minister pointed out, this is something this administration is yet to learn.
In ending this month’s Voice of the Opposition, I will repeat the advice of the Roads Minister to the Leader of Medway Council: Councillor Maple, you should live up to the promises you made in your election and deliver for your electorate.
Cllr George Perfect is the Deputy Leader of the Opposition at Medway Council and Conservative councillor for Rainham North.