By Cllr Stephen Conway
Readers of Wokingham Today will, by now, be familiar with the financial challenges facing councils across the land, regardless of the colour of their political leadership.
Everywhere, high levels of inflation, rising demand for services, falling income, and increasing interest rates are hitting councils hard.
In Wokingham Borough Council’s case, the situation is made worse by historic underfunding by central government; we received a very small increase in core funding from Whitehall this year, nowhere near enough to cover inflation, let alone help us pay for rising demand for services. We are particularly dependent, therefore, on what money we can raise ourselves and what savings we can make.
Some councils, better supported by central government than Wokingham, have effectively gone bankrupt – Slough, Thurrock, and Woking are nearby examples. The consequences for the people of those boroughs have been truly awful – government commissioners inflict deep cuts in services and much higher council tax rises than the government allows other councils.
In the face of these existential challenges, councillors of all parties have to face up to their responsibilities and put aside political differences.
The people whom we are here to serve expect, rightly, that we will work together to overcome problems, not seek to make cheap party political points. They know we have different views, but they expect us to work collaboratively when necessity demands it.
I am perhaps the least tribal of council leaders. I am a member of a political party – the Liberal Democrats – but I don’t think my party or I have all the answers. I respect other’s point of view and am always willing to try to seek common ground on which opponents can unite and build.
In that spirit, I offered a collaborate approach to the opposition when I became leader of the council. To me, this is part of my wider commitment to a partnership agenda of working with everybody we can as an administration – whether that’s other councils, the voluntary and charitable sector, businesses, educators, the Youth Council, healthcare providers, or the emergency services – to achieve the best for Wokingham Borough and its residents.
So far, we have had some real successes in forging productive and effective partnerships.
My ambition is to include partnerships within the council itself in this list of successes. Council officers and elected councillors are working together well, with a relationship based, as all successful relationships must be, on mutual trust and respect. But effective working between the ruling group and the opposition remains elusive.
Committed as I am to a collaborative approach, which subordinates pleasing the party faithful to serving the public wherever possible, it takes two to tango.
I started my term as council leader with what objective observers regard as an inclusive offer to the opposition to join with us in trying to tackle the council’s many challenges. I hope, in the same spirit, that they will find it possible to respond more positively than they have done so far.
I’m not asking them to give up their proper role of holding the administration to account – we all benefit from that – but to be less partisan and more focused on helping to produce the best outcomes for local people and local businesses.
My door is always open.
Cllr Stephen Conway is the leader of Wokingham Borough Council and ward member for Twyford
