From 2006 to 2010, I was a councillor for Lee Green ward in the London Borough of Lewisham. During that time, I blogged regularly and in 2009 I won the Tim Garden Award for the Best Blog by a Liberal Democrat Holding Public Office. My blog posts from my term of office are archived here in case they prove of use to former constituents, or to those who share my annoyance with faulty street furniture
The Council met last night to set this year’s council tax. As usual, a lengthy debate. There were three options open to us:
- Sir Steve Bullock’s 2.5% rise
- The Green Party’s 2.5% rise (with some different spending priorities to the Mayor’s)
- The Lib Dem proposal to FREEZE Council Tax at the current rate
The Lib Dem group proposed to freeze this year’s council tax to try and make things slightly easier for people in the face of the recession. It’s not a radical proposal – neighbouring Greenwich Council (Labour led) and Southwark Council (Lib Dem led) have done the same thing, as have at least 9 other London Boroughs. We proposed to pay for the freeze by re-allocating a fund the Mayor has set up for (so far unspecified) recession-fighting. The Lib Dem group said we’d judge individual schemes the Mayor put forward on their merits and fund them from the Council’s reserves. This is money the Council puts aside for rainy days – and as I said in my speech last night, it’s more than a little rainy at present. The people who are really being hit hard at the moment are those in work who live in a Council house. They’re seeing their rent rise by 6% and Council Tax by 2.5% – at a time when employers are cutting shifts and making tiny cost of living rises. It’s these people – the working poor – who’d have benefitted most from our amendment.
Our amendment was put to the vote and had the support of all 17 Lib Dems, plus the 2 Socialists and 2 of the Tories (a bizzare alliance, but reflecting the broad support for a tax freeze elsewhere in London). The 6 Greens voted against, as did Labour, so the freeze motion fell. The Green amendment was then put to the vote and was only supported by their group and the Socialists, so fell.
Then the Mayor’s budget was put to the vote – and here’s where it got interesting – all opposition parties voted against, except the Tories, who abstained. As a couple of Labour councillors were absent, that meant the vote was tied. So the Tory Chair of Council ended up passing the budget on his casting vote!
All in all, an interesting night. The Greens could see they weren’t going to get a majority for their proposals, yet refused to back ours, despite the Lib Dem proposals gaining the support of the other 3 opposition parties. The Tories had TWO chances to stop the Mayor’s budget – they could have voted against, which would have seen it fall, or the chair of Council could have cast his vote against, but he chose not to.
So, residents of Lewisham face a 2.5% rise – the second highest in inner London, and the only one of the inner London councils south of the river to increase Council Tax this year.
