Bulging eyes and red face.
The diminutive Parish Chairman was in a filthy mood even before the Parish Council started last Thursday evening.
It was raining. He
was locked out of the Methodist Church Hall.
The Annual Parish Meeting was scheduled for 6:30, half an hour before the
monthly Parish Council. He was on the
phone trying to contact the caretaker.
The Parish Clerk hadn’t told the caretaker about the earlier start. She came in for some choice words. I was the only other person there. He had to talk to me until another Councillor
arrived. That unleashed a torrent.
The Council vacancy will be filled by an election, not by co-option of mates! The Residents will decide! Strelczenie will not get to browbeat the Vegetables
to co-opt his choice.
Maybe he was
thinking about the time his wife was up for co-option. The proper Parish Clerk back then, Brian
Hopper, told Strelczenie he should not take part in the co-option. That didn’t bother the little Napoleon. He ignored the Clerk so she was co-opted on to the
Council. Four of the eleven Council seats
occupied by two friendly families - until residents kicked two of them off.
In his agitated state, maybe ‘Gobby’ was thinking of the
village grapevine. Months ago, the village
grapevine alleged the Parish History Gang had done a dirty deal with the
Village Hall Gang. Chairman Strelczenie wouldn’t
be challenged by Vice-chairman Procter in the annual appointment of Parish
Chairman. Not like last year, then. A Councillor was about to resign. As reward for not challenging the Chair, a
Village Hall Gang Member would be slid on to the Council. The chosen ‘candidate’ was collecting names already
in support. That person hadn’t taken any
visible interest in Council before.
Anyway,
that would be a better deal than having a Hagg Lane Green Gang Member back on
the Council. They had lost three of
their seats at the last election after four year of buggering about and doing
very little. Unless you think banking
the precept at no interest to be an achievement. The Council auditor didn’t think so! Neither did the residents.
Maybe Strelczenie had been spitting blood all day. The Clerk got an email earlier that day
telling her there will be an election. Residents
will decide. Gobby doesn’t get to fill
the vacancy by co-option.
Thwarted Gobby was enraged.
He words about an election were made before the meeting started, so I
won’t record them. He was reminded about
“The Costs of Democracy” built into every Council budget to pay for residents
to decide whom they want.
To pump up the pressure further, the Annual Meeting
started in high farce. Strelczenie
started reading the minutes of last year’s Annual Meeting in his usual,
faltering style. He reported it had been a short meeting with no Public present.
Councillors sat there like ‘rabbits in the headlights’ – physically
present, but disinclined to contradict livid Gobby. Where are their brains? The Parish Clerk, who had arrived two minutes
before the meeting started, just sat there.
The Chairman’s saw a raised hand in the public gallery. Questions and comments at the end, he said.
It wasn’t a Parish Council meeting; the rules are different.
YOU ARE WRONG! Residents WERE at last year’s
annual meeting. I have it on film! Do you remember when ………! Another resident chipped in. The evidence was overwhelming. Gobby and the Clerk had completely messed up, even getting the location of the meeting wrong. Gobby
doesn’t take embarrassment very well.
What’s wrong with the vegetable-like Councillors? Why did ceiling-staring Vice-chairman Bob
Procter just sit there? What’s so interesting
for him on the ceiling? Are most Councillors
so concerned by only their vested interests they don’t know what’s going on
under their noses? If Gobby had said ‘Elvis
is alive and living in Hemingbrough’, they would say nothing, unless he was said
to be living on Hagg Lane Green.
Anyway, back to the forthcoming parish election. It can’t be held on General Election day. If Eddie had resigned a month earlier, it
could have been, but that’s life. Selby
District Council prefers residents should vote to fill a vacancy. Co-option is a device for those Parishes
where there are not enough candidates to fill council seats and co-opting mates
is the only way to get a council.
A
parish needs only ten residents to trigger an election. It had taken the vastly experienced, independent
Councillor Chilvers less than an hour to gather the signatures. One of them was from the independent Councillor
Keith Terry.
BUT, DOES IT MATTER?
How do you feel about the potential diesel tanks risks and
costs ‘time-bomb’ under the Memorial Gardens being transferred from the Parish
History Gang (leader Jan Strelczenie and his wife) to the Parish Council (leader
Jan Strelczenie) without a full debate as an ‘Agenda’ item in Council?
The Council needs independent Councillors.
The potential costs could bankrupt the Council, suggests one
Councillor. Some Councillors are already
getting cold feet about their late night sneaky session vote for residents to
take ownership of the Gardens, and the tanks!
DUE DILIGENCE? Gobby probably doesn’t know the phrase - reasonable steps, such as a survey or risk assessment, taken to avoid being neglectful or just plain stupid.
