[2011] PRIVATE & PUBLIC LIFE IN THE 1970s

0235 Elmbridge Borough Council

When I became a borough councillor, I shifted gear into a more important role.  Being a politician, albeit aligned with no party, gives you responsibilities that others don't have. In return it gives you a feeling of self-fulfilment which is difficult to match.  I seemed to be walking a little taller, and to be recognised by others as someone apart.

This feeling was enhanced by the formal procedures of the Council, when we met in the council chamber, all seated at our individual desks. It seemed almost like theatre -- and this was enhanced even further by the fact that we had a gallery of spectators.  I found that I was soon able to fit into the rigmarole, the formalities of which made even the simplest contribution a complex process.  And, very soon, I started to make those contributions.

The meetings took place in the evening, since it was assumed the councillors were part-time and had other jobs during the day.  As such, we only got minimal expenses and no salary.  About seven o'clock, therefore, we would congregate and go to our designated places in the council chamber, proudly sitting behind our name plates.  The air seemed almost quiver with anticipation, about the decisions yet to be made.  I don't know why I felt like this, since the Conservatives dominated the council with something like 35 out of the 60 councillors.  We had approaching 20, Labour had five or six and the Liberals 3 or 4.  Thus, at that time, there was no chance that we could vote for anything that would overturn the wishes of the Conservatives. The whole proceedings, therefore, were a sham!

The mayor presided, though in fact he didn't hold the real power. That was held by the ‘leader of the council’, in essence the leader of the Conservative party, whose decisions were the ones that mattered. The mayor was merely a figurehead, who supposedly maintained an unbiased position. Indeed, somewhat later, the Conservatives even offered the position to me. I didn't accept because it was a position without any power and cost a great deal of money -- reportedly something like £30,000 for the year -- which I couldn't afford.

The mayor sat on a dais facing us, flanked by various council officials -- the chief executive and the various heads of departments. It was an impressive occasion, and the formalities with which the debates, such as they were, were undertaken gave it a feeling of power.

In fact, there was also almost no real power on display whatsoever. All the decisions had been taken beforehand in the various committees and the main council was merely a rubber stamp. Occasionally there was some debate, usually started by the Labour councillors as a means of showing that they existed, but the outcome was inevitable.  The only thing which made it worthwhile was that, from time to time, we - residents association councillors - actually did hold the council to real debates about subjects we thought was important.  The thing that really confused Conservatives, and interested the local press, was that we never knew what our final decision would be. We used to actually listen to the debates and take our decisions on the basis of that, rather than follow the three-line whip as did everyone else!

As I have said the real decisions were taken in the committees.  Of these, the Policy and Resources committee was the senior committee, which in essence led the other committees.  I was immediately put on Policy and Resources committee -- where the various political parties (including the residents association) had memberships of the various committees in proportion to their members on the council overall.  I guess the residents association put me on because they thought I would be a strong councillor, which I was. But - after a year - I eventually gave up Policy and Resources.  I found that it was, rather like the council, more of a formality – more about that status of its members - than a real debating chamber.  It was -- as the senior committee -- once more ruled by the party divisions.

The other committee that I was put on, where we typically only had two committees each, was the planning committee.  This was my favourite choice, since it played to my interest in architecture.  It was also the committee which in reality had the most power over the lives of the people of Elmbridge.  We decided what could and could not be built in Elmbridge.  Even then the full planning committee was rarely the forum for the important debates.  Within it there were three planning subcommittees, one for each area, and they were where the real debates took place.  The reason for this was, not least, that these were confidential.  All other meetings of the council could be attended by anyone, especially the press, so that made debates rather risky for any dissidents who were appointed by the political parties.  In the subcommittees we could say what we thought. As such, these subcommittees actually did work well, and political differences were not to be seen.

Most of the planning applications were of a minor nature, typically house extensions, since the area was already built up; with few opportunities for major developments.  Even so, when neighbours clashed, the debate could get quite fraught -- with neighbours recruiting councillors as their lobbyists.

Before I got into the council I'd spent a lot of time organising meetings to oppose planning developments.  Once I was on the council, however, I put most of my effort into persuading my fellow subcommittee members to support our views.  This was a new departure for the residents association, who had developed a reputation for always fighting issues - regardless of the facts of life.  My diplomacy was later enhanced when another councillor was elected and joined the subcommittee alongside me.  Gwen Barber was a lovely lady who followed very much the same style as myself.  Between us we put a lot of pressure on other councillors and the officers.

Incidentally her husband was a member of the Special Branch.  He was the only person I knew who slept with a revolver under his pillow. He was in its protection squad and, at that time, was on duty protecting the Northern Ireland minister -- the most dangerous job in the country, as the IRA were then very active.  He was a person whose whole life revolved around the special branch -- though he happily admitted that they regularly broke the law in order to achieve their results.  He was eventually fast-tracked, in that he managed to get moved from sergeant to inspector within the Special Branch.   This was highly unusual, because most promotions had to be gained by people going out of the Special Branch. 

I remember that that this promotion was very important.  As a sergeant his job was quite simply to get in the way of any bullet fired at the Secretary of State.  As an Inspector his job was to point to the person who would get in the way of the bullet.  That really was a worthwhile promotion!

Anyway I worked, with Gwen, very hard behind the scenes and we eventually swung the committee behind us.  Such was the impact of this that the other members of the committee essentially ignored their political affiliations and joined us to work as a team.

For some reason, I think it was still about sharing jobs, I was appointed deputy chair of this committee.  To my surprise when the chair resigned, and I expected a Conservatives to be appointed to the chair, I was instead elected by the committee to the chair. This was highly unusual, since I was the only non-Conservative holding any such position within the council.

As the chair of the subcommittee, I worked even harder to bring the committee together as one team. Soon we worked very effectively, to simply represent the people without any political import whatsoever. 

This came to a head when there was a larger development applied for, in the centre of Walton.  We discussed this at some length, and obtained concessions from the developer, at which point we reasonably agreed to support the application when we got the full council. To my surprise, when I introduced the recommendations from the subcommittee, I suddenly realised that other members of the council were speaking against this -- which was very unusual in view of the way that everything was normally stitched up in advance. I, fortunately, was able to speak last and put forward our views quite cogently. In the event we won, by a nose.  As usual the Labour, Liberals and - of course - the residents association councillors supported me. This was not least because I made good argument, but to my surprise the Conservatives on the subcommittee also voted with me; and that made the difference. 

Afterwards the Conservative leader of the council grasped my hand enthusiastically, and said " Congratulations David that is the first time anyone has won against a three line whip." Unknown to me the Conservatives had put out a three line whip against our position.  Despite that, the cohesiveness of the subcommittee had forced its members to take our agreed position; and they had still backed our original decision.  I later on found out that the reason for the council opposing the decision was that it was going to be the subject of inquiry by the local government ombudsman -- there had been some jiggery-pokery by an office behind the scenes.

It was, very soon, a friendly and worthwhile atmosphere -- at least on the subcommittee.  And, indeed, this mood seemed to have infected the rest the council which also started to become much more non-political in its considerations.  Thus, after seven years, when I retired from the council, it was in effect a non-political body.  Fairly soon after that it was taken over by the residents associations in toto.  The Conservatives, worried by the emergence of the residents association (which was unusual, in that this was the only council where this happened), had recruited the chairmen of the local residents associations to be their Conservative candidates.  What they didn't realise was that this was bringing a Trojan horse inside the walls, and those Conservatives soon returned to being residents association representatives!

I was proud of the feeling of shared service to the community that I brought the council.  It showed me that it was possible to have a political institution without the confrontation that is at the heart of the party systems.  Having said that, when I left the council and another residents association councillor took over from me, he was much more combative and the whole atmosphere of collaboration fell away very rapidly.  It shows just how fragile democracy is.

[back]     [home]

hits