Bad for politics and bad for democracy in Tameside!

Tameside Labour Council Leader Kieran Quinn

To the resounding cheers from his Labour colleagues, the Executive Leader of Tameside Council, Councillor Kieran Quinn stated that ........ "because we understand and empathise with how tough many households are finding it, we have decided not to raise the Council Tax this year" and "morally we cannot heap more financial pressure on households already struggling to pay for the basics and keep a roof over their heads."

No further increase in the Council Tax is certainly something to be welcomed. But what about last year, when people were first being hit with the Bedroom Tax? That didn't stop Tameside Council from putting up the Council Tax by 3.5%. It didn't stop the nasty letters from the council or the extra charges being imposed upon many people struggling to meet their monthly payments! There were, as I recall, no cries of anguish or howls of outrage echoing through the Town Hall from any of our Labour councillors then - only a subdued wall of enforced silence!

Last year however, there were no local elections, so the Council Tax went up. This year there are local elections, so there will be no increase in the Council Tax. Meanwhile, the final decision on the future of Children's Centres throughout Tameside, like the decision on the libraries two years ago will not be taken until June - a month after the local elections.

Maybe I am being cynical? However, the closure of the libraries announced in June 2012 brought about a huge public outcry in those areas affected. Yet, to quote the words of Labour Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, a week is a long time in politics - and after almost two years, a crafty Tameside Council would reasonably expect most of the outrage caused by those closures to have died down by now and for the anger of the people affected to be replaced by a grudging acceptance. Similarly, the increase in the Council Tax last year would also be softened by the decision not to increase it this year!

Soon, the local elections of May 2014 will be upon us once more, and Labour councillors will go into those elections confident that any damage to their own prospects of re-election will be quite minimal. After all - and just for good measure - they can and will be placing all of the blame onto the Conservative/Lib Dem Government.

The councillors are, no doubt, depending mostly on voter apathy to get themselves re-elected in May (if they can just bring their own supporters out to vote in a low turnout - they will win). It is a sad truth that people who feel disillusioned and powerless to change or influence anything will simply stay at home and refuse to vote. 

Once re-elected and safe in the secure knowledge that they have successfully avoided any consequences from angry voters they can and will proceed to close down many of those Children's Centres in June -  confident that, by next year, those closures too will have been largely accepted???

I believe it is wrong for councillors to use the electoral system for their own maximum political advantage in such a cruel, manipulative way. It is bad for politics and bad for democracy in Tameside! 

It is also demonstrates that Tameside Labour councillors are not the strong "local voices" that they like to say they are! 

Carl Simmons

Denton South Independent

Friday 7th March 2014