There are four wards in Rayleigh with District Council elections this year -Downhall & Rawreth, Grange, Lodge and Sweyne Park. There are no Labour, Green, UKIP or BNP candidates in Rayleigh this year. Just Lib Dems, Conservatives and English Democrats.
Obviously this piece is going to be a bit biased!
Lib Dem Ron Oatham is standing for re-election in Downhall and Rawreth. He is in a two-way contest with a Conservative who lives in Hullbridge, Mark Hale. Obviously we hope Ron wins…. 🙂
Lib Dem June Lumley is standing for re-election in Grange Ward. She is being opposed by a Conservative who lives in Hockley, Scott Crossland. And obviously we hope June will win and be able to carry on representing local residents 🙂
We are delighted to have Nicola Davis as our candidate in Lodge Ward. Nicola lives in Rayleigh with her family, and runs a business in the town centre. It’s the first time she has stood as a candidate.
Some residents in the Downhall area may just remember her as “The Lady in Red” who spoke very eloquently at the meeting at Downhall School last year about the proposed Surestart centre there. One thing for sure – whatever happens in the election, Nicola won’t forget the first few months of 2011 – because she had a baby in February! We could certainly do with more parents on the council…. and we very much hope she wins.
She could become a very influential voice….
The sitting councillor here is Conservative Terry Livings, who is stepping down, so someone new has to be elected here. There are three candidates – Nicola for us, Ian Ward for the Conservatives , and Jason Hodson for the English Democrats.
Sweyne Park is a very marginal ward – Jackie Dillnutt won a seat for us here in 2007, and Joan Mockford won the other seat for the Conservatives in 2008. Jackie is stepping down this time and our new candidate is Trevor Parrett. Trevor runs his own printing business in Basildon, lives with his family in Rayleigh and as you can see, is very involved with onlineFOCUS. Trevor would be a very energetic, enterprising councillor for Sweyne Park Ward, and we’d love to see him on the council.
The other two candidates are Toby Mountain for the Conservatives and Alan Twydell for the English Democrats.
Just out of interest, does James Cottis live in Rochford?
I believe so.
But the District Council website just says:
C/o Rochford District Council
Council Offices
South Street
Rochford
Essex
SS4 1BW
Chris and June Lumley were my local councillors and despite at the time leaning more to the right I always voted for them. They actually did do doorknocking, at least twice if not four times a year and their newsletter contained useful news. I remember disagreeing with Chris on recycling bins (I cant remember what, this is going back a good few years now) but respected his well explained position, and I am not sure I was even voting age at the time. You would very rarely see them in the media, unlike some of the “pothole pointers” you get in the Evening Echo.
Contrast this to my current local councillor. I have NEVER EVER seen him or met him, never had any sort of newsletter from him, and only see him in the news when he wants to promote himself.
I just hope that Clegg’s coalition calamity doesn’t result in those excellent councillors losing their seats. But given she only has a non-local Tory opposing her, I don’t think that’s too much of a risk.
Chris and June are an example to us all. I hope people will “Think Local” and see who works hardest for them locally and who keeps them informed. Look at the new post too – Meetings not being attended! National is National, these elections are about our wards in Rayleigh and what we can do here. The more Lib Dems who can get seats the better it will be for Local People.
Sean, many thanks for your kind words about Chris and June.
We aren’t complacent, but when I’ve been canvassing in Rayleigh so far the coalition hasn’t been mentioned very much and doesn’t seem to be affecting things much, either for or against us.
Those people who tend to vote Conservative nationally and Lib Dem locally still seem likely to do so.
As for those on the left , I talked to one lady who said she was to the left of 99% of people in Rayleigh. She was disappointed by the coalition. But she understood why the Lib Dems had gone in for it and she was still almost certainly voting for us locally.
I hope all the LibDem candidates do well contesting the the Rochford District Council seats. The Conservative way of democracy and transparency is to give opposing parties no way to oppose their policies. The Cabinet way of democracy is ‘undemocratic’ and should be seen for what it is. The Conservative candidate for Sweyne Park has called for democracy and transparency in local politics, just remember this candidates views in a few years time, that is all I am asking. I am just sad that I will not live in the Rochford district Council boundary for this election otherwise I would be hopefully, up against the Conservative candidate and maybe cutting their majority down further. Good luck Trevor, If I am still here my vote will go to you.
Many thanks Mike and thank you very much for your help delivering leaflets. I delivered over 250 yesterday and spoke to a lot of people and the feedback is 99% good. Lets hope people will THINK LOCAL and VOTE LOCAL.
Cllr Joan Mockford has asked me to put this message on your focus.
Trevor, you refer to glossy literature, please note that all Conservative Candidates pay for their own personal literature so therefore surely it is the candidates choice. It may be useful to use the space in your literature for something informative rather than wasting the space in worrying about what we are doing.
I have indeed called for openness and transparency within local government and these will still be my views in a few years time. I love living in Sweyne Park Ward and have endeavoured to meet and introduce myself to as many local residents as possible. I also hope that people will think and vote local and remember that I am the only candidate who actually lives in Sweyne Park Ward.
Toby, first of all welcome to onlineFOCUS.
I’m sure you do believe in openness and transparency. So I imagine you are not happy with the way the council cabinet conducts business sometimes!
Anyway, I know you live in Sweyne Park Ward, because I’ve seen the official council list of candidates (you didn’t include your home address in your leaflet, which surprised me) My own view of ‘local’ is that everyone who lives in Rayleigh is local to Rayleigh, everyone who lives in Hullbridge is local to Hullbridge etc. Trevor has been upfront and published his address and full contact details in his leaflet.
Hello Cheryl, Joan and Toby. Great to see you keeping yourselves up to date with onlineFOCUS. You are not alone, more and more “National Conservatives” are supporting us locally.
Thank you very much for your input. You did miss all the points completely but it’s great to hear your views. By all means re-read my leaflet, keep logging on here daily and we will continue to lead the way and keep you and Rayleigh informed.