Tory Veterans Minister- out of touch with Armed Forces

David Ellesmere , soldiers and tickets to watch Jools

Tory Veterans Minister - out of touch with Armed Forces? - Some would say no surprise that a Minister is out of touch with those who he is meant to represent, but I was surprised how much Tory Minister, Andrew Robathan was out of touch with not only veterans but serving members of our Armed Forces. Why surprised? Mr Robathan is a veteran himself. Without being seen to be playing the class card it may be as an ex Guards Officer he does not understand the pressures that both serving soldiers and veterans are living under.



Andrew Robathan - out of touch?

I attended the Local Government Association sponsored conference in London on Tuesday. It was attended by councillors and council officers from all over England plus representatives from the Ministry of Defence, serving soldiers plus representatives from Service charities.

Most of the councils represented were County Councils and the idea of the conference was to get councils to sign up for the Community Covenant Scheme. Hampshire, Oxfordshire and North Yorkshire have led the way. By signing up you are able to access grants from the MOD to help both the local and Military communities.

Disappointingly Suffolk County Council did not attend but I represented Ipswich Borough Council and we will be looking at joining the Community Covenant Scheme. We have already started working closely with our local military units. On Saturday a number of troops from Wattisham received free tickets to see Jools Holland at the Regent and next week those who reside in Ipswich will get access to our sports facilities. Most of the troops residing in Suffolk live in our more rural districts and the County Council would be best placed to set up a scheme with the military. But as Suffolk seem more keen on getting rid of the services it is already responsible for it seems unlikely they will want to commit to the scheme.

I was fortunate to be able to ask the Veterans Minister a question and then get into a discussion with General Rollo, the senior soldier presentm both my questions led to further debate.



General Rollo, waiting for my question?

Most of the councils were Tory run, and I expect that Mr Robathan expected an easy ride but that did not happen. Mr Robathan was quick to boast about how the Tory Government had doubled the Operational Allowance, a Tory councillor from Huntingdon (and a veteran) was quick to tell the Minister that this increase had come at the same time that many other military allowances were being cut, including Disturbance Allowance and grants for education.

The Minister was then warned by Dawn McCafferty, chairman of the RAF Families Federation, about the impact of redundancies and cuts to allowances on service personnel.

She told the Local Government Association conference on the covenant that many were "keeping their heads down" in an attempt to avoid the next rounds of job cuts.

"Families are hurting and actually the covenant doesn't mean a great deal to those who have just received a redundancy notice," she said.

This was disappointing to hear and I hope the Minister took note but as he did not stay for the afternoon session, I am not sure he understood how many in the military and those working for military charities feel totally let down by the Tory Government.

What was good, is that many in the Ministry of Defence are keen to work with local councils to improve the lives of those in the military, veterans and their families.

You can be certain that Ipswich Borough council will be playing it's part.

My week ahead 31 October - 6 November

Monday 31 October 6pm - Labour Group meeting

Tuesday 1 November 9am - Communities supporting our Armed Forces … our Armed Forces supporting their communities - conference in London

Saturday 5 November 10.30am - Campaigning in East Ipswich

Sunday 6 November 7pm - Labour Bonfire Night - Fund raiser

This week has seen further campaigning in St Margaret's, seen the occasional Tory out delivering leaflets but the Lib Dems seem to have given up or are very confident.

On Thursday I attended a meeting of the licensing committee at Ipswich Borough Council, one of our more important meetings this year as it gave us an opportunity to discuss the new Governments proposals for licensing (in short, it looks like it will be self regulation and only one of the committee thought this was an improvement on current legislation)

As it was such an important meeting it was very disappointing that 3 Tory councillors failed to turn up and did not even send in their apologies, now they are not in power seems that some of the Ipswich Tories have lost interest in attending meetings (and representing their constituents).

I was in London on Saturday so missed the Jools Holland concert at the Regent. Not only was it disappointing to miss Jools but this was the event where we launched Ipswich Borough Council's partnership with 'Tickets for Troops'. This will enable members of our Armed Forces to enjoy free tickets for events at the Regent and the Corn Exchange. A number of soldiers and their partners from the Army Air Corps at Wattisham were the first recipients of tickets from this scheme.

Glen Chisholm - The man for St Margaret's Ward - Ipswich

GLEN CHISHOLM WANTS TO BE AN IPSWICH BOROUGH COUNCILLOR. This may seem obvious. Why else would he stand for election in St Margaret's ward on 10th November?

But when you know how this by election came about, perhaps it is not so strange that this is an issue in this election. Back in May, St Margaret's ward elected a Tory councillor for the first time since 1998. Within four months she had resigned from the Council.

Local Tories tried to hide the reason she had resigned, citing "personal reasons", but Mrs Stokes was prepared to go on the record. She has told the Evening Star that she was misled into standing by Ipswich Conservatives, who did not make her aware of the commitment involved, told her she would not win and left her almost completely unsupported as both a candidate and a councillor. Ipswich Tories have cost the Council Taxpayers of Ipswich £10,000 through this unnecessary by election. They do not deserve your support.

The Tory candidate is Stephen Ion - now the Tories will make a big deal of Stephen living in the ward, but after losing there in 2010, he jumped ship to Rushmere ward (where he lost again) and the Tory leaflets kept going on about how he has been working tirelessly for Rushmere residents - so where does his loyalty lie?



Labour's Glen Chisholm has done his research. He attended a non-partizan training event organised earlier in the year, and after deciding that he has something to offer, he spoke to Labour councillors about his next steps. He actively campaigned in Whitehouse and Whitton wards earlier in the year, helping Stephen Connelly win Whitton for Labour, for the first time since 2002, and Martin Goonan to massively increase Labour's share of the vote in a ward the Conservatives had hoped to win. He has been an active campaigner against Tory cuts to school crossing patrols, libraries and legal aid.



Glen was born and brought up in Ipswich attending local schools and Suffolk College, before working for a local insurance company. He previously served our community as a Special Constable for five years. Glen will not let you down.


I was one of 4 councillors from different political groups who spoke to members of the public interested in being councillors at an event held in the town, I am glad that I never put Glen off and that he thought the Ipswich Labour Party best represented the views of someone born and bred and living and working in this great town - Vote Gen Chisholm on the 10th November

Taking Decision Making Closer to the People

The Tory/Lib Dem coalition talk about their 'localism' agenda, but in reality all we have seen is Eric Pickles telling councils when they must empty their bins, or on the other hand we are told 'localism' will mean more say for communities but in reality again it means we will allow developers able to build what they want, where they want.

In Ipswich we have for a number of years tried to enable the local community to have more say in local decisions, we currently have area forums, these have had success in getting information over to local residents but they have not had any real power. Councillors have attended but not been put in a position where they can answer to the public for the deeds they have carried out. There has been money available to each forum area but both local councillors or residents have had no real say in how that is spent. Ipswich Labour had seen the influence of the forums wane under the last Tory administration where it seemed the power just sat in the hands of one person- not even the leader but John Carnall.

We have now started changing that, we have already seen the all party working groups have their first meetings, the one I attended worked well. It gave backbench councillors an opportunity to have a say in policy, and that was backbench councillors from all 3 party's. It was then slightly disappointing that the Tories did not attend two of the working groups.

Labour are keen to hear what local residents think about these new proposals, including area forums being replaced by area committees -Here is the statement from IBC.


Ipswich Borough Council is looking at ways of moving power closer to the people through an ambitious programme to give communities a real say.

"We are looking at options for devolving decision-making to the local level," says the Leader of the Council, Councillor David Ellesmere.

"This would involve ward councillors working with community groups, businesses and residents on a wide range of services, based geographically on the five existing forum areas.

"In order to deliver this, we have published for consultation a paper entitled 'Taking decision-making closer to the people'."
Among its key proposals are:

Developing local Area Committees to devolve specific powers to ward councillors.
Giving councillors more opportunities to be informed by residents and users on how services can be improved through Panels.
Giving backbench councillors a role in developing policies and advising the Executive on its forward plans through active Working Groups.
Making better use of new technology including websites, social networking and Twitter; to reach and engage new people and improve services.
Reducing the number of other meetings that take place, as we seek to focus decision and policy making in these new and cost effective bodies.

Councillor Ellesmere added: "I believe these changes could make a real difference to how Ipswich is run. They would enable councillors of all political parties to take a more active part in the running of the council and better able to represent their constituents."
More information is available in the report Taking Decision Making Closer to the People. Comments must be received by 11th November 2011 and should be submitted by email to areacommittees@ipswich.gov.uk or by post to:

Councillor David Ellesmere
Ipswich Borough Council
Grafton House
15-17 Russell Road
Ipswich
IP1 2DE

My week ahead 24 - 30 October

Monday 24 October 4pm - Meeting with officers, discussing culture in Ipswich
Thursday 27 October 9am - Licensing meeting - Grafton House

Not many meetings this week but that leaves plenty of time to join residents in their campaign to stop the Golden Key becoming a supermarket and also helping with the Labour campaign in St Margaret's Ward.

The week just gone has also seen plenty of time spent campaigning in St Margaret's but also time to work on issues concerning Rushmere Residents,on Sunday the 16th October, I met local residents outside the Candy Box in Woodbridge Road as they handed over a petition against the planning proposal that would see the Golden Key pub becoming a site for a supermarket. An hour later along with Labour colleagues we met an even larger group of residents who are very concerned that a supermarket may be built next to what is a major road junction.

The evening was spent at a Labour fundraising 'Harvest Supper' - great food, good company but no quiz!

Monday saw North East Ipswich councillors meet the local police to talk about police priorities for the area.

Wednesday was meeting day - 3 of them - starting with planning, the committee turned down a proposal for a building development in Levington Road - more here. In the afternoon I met the manager of the Regent Theatre to discuss 'Tickets for Troops' and then the day finished off with a meeting of the Leisure and Culture Working Group where we discussed the savings we will have to make next year. It was good that both Tory and Lib Dem councillors contributed towards the discussions, something that was not even permitted under the last Tory/Lib Dem administration. It is far more democratic to allow all councillors to have an input, slightly disappointing that no Tory Councilor was able/or could be bothered to attend a similar working group about housing.

Thatcher and friends!

Those in the Tory supporting media and even Tories closer to home have enjoyed going on about Tony Blair and Gordon Brown meeting Gaddafi, or as they put it being friends of Gaddafi. An example here from Tory supporting blog 'A Riverside View'.

But I was surprised that our local Tory MP, Ben Gummer even linked Blair, Brown and Gaddafi in one of his tweets,

Now all national leaders often have to meet, shake hands and discuss issues with people they would rather not even have to spend 10 seconds with. As an ex soldier I still find it hard to see politicians of all sides having to meet and talk with the likes of Gerry Adams and Gerry Kelly. But I also know by doing that it has helped cement peace in Northern Ireland.

Mrs Thatcher and General Pinochet - actually forget that she probably enjoyed meeting him (as many other Tories would) but even Ipswich Tories and Ben Gummer may not be so happy to be reminded of this photograph.

The Levington Road problem

Planning issues have been the topic of a number of posts on various Ipswich political blogs recently, a number of these posts have been about the proposal to turn the Golden Key into a supermarket but two of the Tory supporting blogs have had an identical post about a planning application to build a bungalow in Levington Road.

Nothing wrong with that you may think? That is what political activists should do, inform residents of local issues that they may be interested in. But what has annoyed me with these two Tory posts is the assumptions, some may even say accusations made by a senior Tory councillor- someone who should know better.

The same post by Cllr Liz Harsant is published on both the Ipswich Politics and A Riverside View blogs. The post is a copy of her Evening Star column that was in the paper this Tuesday (18th October) but this is where it starts to go wrong. It seems after sending her column to the local paper she handed it over to one of her Tory colleagues to place on their blog, the post went up on the two Tory supporting blogs a week before it appeared in the paper. You would have thought they would have at least waited till the article had been printed, especially as the post is date sensitive, referring to a planning meeting that will take place tomorrow (the 19th). It makes you wonder if Nadia Cenci or Kevin Algar even read it before putting it up on their blog.

But the Evening Star decided not to publish all Cllr Harsant’s article and though it has the item about the bus shelter on Nacton Road, the ‘Star’ decided not to print the item about the Levingon Road planning application. I am not sure if that was because there was not enough room on the page or if they thought the article may be not what was expected from a senior councillor.

I have printed below the article so you can read it:
So tomorrow we will know the outcome of another application which has been submitted to the Planning Department for a bungalow at the rear of 34 to 40 Levington Road and using part of 36 and 38 Levington Road. A precedent was set back in June this year when an application for a bungalow was approved further up Levington Road towards Felixstowe Road in spite of the residents fighting against this for over 6 years – can you imagine their dismay when this was agreed. So my prediction that this would happen again is about to come true – we shall soon have another street between Levington and Salisbury Road! The site in question had some lovely trees on it and suddenly overnight the developer cut them all down. The residents are very distressed by this as many of them saw what they believed to be a bat roost in there. I am told by the Planning Officers that it is the Wildlife and Countryside Act that offers protection to any protected species and any offences under the Act are criminal offences to be dealt with by the police rather than the local planning authority. So we shall see but it is strange that biodiversity is important along the greensward on Nacton and Clapgate Lane but not important at the rear of these properties. Let’s hope the Planning Committee listen to the residents’ concerns this time. The application will be heard tomorrow Wednesday October 19th at Grafton House.

Now from the tone of the article it seems to me that Cllr Harsant is implying that she thought a decision had already been agreed on before the planning application had been heard by the committee, now as a senior councillor she should know better than most that planning decisions should not be political and certainly not decided on before the meeting. That has certainly been the way it works since I have been a substitute on planning and quite often we find ourselves as Labour Councillors not always voting together. Cllr Harsant repeated again that she thought the decision had already been made when she gave her comments at the planning meeting. Now I am sure many of the public think that planning is dealt with behind closed doors but it is not, I have never heard of a planning decision being made by a group before the meeting, certainly not by the Labour Group. She also implied that many of the residents, especially some of the more elderly were not happy with the way the property company had behaved – that should be a police matter not something that the planning committee should or could deal with. Cllr Harsant was also concerned about a possible bat living in one of the trees, I am glad she seems to be now caring about our local wildlife as she certainly did not seem to display the same passion for protecting wildlife when she gave the reasons behind the last Tory administration’s plan to sell off Kiln Meadow.

Anyway for all of Cllr Harsants predictions, on Wednesday the application was refused by the planning committee. (However, Christchurch can appeal against our decision, in which case an Inspector will investigate the case and make a final decision.)
But the posts by Cllr Harsant all seem to be part of a tactic to blame the Labour administration for building on back gardens and any small available space in East Ipswich.

We need to correct that misleading impression that Labour committee members have supported building on backland plots in Levington Road. This was not the case on Wednesday. Nor was it the case on any of the occasions where Christchurch Property applied to build on a similar backland plots behind 8-18 Levington Road.

In reality, Labour have consistently led the arguments against every application (and in every case, against the council officers’ recommendations.) The planning committee won two appeals against Christchurch Property. In the end the committee were left with no planning reasons for refusal, and planning committee members of all political parties voted for the single bungalow behind 34-40. Nobody was happy about this, but it was better than Christchurch’s first application – a row of terraced houses and chalet bungalow.

However, Labour members were so worried by this attempt by a developer to build what amounted to another, unplanned street in between two roads, Levington and Salisbury, that in 2009 we added a proposal into the Council’s Local Development Planning Framework. We wanted to give the local authority the power to refuse applications like Christchurch’s. We actually called it the ‘Levington Road problem’ because this was the place where we had found ourselves, in the end, without strong enough planning reasons to refuse an application nobody wanted except the developer.

We are also very worried by the government’s new National Policy Planning Framework (which has been described as a ‘developer’s charter’), and by local Tory MP Dan Poulter’s comments – he thinks there should be more building in places like East Ipswich because he doesn’t want any building on North Ipswich. As we know, this means more houses crammed into places like Levington Road – which already have enough houses and people and traffic.