KINGTON LANGLEY ANNUAL PARISH MEETING
TUESDAY 27 MARCH 2007

DISTRICT COUNCIL REPORT
DISTRICT COUNCILLOR PETER GREEN

On May 3rd next, new Elections will be held for the 54 seats on North Wiltshire District Council. I shall not be seeking re-election.

There are two reasons for this.

I shall then have been your District Councillor continuously for 24 years starting in 1983. During that time I was also your County Councillor for 8 years. This is rather a long time for anyone to have been in the public arena and I think it is high time for me to retire.

It is also a convenient time because of changes to the make up of many District Ward Boundaries as determined by the Boundary Commission; not the District Council.

These changes affect the present Kington Langley Ward that comprises the three parishes of Kington Langley, Sutton Benger and Seagry.

For the forthcoming District Elections Kington Langley will be joined with Kington St Michael, Stanton St.Quintin and Grittleton to become a new Kington Langley Ward of four parishes. The remaining two parishes, Sutton Benger and Seagry will become part of a new Sutton Benger Ward.

With regard to the District Council, I shall be leaving at an unfortunate time for the present administration and for the residents of North Wiltshire.

With Mr Brown's budget presentation in Parliament last week the spin for the future looked good until the substance was closely examined. This has now happened with your District Council.

The leaflet entitled "Your Council Tax" sent out with your Council Tax Demands included a glowing report from North Wiltshire District Council entitled "How are we doing this year?". This was followed up by a larger leaflet headed "Improving North Wiltshire" delivered to all households during this month with further glowing news.

Again, the spin looked good with both documents. However, a search through the Council's Web Site plus the Briefings given to Councillors reveals a very different picture.

In a nutshell, the District Council is short of money and has had to scrape around to cut expenditure.

Well you may ask, how can this be? I was a finance spokesperson for many years at District and gave several warnings to the administration that unless economically sound measures were put in place; revenue cash would begin to run out and it would all end in tears.

Unfortunately for all of us, what I forecast has now happened. The result is that District has had to raise its share of Council Tax by the maximum the Government will allow and a rash of cuts in some of its services and increased charges in others (e.g., car parking charges).

Looking ahead to future budgets, even more savings will continue to be required. This will be necessary, even without the Leisure Centres fiasco that, with forethought, could have been better dealt with or even avoided.

Now I turn to my closing thoughts. These are how am I leaving my District Council stewardship as it affects all in Kington Langley. Hopefully, I have caused no lasting harm to the law-abiding residents of this parish over the years. Hopefully too, I may even have done some good. However, that is for others to decide.