One of my local councillors - Canbury ward Lib Dem - Tim Dennen - has resigned from the party for personal reasons and now sits as an independent.
This is the first change of affiliation in Kingston politics since the Tory civil war of the turn of the century and the first Liberal change of allegience since the 1980s. In another return to the 1980s the Conservatives won the Coombe Vale by-election in December - their first such win since 1987.
One of Cllr Dennen's last acts as a Lib Dem councillor was to vote with local Conservatives for tax payer funded trees and bunting to celebrate the jubilee.
Kingston has the highest council tax in London and one has to wonder whether trees and bunting are a sensible use of public money.
Factually incorrect Dan -- Kingston Lib Dem Councillor Jeff Hanna joined the Labour Party in January 1998.
ReplyDeleteThanks Chris for pointing that out. I'd completely forgotten about Jeff Hanna - which probably suggests more about the significance of his actions than Labour would like to admit...
ReplyDeleteHowever that may be, your words were "first Liberal change ... since the 1980's" not "first Liberal change that I think significant ...". You should follow Adlai's precept, and eat them.
DeleteHaving completely forgotten about Jeff Hanna - your persistence in claiming significance for him is both charming and meant I have had to spend rather more time trying to recall him than I otherwise would have. Jeff Hanna's claim to fame is two fold - he was the favourite for the Kingston and Surbiton selection in 1995 until losing out to Ed Davey - an event possibly not unrelated to his eventual defection. And secondly (and definitely more significant) was his persistence as an opposition spokesperson in getting the ruling by the Major government overturned that LEA education committees could have an administration majority when the administration didn't have a majority on the council and the committes contained voting church reps. In his fight he outfoxed (now Lib Dem) peer Lord Lester. The significance being that at the time Kingston was 25 Tories, 18 Lib Dem and 7 Labour, so the Tory administration had an effective majority, but not a technical one. The ruling meant that the education committee had to be politically proportional with the church voting reps additional to this balance, but two years later when the Lib Dems won an overall majority they had to have not just a majority among political members, but overall on the education committee too.
DeleteOh and he owned a caravan (that's three).
Sheila Griffin left the Labour Group and sat as an Independent in 2008.
ReplyDeleteAnd at the recent Neighbourhood Committee I voted against the motion to spend extra money on trees and bunting. The voting went totally on non-party grounds, with members of each party voting differently.
Geoff Austin.
Didn't former mayor Jenny Philpott resign from the Liberal Democrats and become an Independent?
ReplyDeleteThat was in the 1980's.
DeleteIsn't Jeff Hanna now a Labour councillor in Merton?
ReplyDeleteApparently so...
Deletehttp://www.merton.gov.uk/council/councillors.htm?view=member&cllr_id=186
It's nice to be remembered, however vaguely. The caravan is long gone. I am indeed a Labour councillor in Merton. Watching the Lib Dem performance in the coalition since 2010 has only confirmed my reasons for switching party. I joined the then Liberal party as a concerned resident, as do so many Lib Dem members. I then found that the party lacked consistent principles, and as Labour re-established the credibility of its own policies, I crossed the chamber. No regrets. No broken promises.
DeleteThanks for responding Jeff - I hope you are enjoying the blog. I suppose the less said about the 12 years between you joining Labour and having the decision confirmed by the formation of the coalition the better!
ReplyDeleteI gather Wimbledon Labour regard him as a bit of a trouble-maker anyway.
ReplyDeleteEspecially as he has found a nice safe seat.
ReplyDelete