By©Muhammad Haque
1255 Hrs GMT
London
Wednesday 14 May 2008
What makes a councillor worth the people’s votes?
The simple answer is: the work of representing the people.
And what does that involve?
Here is the Khoodeelaar! summary of the constitutional role and of the democratic duties of an elected local councillor in an inner city borough such as Tower Hamlets in the first decade of the 21st century:
It involves ‘the 'Ward' [constituency]’ work, in that taking up cases on behalf of electors and people in the ward. But more importantly, keeping an alert, intelligent relevant and active watch on what the ‘officers’ in the council are doing.
Assuming that the councillor is one of the ruling group.
For an opposition councillor or one who is of no party or group allegiance, their worth is tested in the quality of their advocacy on issues that affect both their word and the lives of the community in the borough.
Given that the Khoodeelaar! campaign came into being on issues that affect a wide cross section of people in the borough in many ways, participation in the work of the campaign by any opposition councillor on Tower Hamlets would have been of serious long term impact.
We made available information and facilities to a good number of those from the very start.
It is significant to note who took up our offers and how far they went with that.
One of the early opportunities to get involved with Khoodeelaar! was made plain in our printed campaign publications.
We also prepared questions, briefings and other information materials for anyone interested to use.
The aim in all of this was to educate the person about the issues and in the case of opposition councillors, to use their position within the council, to raise the questions that would bring out the information from the Council’s executives.
Eventually, the issues that we have been campaigning on would get the support of all concerned.
It would therefore have been clear to anyone observing events from the very start of the campaign in January 2004 that anyone on the opposition benches on Tower Hamlets Council who wanted to make an impact on behalf of the voters in Tower Hamlets could not ask for a more ideal campaign to get involved with.
So what did the opposition councillors at various times do? Did they join en masse and did they want to know how the campaign was doing at various stages.
The interest was almost unrecognisable until Sunday 22 January 2006.
On that day, at the Brady centre in Hanbury Street, the No to Crossrail hole Campaign meeting in support of the Khoodeelaar! campaign took place.
Among the speakers were several opposition group councillors.
Included among the speakers were:
Janet Ludlow [Opposition leader on Tower Hamlets Council]
Akikur Rahman [Janet Ludlow’s colleague on the sam e council]
and
Louise Alexander [councillor in the same group]
Shortly after that meeting, the Khoodeelaar! campaign got in touch with a number of those who had taken the platform and made statements variously supporting the opposition to Crossrail hole plot.
The ONLY one of those who actually sent a reply was Louise Alexander!
Until that occasion, the Khoodeelaar! campaign had had no contact with councillor Louise Alexander. We had not heard any comments that she might have made about Crossrail either , other than our assumption that she would support her group line on the matter.
But when she did communicate to Khoodeelaar! after the 22 January 2006 public meeting in Hanbury Street, she in fact came across as genuinely interested in the campaign.
She of course said positive things that could be put down to her politeness. But the one thing that she did convey was the fact that she acknowledged that the Khoodeelaar! campaign had contributed to holding the councillors to account.
This communication was followed by a series.
One of the follow up steps she then took of them was that at the full Council meeting of the Council on 1 March h 2006, Louise Alexander in fact tabled a motion against the Crossrail hole which in most respects was identical to the Khoodeelaar! motion that I had proposed at the meeting on 22 january 2006.
This was remarkable.
Because neither I nor any other member of the Khoodeelaar! campaign had asked Louise Alexander to put that motion forward. Nor had we any conference about what was going to happen at the Council meeting.
Khoodeelaar! found out about the Louise Alexander motion in the course of our normal research. And we publicised that motion on our web sites and in our campaign literature.
Because it reflected what we had been saying for exactly two years about what the Council should do. SAY NO to the Crossrail hole Bill!
[To be continued]
No comments:
Post a Comment