On 4 Apr 2010 at 8:50pm Prick Stein wrote:
What exactly do the Town Council do and why do they get so much of my council tax bill?
On 5 Apr 2010 at 9:28am Merlin Milner wrote:
It is explained on this LTC page:
lewes-tc.gov.uk/infopage.asp?infoid=294
On 5 Apr 2010 at 2:09pm Clifford wrote:
I think Prick Stein's question after reading the link will be 'Why'.
On 5 Apr 2010 at 2:59pm Ed Can Do wrote:
£785k just to look after the bins and bus shelters and lease out the All Saints and Bridgeview? I would imagine that a least two of their full time staff are employed just to organise the governance of the council, pointless self-perpetuating jobs.
I'd be amazed if you couldn't contract out the services they provide to the private sector for a quarter of what we pay LTC, then just elect one person to sit on LDC's planning committee. What a hilarious waste of money.
On 5 Apr 2010 at 3:09pm Clifford wrote:
Exactly Ed. But we musn't forget the self-importance factor.
On 5 Apr 2010 at 4:45pm Gloria mundi wrote:
It reminds me of the time it was discovered that the cost of the judges' lodgings at Telscombe village divided by the number of nights spent there cost the taxpayer £3500 per judge per night. A TV journalist and the manager of the Grand in Eastbourne then tried to rack up the largest possible bill - best suite, excellent dinner, fine wines, bottle of vintage port, superb brandy and cigar - and they couldn't get the total over £1900. That was twenty years ago. The judges now commute from London and their fine lodgings are no more. Sic transit ...
On 5 Apr 2010 at 7:18pm Happy as Larry wrote:
I thought benefit dodgers like prick stick got their Council Tax for free or at most 86pence?
On 6 Apr 2010 at 12:35pm Ed Can Do wrote:
Change the record, Larry, nobody's listening to that one. Or at least if you're going to come here just to troll people, put some imagination into it.
Bored, are you not concerned that so much money is being spent on such a pointless service? There's about 40,000 households in Lewes district so the town council are costing us £20 a year each more or less. Doesn't seem like much in the grand scheme of things certainly but it's still money that could easily be better spent. You could, for example employ about 40 nurses for that much money a year, or pay to have a few police on the beat, or provide free milk for school kids or any number of more useful things than having an 18 person comittee to look after the bus stops and sign a lease renewal on a couple of buildings every year.
On 6 Apr 2010 at 12:45pm Prick Stein wrote:
Does the Town Council really need 18 elected members??!! Seems an awful lot for a small town, and surely proportionately less than 50% of the electorate vote in local elections, whch means that these 18 aren't exactly representative of the Town as a whole. It would seem that you could stick a dog on the ballot sheet at local level and the thing would get elected.
On 6 Apr 2010 at 1:49pm Sherlock wrote:
Prick Stein - I think dogs are too sensible to get involved with nonsense like that.
On 6 Apr 2010 at 2:42pm sashimi wrote:
Ed, the Town Council just covers the Town and the average cost per household is £120 not £20 - with no opt out for anyone who doesn't want the service (whatever that might be).
On 6 Apr 2010 at 3:23pm Dave wrote:
I think they're a waste of space, they don't deliver any services, and the things they do could either be done by others or preferably, eg twinning visits, not at all. The role of mayor is a pointless concept here, excercising no real power at all. French and German mayors carry real power and influence which can be used to good (or bad) effect. Lewes is like toytown, if the town council disappeared overnight noone would notice the difference.
On 6 Apr 2010 at 3:50pm Sherlock wrote:
... and we could move the museum to the town hall and let it bloom.
On 6 Apr 2010 at 3:51pm 'ere be monsters wrote:
Ed can Do but can't count
On 6 Apr 2010 at 3:55pm No Pot Pourri wrote:
Comment, Merlin?
On 6 Apr 2010 at 4:18pm Annette Curtin-Twitcher wrote:
I'd prefer to devolve district functions to the town council and do away with the district, tbh. At least we could then be fairly sure they had the interests of the town at heart.
Any functions too big for the town council to handle could be contracted out or passed up to the county council.
On 6 Apr 2010 at 4:18pm 'ere be monsters wrote:
I think having our Town Council is a great idea, it should be the jewel in the crown of our wonderful town. I love the crest and knocking the Mayor is a bit unfair in as much it costs the individual a fortune to perform the duties involved.
It's not fair to compare our Mayor with those elected ones on the continent. Their jobs are the CEO of the town. We should be electing the Chief Executive of the District Council if we're going to compare ourselves with Europe.
The Town Hall costs a fortune to keep in the generally tatty state it is in now. We ought to be spending more.
On 6 Apr 2010 at 7:23pm parking meter wrote:
Don't worry about that I just found out that
At the ESCC the council members get a free meal when they go and attend their meetings
Don't know about you but I take a sandwich with me to work or stop at a shop & BUY something for dinner !
Seems a real PXss take that I have my council tax paying to feed the morons as well!
Who said there's no such thing as a free meal (unless you're a ESCC member)
Is this right or wrong Someone can you tell me please
On 6 Apr 2010 at 9:45pm Annette Curtin-Twitcher wrote:
They have done for years, PM. They used to get a poper cooked 2-course lunch, done by the ESCC caterers, but now there aren't any ESCC caterers, I don't know what they get or who provides it.
The justification used to be that the subsistence money they were entitled to claim was more than the cost of feeding them, so it was the cheaper option, and it was quicker to feed them there and get back to the meeting than to have them all bog off elsewhere for lunch.
On 7 Apr 2010 at 11:47am Clifford wrote:
I wouldn't mind betting that if we looked into it we'd find that they get a free lunch AND a subsistence allowance.
On 10 Apr 2010 at 7:28am jrsussex wrote:
The exact point I make under another thread "Recycling". We. the council tax payers, have our services whittled away but what are the county and town councils realistically doing to cut their costs, very little I suspect. Anyone can work out the level of money going into councillors pockets for "seving the public", in one case that I am aware of around 70k per annum. They are getting far more than a free lunch added to their allowances.