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Back to Normality. This recently overheard outside a Shop in Tisbury.
‘Some of we locals expressed surprise concerning the outcome of the Council Election . I weren’t at all as it happens, for I had been told as how it might be, so I didn’t bother to vote. It were the lady with the fish as told I. She said as how she had found it on a news sheet called Poople Scoop or the like, that she found in one of her nets . Maybe it was a Horror Scope, for there was the forecast there that if two Liberal Democrats stood together then together they would fall’.
Prediction didn’t come into it really in the end. It was just that neither attracted sufficient votes to gain either seat. Some of their support might have been due to ‘Tactical Voting’ by those who realised that every vote for the Conservative Candidate and possibly every abstention would detract from what became the Independent’s eventual majority over the Conservative of only 146 votes . Tisbury, now Tisbury and Fovant has a History of supporting Independent Councillors. On this occasion only one such stood.
Interestingly enough one of the Liberal Democrat Candidates received 104 votes more than the other. What did these 104 voters do with their other vote? Did they not use it? Did they vote Conservative or did they vote Independent? In reality it matters not, however maybe the figures illustrate how precariously returns are balanced.
It is a pity that so few seem to be interested in local management. If time is the restricting factor it is wise not to seek Office; especially on the District Council which is a far more demanding of ones time than is a Parish Council.
‘If one cant stand the heat it is better to stay out of the kitchen’.
WHY SHOULD ANYONE WISH TO BECOME A COUNCILLOR? Only too often one hears the age old pious chant on the lines of wanting ‘to put something back into the community’ I do not believe that is; or should be anyone’s motivation .
It reminds me of the wrong response to that the age old question posed to aspiring medical students .
‘Why do you want to become a Doctor ?’
The wrong reply is
‘Because I want to help people’.
It is probably true, none the less if one asks a similar question of a Chef, surely the proper response should be that its because he enjoys cooking, rather than that it is because he enjoys feeding people.
So too the best motivation for wishing to become a Councillor is that one has an enthusiasm for the work, for work it is. It really is not good enough just to acquiesce to ones nomination with no knowledge of the time one will have to give to the work one is taking on.
‘Scope Quote ’
With Acknowledgement to the Author Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
‘Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job’.
Who knows how long the Salisbury District Council will persist, or how many of the Councillors recently elected to it, or to the Various Parish Councils will seek a further term should there be a chance to hold an Election in 2011.
Tisbury and Fovant have been fortunate that all four of the Candidates who stood for Election on May 3rd. Already have earlier experience of being a Councillor.
Over the last four year session Tisbury Parish Council has put one in mind of a Skittle Alley. Hopefully we will have better luck for the next four years. There comes a time for each of us to realise that one is no longer ‘bright eyed and busy tailed’ . Then it is maybe better not to offer ones services. The Parish recently lost several of its leading Councillors through retirement. Please when it comes to co-opting two others as Parish Councillors, may Councillors, if there be such an opportunity, make up the number from a younger generation? Maybe persons whom the Councillors have no personal knowledge of. Being a Church Member, or Pilates sufferer, or a member of the Dramatic Society, or the Chamber of Trade or the Cricket Club, is no worthier a qualification, than being an unremarkable member of the Community just doing ones ‘thing’ .
‘Ask not what they have done for the Community, nor why they have not done the things that you consider they should have done’
for very possibly they have been hiding their light under some bushel.
It is the self motivated Independent Candidate who may have the most to offer an Electorate. Some may wonder how others have time to spare when they don’t. The fact that District Council Meetings happen during Working Hours, can be an obstacle to any other than the self employed and the Retired .
contact : John B. Pope
Email : pionono@tiscali.co.uk