West Sussex Votes 2021: Labour promising 'more vibrant vision' for county
We've been speaking to leader Michael Jones ahead of Thursday's elections
With West Sussex County Council elections just days away, the leaders of the main political parties have made their pitches for your votes.
The candidates were quizzed on their track record, main campaign policies and what their focus would be on if elected next month.
Polling day is Thursday (May 6th) with all 70 seats up for election.
Labour go into the election as the smallest of the three parties represented on the County Council - here's what they are planning to do if they can win a majority:
Labour says it is offering a ‘more vibrant vision’ for West Sussex, promoting fairness and ensuring the county has the very best services.
Michael Jones, the party’s group leader at County Hall, explained how they also wanted to see the county council’s work truly reflect the priorities of residents and be far more listening.
He said:
“The bottom line is the last four years have shown like never before that the West Sussex Tories have failed the county. Children’s services and the fire and rescue service were found to be inadequate and the county council was found to be run badly with many examples of poor spending while the Tories cut back on many vital services.”
He argued that a vote for Labour ‘sends a message loud and clear that the Conservatives’ disastrous management can’t go on’.
Their six main campaign policies are: halting the closure of all children and family centres proposed by the Conservatives, taking the necessary steps to reopen all the rubbish tips for seven days a week and ending the booking system trial, rearranging spending priorities so potholes and repairs to broken pavements are ‘finally dealt with properly’, ending wasteful spending on outsourced services, real action on tackling climate change and continuing the work to revitalise the local economy and communities as we recover from the Covid pandemic.
A public consultation is currently being held on a redesign of early help services, with the most controversial element the proposed closure of many children and family centres.
For Mr Jones these centres are important not just to support young children and their parents, but are places where families can meet and get advice.
Although supportive of work to ensure hard to reach families are targeted, he thought this should not happen at the same time as ‘drastically cutting the service for everyone else’.
Several years ago a number of rubbish tips were closed for two days a week with opening hours reduced and Labour wants to reverse these decisions, believing the cuts increase the risk of flytipping and disincentivise recycling.
Labour is also pressing for action to address the ‘chronic poor state of the roads’ and disrepair of many pavements.
Mr Jones pointed towards recent government decisions cutting funding for road repairs, but also felt the county council’s leadership had ‘failed to get to grips with it’.
He also described the ‘troubled history’ of outsourcing services at County Hall with ‘some examples of poor contract management’ meaning the county council had not received good value for money leading to a ‘constant stream’ of services being brought back in-house.
He said that many practical issues and concerns raised had been either ignored or glossed over.
Meanwhile Mr Jones believes his group has ‘led the way on environmental issues’ at County Hall.
This includes pressing for a climate emergency to be declared and calling for the West Sussex pension fund to divest from fossil fuels.
Labour is also pressing for greater investment in renewables, increased use of electric vehicles, more recycling and greater support for public transport.
Lastly, Labour wants to continue work to revitalise the local economy and communities following the pandemic.
Mr Jones said: “The extent of the challenge here is daunting for all of us who wish the very best for our towns and villages.”
In particular, they want to put pressure on government for more strategic help to recover given the impact on the aviation industry and other sectors.
Diversification of the local economy could involve promoting the green jobs agenda while they are also calling for support for village and town centres as well as more of a focus on the night-time economy.