The Liberal Democrat Mayor's press office is flat-out announcing and re-announcing activities. The roads team are in overdrive pothole filling and resurfacing, and he is finally if only temporarily addressing the Borough's major fly-tipping problem. It really feels this his 14 years of power have been a time of missed opportunities.
Why does it take an election to spur the Lib Dems to get into action?
If they had not neglected issues they would not need this last-minute splurge in the run-up to this May’s election. It’s almost as if they are now trying to dazzle Voters!
The Council has finally passed its budget with the current Mayor again putting up council tax for the 5th year in a row. And again, we think he is going to take more of your hard-earned cash than he needs. In my opinion, he has run a surplus for the last few years - in plain language, this means he has taken more than he needed and we think he is planning to do this again. I voted against this - it’s just plain wrong to moan and blame Central Government and then put local tax up so you can splurge money about at election time.
Bedford deserves better. It deserves proper management of its finances. And most of all our proud historic town deserves a change.
I commit to
- A proper 4-year financial plan and I promise to be a Mayor for 4 years not just during an election year!
- A planned cycle of Footpath and Road improvement over at least 4 years.
- Have more litter-picking and clean-up teams - rubbish and dirt are not just limited to fly-tipping.
- Introducing 4 hours of free parking in our Multi Story Car Parks to encourage people back to Bedford. I will also look to extend the opening hours of some MSCPs to ease evening kerbside parking problems.
We have loads more exciting plans to share soon. I firmly believe Bedford’s best days are yet to come.
