Bryan wrote:Any other suggestions that might explain Councillor Whiting's self-imposed purdah
Councillor Whiting has put his head above the parapet once (which is, bless him, one more than other councillors despite many friendly invitations).
I deduce he felt that he would be set upon by the multitudes playing the man rather than the issues. Politicians should have a thick skin but I guess he thought there was more to lose than to gain. Or may be our local councillors don't trust the editorial integrity of ST?
In this I think they are mistaken.
I feel it a shame that they should not see ST as a small opportunity to combat the growing democratic deficit that leads to greater cynicism about local government and catastrophically low turnouts at elections.
Harriet Harman, in a paper on eDemocracy, suggests that MPs should, amongst other things, present an annual report of their activities to their constituents and teach citizenship in local schools. Should local councillors not do something similar?
I would have thought that using this website and others to explain what they are doing, explaining the difficulties and the reasons for their decisions and occasionally taking on board some ideas from their constituents would begin to build a fund of goodwill.
I'm sure I, like you, would disagree with much of what they might say and you would have the advantage of giving them a hard time about it. But in the end when we go to the ballot box we ourselves have to choose between a group of people none of whom are we in complete agreement.
Basing the choice solely on the party badge is not working unless you believe in 30% turnouts. We need more visible beef in our councillors (and prospective councillors) arguing their case.
I repeat again the ongoing invitation to all local politicians to use ST & STF to communicate with considerably more Sydenham readers than bothered to vote at the last local election.
A free webpage on a topic of your choice is only an email away ...