Category: DADDS, Cllr David, JP (Con, Billericay East & fmr Mayor of Basildon)

BASILDON LOCAL ELECTIONS 2019 The dust has settled on Thursday night and there is no getting away from the fact that it was not a great night for the Conservatives. Nationally, the Tories have lost over 1,300 councillors. Labour also lost seats nationally and, although they lost less than 100, they have little to crow…

BASILDON LOCAL ELECTIONS 2019 Well, here we are once again. The wheel has turned and I am sitting down to write my annual ‘Runners & Riders’ blog for our seemingly ceaseless cycle of elections. Normally the main problem is ‘voter fatigue’ and apathy but this year’s local elections will be like none we have witnessed…

The day we knew was coming finally arrived last Thursday at the Policy & Resources Committee of Basildon Council. Having ousted the Conservative Administration in May, we knew it was only a matter of time before the new Labour-led coalition now running Basildon Council came after the people of Billericay. Billericay residents are guilty of…

As usual, I must apologise for the length of time it has taken me to write up the Annual Meeting of Basildon Council, which took place on Thursday 26th May, just over a week ago. It does sometimes take me a while to find the time to sit down and put pen to paper (or,…

Apologies that is has taken me over a week to pen this blog about the budget-setting meeting of Full Council on Thursday 11th February but I have had a lot on. The meeting was preceded by an extraordinary meeting of the Council to vote on a proposal from the Deputy Mayor – Cllr Danny Lawrence…

This blog should start with an apology, as I realise it is my first one since November of last year. Happy belated New Year to you all and I hope you all had lovely Christmases. It means I did not write up the meeting of Full Council in December or January. I am not sure…

As I come to write up last Thursday’s meeting of Full Council, I would just ask readers to bear with me, as this was a mammoth SEVEN-HOUR meeting that went on until two o’clock in the morning. The meeting started at 7pm, earlier than usual, with a special Extraordinary Meeting to consider two nominations for…

So, thought I’d write-up the Basildon Council Annual Meeting held on Thursday. These are normally quite civil, set-piece affairs, where we elect our Mayor and Deputy Mayor for the municipal year and also pass the winning party’s Order Paper, enabling them to form an Administration. The Order Paper confirms the Leader and Deputy Leader of…

Believe it or not, it has taken me about a week to recover from Polling Day. I have never fought a General Election campaign before – in 2010, I stayed up with a friend and watched the result coming in on the telly – so to do so as an agent, running an MP’s re-election campaign,…

It is now officially Polling Day and chronic insomnia allows me this opportunity to make some election night predictions and speak briefly about the elections before us – not just the General Election to Parliament but also our own local borough council elections. Every politician says at every election that it is “the most important…