Recent News

The year 2019 is coming to a close with an almost mirror image of the end of 2018. In 2018, I entered the year as an Opposition backbencher on Basildon Council, with a Labour-led alliance in power, only for the Conservative Group to regain administration in May and the new Leader of the Council, Cllr…

The most important General Election for a generation The Stakes could hardly be higher…   We are having a General Election. I am assuming this has not escaped anyone’s attention. This is not an election the Conservative Party wanted. We wanted to deliver Brexit, fulfil the mandate of the British people expressed in the 2016…

Since the announced resignation of the Prime Minister, Theresa May, I have been asked many times and by many people – though few as doggedly as Johnny Jenkins at Gateway FM – whom I would be supporting in a Conservative leadership election. I have resisted, up until now, all attempts to coax an answer from…

On Saturday, I attended a meeting of the National Conservative Convention in my capacity as Chairman of Basildon & Billericay Conservative Association and sat in on a hustings for the upcoming Conservative leadership election, attended by all six of the remaining candidates and I thought I would share my recollections and thoughts about the occasion.…

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…

At the February meeting of Full Council, the Leader of Basildon Council, Cllr Andrew Baggott (Con, Burstead), moved the following motion: “Council notes its strong association with the armed forces through the Civil Military Partnership Board and having awarded Freedom of the Borough to the Royal Anglian Regiment. Council deplores the persecution of any Basildon…

I already posted a ‘vlog’ on my Facebook page back on 15th February about the February meeting of Full Council and the passing of the 2019/20 Conservative Budget but I thought it would be worth uploading my budget speech on this website.  You can also watch the webcast of the meeting here. “Thank-you, Mr. Mayor.…

At the Full Council meeting in December last year, Cllr Kerry Smith (Ind, Nethermayne) moved a motion with cross-party support seeking to promote a borough-wide ban on products containing palm oil. Never one to miss a passing bandwagon, Councillor Smith was quick to seize on the publicity surrounding the Christmas advert for Iceland, which sought…

This has been a tumultuous year for me – politically, professionally and personally – but also for Basildon Borough. When I look back to the end of 2017 and where we were; Basildon Conservatives were in Opposition, having previously been in minority administration since Basildon Council fell into No Overall Control in 2014. We had…