What worth a councillor?

Ipswich Borough Councillors from all parties work hard for their communities. There are a very few exceptions but in the main we put in hours on casework, reading, attending meetings and training sessions, community events, committee meetings evening and daytime and we are on the end of a phone 24/7.

People have literally laughed when we've told them how much backbenchers receive when they find out it is less than £3800. Most are astonished.

We have refused the recommendations from the independent panel for over a decade and have not had an increase for 10 years.

Had we have taken their recommendations, the remuneration would now be a thousand pounds more a year than we currently receive. This would not have felt right in a time of austerity but I don't know of one single person who has not had a rise in over a decade, if they are still in the same place. Time to stop being embarrassed about this and do what's right, reward where it is due and value what we do.

Furthermore most of us do not claim for travel expenses to and from our meetings, as is our right. My only claims have been for unique travel to the Bournemouth LGA conference a couple of times in 10 years.

Some of us are out of pocket because of the time commitment we have to give (average of 15 hours per week but many do more) and all of us sacrifice family time and leisure on a regular basis. I'd like to think a reasonable person would recognise this and not begrudge us a penny.

I was determined to do something about this and so I contacted the leader of the council who agreed with me that we should have a consensus amongst the leaders of each party, on behalf of our groups.

Even though we can disagree vehemently on how to go about achieving our aims it is not as often as people might suspect. Our influence on national problems is limited but the one thing we must do together is ensure we attract good people to become councillors and that we encourage them from a wide, diverse background. My personal wish is for more young parents. Councillor Jones said at the council meeting that they don't have any special talents. I disagree. All ages have their own special unique talents and wisdom. I think an old wise head with experience of life is equally valuable - just in a different way but I don't want to mix with just wise old heads in my political world.


The point is our low remuneration (one of the lowest for backbenchers but one of the highest for special responsibility) needed addressing and I felt we should value ourselves a bit more than to just take the easy route and ignore the whole thing once again.

Ignoring would've meant in 4 years time at the next review, we would've fallen even more behind and this would be a huge decentivisation, requiring an even bigger increase.

An alternative proposal to the one put forward by the panel, was agreed together which corrected my concerns - increase backbenchers basic allowance and re-calculate the special responsibility allowance to address the inbalance and shrink the gap between the 2.

I was upset with the Ipswich Star yesterday and I said so at the meeting. Cllr Ellesmere and the Mayor both concurred. Their headline did not reflect what was actually going on and all the facts.

I'm looking forward to seeing the follow up and apology in todays paper

How We won Better Rail by Ben Gummer MP

How We Won Better Rail Well, what a way to return from ten days’ holiday!  The announcement of the new franchise a few weeks ago felt like a very, very early Christmas present.  It is hard to overstate the importance of this decision: quite simply, it will change Ipswich and our region for the better.  Here’s how it happened. Back in what now feels like the dim and distant past, when I was a candidate contesting this seat, I recognized albeit in an unfocused way that the trains were no good, that the franchise was part of the problem, and that bringing prosperity to Ipswich was connected to how good the train service was.  So I promised, very vaguely, to do something about it; what that ‘something’ was, I have to admit I was not yet clear about. Within the first few days of arriving at Westminster in 2010, I found out that Chloë Smith, the energetic new MP for Norwich North, was having precisely the same thoughts.  She too knew something had to be done but was not yet clear about what that needed to be.  So came about our first discussion with a very important man whom few of you will have ever heard about: Jonathan Denby.  For many years, Jonathan has been the man who has kept we politicians in the loop – but he is not just a PR guy: he knows a lot about trains and has been around the political circus long enough to judge how to get things done.  It was Jonathan who helped Chloë and me, together with Priti Patel representing Essex, to craft the demands that you will soon see delivered as beautiful new rolling stock. Knowing what to do was the easy bit; making it happen has been the real work of the last five years.  Once we had established that we needed new trains and lots of them, it was the grunt-work of making the Department for Transport understand why East Anglia was a priority, then doing the same with the Treasury, then with the Prime Minister, and then making sure that once we had commitments and promises, that they were translated into the right tender process and the right incentives to train operators.  At every stage, Chloë and I have had to make friends with key civil servants in Whitehall, with special advisers, and with a series of ministers.  It is not all a battle: 80% of the time it is selling the vision again and again – and once you have done that the advantages of what we proposed were so self-evident that people were willing to help. But now and again we did have to go into battle.  It is remarkable how much damage and delay one wrong person in the right place can do.  There are a few people who actively tried to de-rail our rail dream and we had – quite simply – to take them out. And so, after all this work – celebrating each victory as it came – the policy announcements, the invitation to tender, the launch of the tender bidding process, and the eventual award a few weeks ago – we now have the confirmed prospect of new trains.  It has been painstaking and laborious but my Lord it will be worth it when it all comes. As you would expect me to say – we are not finished yet.  We must now secure the track upgrades we need from Network Rail and get going on East West Rail – a scheme that will ultimately bring even greater benefits than the thousands of jobs and billions in investment that the improvements to the Great Eastern Main Line will achieve.  But all that is for next week, when I shall outline what is actually going to happen and what more we want to win.   Welcome to Ben's regular newsletter. If you have any comments or concerns, please get in touch with my team. Email: Ben can be contacted directly at ben@bengummer.com Ben's office address is: 9 Fore Street Ipswich IP4 1JW 01473 232 883

[www.bengummer.com]

Suffolk BME Business Awards

Nominations are requested for the Suffolk BME Business Awards to celebrate the diversity and achievements originating from the BME community

The award categories are:

Business of the Year
Business person of the Year
Start Up of teh Year
Community Business of the Year

Nomination forms can be downloaded at www.uos.ac.uk/business or www.bscentre.org.uk

Closing date 30th September 2016

And an evening of celebration will take place on Wednesday 28th October at 7 pm at the University of Suffolk

You can also find out more from the Bangladeshi Support Centre 01473 400081

Good luck to all our fab BME businesses!

The Doctors Strike and what you should know

The BMA must be the first union in history to call for strike action against a deal they themselves negotiated and said was a good one!

In fact the current chair of the JDC, Ellen McCourt, who called these strikes, co-led negotiations for the BMA when agreement was reached in May – and recommended the revised contract to members as ‘beneficial to our patients and to our junior doctors’.

The Government has been speaking to the BMA for three years and have made 107 different concessions. The Government is prepared to talk with the BMA about how we can call off the strike.

As doctors’ representatives, the BMA should be putting patients first, not playing politics in a way that will be immensely damaging for vulnerable patients.


Whilst there are many pressures on the frontline, funding is at record levels, with the highest number of doctors employed in the history of the NHS. Co-operation not confrontation is the way forward to make sure patients get the best treatment and the NHS is there for people whenever they need it.


The new contract is:

* Better for patients – who will have access to a great and improving service 7 days a week. These changes are the most significant change to the contract in seventeen years. The changes ensure the NHS is shaped around the needs of patients who can’t choose what day of the week they fall unwell.


* Better for junior doctors – guaranteeing better training, safety and working conditions. Junior doctors working legal hours will receive a basic pay rise of around 10 to 11 %, subject to modelling. New limits on hours worked, consecutive nights and long days will also be introduced. A new family support plan will help balance home and work and offer catch-up programmes.


* Better for the NHS – linking pay progression to attainment, tackles locum costs and scraps unsafe incentives for long hours. There will be a fundamental shift in the way doctors are paid for weekend work so it is a third less expensive for hospitals to roster doctors over the weekend. By introducing Saturday and Sundays plain time rates and a sliding scale replacing unsocial hour payments high standards of care will be enabled at an affordable rate.

We are absolutely certain this is the right way forward but I fear the BMA are on a one way street with an agenda to bring down the govt written on the side of their Bandwagon.

Community Grant applications

Voluntary groups are an important part of services provided within our town. without them, these services would cost the taxpayer so much more. 

I am glad to see that the pot of money has been maintained - we all know that it is essential to support the good work of kind people.

This press release came out today:

Voluntary and community groups in Ipswich can apply for cash support as the Borough Council announces it has maintained the size of its grant pot.

Groups can apply for amounts up to £20,000 for the year through either a Community Investment Grant (this grant provides core funding for running costs or pump priming funding for an organisation to build its capacity); 

or a Community Project Grant (this grant is suitable for trying something new or for one-off activity that delivers one or more of the Council’s grants priorities).

Successful applicants need to have a legal governance structure and be able to demonstrate how they will measure progress in at least one of the following areas: promoting community safety, improving health and wellbeing, promoting learning and skills development, making Ipswich cleaner, more attractive and sustainable, enhancing culture and leisure activities, working with individuals and groups who are disadvantaged and promoting equality of opportunity and fostering good community relations.

The closing date for applications is noon on Monday 10th October 2016.

The application form and guidance for applicants can be found at www.ipswich.gov.uk/content/community-cash-grants-201516