To Be Or Not To Be

When is a councillor not a councillor? It seems that one can be a councillor but be of absolutely no use to the people you represent if you are a councillor who happens to take a seat on every organisation known to man.Don't get me wrong, belonging to and aiding any community organisation is admirable. In reality, how many can one realistically be on and offer high quality service. The Herald website reports on an extraordinary council meeting in Pembrokeshire whereby 6 councillors have had to refrain from voting on a very important issue. WHY? There appears to be a conflict of interests. some if not all may be serving as school governors. Of course we need school governors but surely by now we all know that most council business surrounds community provision like education, health and planning and therefore being heavily involved in any of these in any capacity is going to come around and bite your self interests at some point. The point is here that their votes could be absolutely critical in deciding a matter, which their electorate depends on. There was a call this week from one councillor in Llanelli who asks for al councillors to be DBS checked. I am afraid I have already petitioned the Welsh Assembly on this and the answer was a categoric (no, it is all fine as it is). I read somewhere else that someone was calling for all councillors to declare each and every community role they were involved with. I would go further and ask that no councillor should be able to sit on any other committee or community organisation and that they are charged solely with representing the electorate. That way, there should not be any conflicts of interest.