At the City of Salford Conservative Federation Annual General Meeting held on Thursday 27th March at Patricroft Conservative Club, the following officer team was elected for the forthcoming year:
Chairman: Cllr Robin Garrido
Deputy Chairman (Political & Campaigns): Cllr Iain Lindley
Deputy Chairman (Membership & Fundraising): Yan-Nin Cockayne
Honorary Treasurer: David Lewis
Honorary Secretary: Cllr Liz Hill
Constituency representatives: Judith Tope and Christine Allcock
Conservative Group Leader (ex-officio): Cllr Karen Garrido
Local residents across Salford will not be able to have their say on proposals to introduce a “toll tax” congestion charge after Labour Councillors voted down Conservative proposals to hold a referendum on the issue.
Conservative Councillors Ian MacDonald and Iain Lindley tabled a motion at Wednesday’s full Council meeting cricitising the complete lack of investment in Salford within the funding bid and calling for the public to be consulting via a referendum. Unfortunately Labour Councillors do not trust local residents to have their say and voted down the proposals.
The proposer of the motion, Councillor Ian Macdonald, said:
“The congestion charge is just another tax for motorists, who pay quite enough in taxation to this Government already. We are not convinced the public transport investment proposed by TIF will actually benefit Salford in any way. The only main proposal is the Leigh ‘misguided’ busway and this has been on the table for 10 years. We think the residents of Salford are intelligent enough to have their say.”
Councillor Iain Lindley, who seconded the motion, described the proposals as “all stick and no carrot”. Labour’s failure to support a referendum comes as the Salford Advertiser revealed that the cost of the toll tax could be considerably more than Labour leaders have previously suggested.
Opposition Conservatives on Salford City Council have called for local residents across the City to be given the final say on plans to introduce a “toll tax” congestion charge across Greater Manchester.
Conservative Councillors Ian MacDonald and Iain Lindley have tabled a motion to be debated at next Wednesday’s Council Meeting calling for a local referendum to be held before the Council agrees to any introduction of congestion charging in Salford.
Councillor Iain Lindley, who represents Walkden South Ward and will second the motion, said:
“As a public transport user myself, I know that the TIF bid will have a negligible impact on bus and rail services in Salford and yet hard-working local residents across the City will still have to fork out to pay the congestion charge. In Salford the plans are all stick and no carrot - Conservatives will trust local people across the City to have the final say”
Conservative Budget Statement
A Conservative statement on this year’s Council Budget, by Leader of the Opposition Cllr Karen Garrido and Conservative Budget Spokesman Cllr Ian MacDonald.
Salford Council has been dealt with most savagely by this Labour Government in two very important ways. Firstly, the Government Grant to our Council has been grotesquely miscalculated. The wrong population figure was used. Even if correct figures had been used, it is obvious that Salford seems to have been singled out for special treatment. There is no need for us in Salford to be treated as a low Council Tax charger, when we are quite the reverse.
Secondly, the calculating of Business Rates has changed and the hoped for windfall to offset the Twenty Million Pounds we are spending to help the BBC to come to Salford will not be coming as we were expecting. Councillor Merry, the Council Leader, has said at that he was not aware of the changes at the time the BBC’s coming was negotiated. Perhaps he should have known.
The Conservative’s alternative budget, which we presented at the recent Council Meeting, would have reduced Council spending for the 2008/9 by about £2.8 Million. We believe that it would be perfectly possible to find extra savings if they were looked for hard enough. Under our proposals, Council Tax would not have risen by the 3.4% that it is going to - and also we would not have taken so much from the Council’s reserves.
Continue reading ‘Conservative Budget Statement’