Richard Baum

Last night was a special meeting of Full Council to approve the constitution which will be used by the Council in the event of us electing a Mayor. And it was as thrilling a ride as that introduction suggests.

Neck bottle of Lucozade, and proceed…

At present the Council is run by a Leader and Cabinet. The Leader is the leader of the political party running the Council, in our case the Bury Conservatives. Later in the year the people of Bury will be asked if they want to get rid of this way of running things, and instead have an elected Mayor, who will be elected every four years by everyone in Bury and who will wield lots of executive powers.

Obviously if the people say “yes” then we have to alter the Council’s constitution. And last night was about approving what we’re going to alter it to. Although, for lots of Councillors, particularly on the sparsely populated Labour benches, last night seemed to be about not going to the meeting at all and spending the night electioneering instead. Which is fairly disrespectful in my book. And a bit illogical, if the point of winning the election is to serve on a Council which you then choose not to attend…

The meeting itself was fairly mundane, as most of the recommended changes were approved without great debate. I suppose the whole thing is academic at the moment, and may indeed never come to be important at all – that depends on the referendum result later on in the year.

But it was interesting to see my fellow Councillors all looking as harassed and stressed as I am at the moment. This election lark may be the life we’ve chosen, but at times it’s not enormous fun!

Rick