Could you be a Warwickshire County Councillor?
Being a county councillor is both a rewarding and privileged form of public service.
County councilors should be community leaders and a bridge between how the county council operates and their local community. Councillors are elected to represent their area (electoral division) in the running of the county council.
Councillors make and review decisions on how services are provided. They scrutinise how the County Council operates. Councillors attend various meetings of the county council and are also appointed to represent the council on outside organisations such as local partnerships or charities and public bodies.
All councillors will be expected to deal with issues and problems brought to them by their constituents and seek to act as a helping hand. This involves working on issues which are the responsibility of the county council and other matters which local residents raise. [Whilst many issues are raised (and resolved) through email county councilors have to take particular care to represent residents who do not have access to the internet].
All Liberal Democrat county councilors are expected to publish a regular newsletter informing their residents of the work they are doing and about issues which have a particular impact on their area.
Liberal Democrat county councillors will be involved in campaigns that affect their communities - sometimes leading the campaigns and sometimes supporting them. (A classic example is the ten year campaign run by Liberal Democrat county councilor John Whitehouse to reopen the train station in Kenilworth - see http://www.kenilworthweeklynews.co.uk/news/local-news/green-light-for-station-to-go-full-steam-ahead-1-6566408 ).
Warwickshire county councilors receive an annual allowance (£8,975 in 2014-15) and can claim a mileage allowance.
Warwickshire County Councillors are responsible for:
- Highways planning and maintenance
- Strategic education matters from Children Centres through to secondary education (although increasingly schools themselves are self-governing and funded directly by the government as academies)
- Social services for adults and children
- Fire & Rescue services
- Waste disposal (including Hunters Lane) and minerals excavation
- Trading standards
The next county council elections are on Thursday 4th May 2017.
The Liberal Democrats' Rugby constituency association is responsible for fighting the elections in the nine electoral divisions which fall in the Rugby Borough Council area:
- Benn
- Bilton & Hillside
- Brownsover & Coton Park
- Dunsmore & Leam Valley
- Earl Craven
- Eastlands
- Fosse
- Hillmorton
- New Bilton and Overslade
It is also responsible for the Bulkington and Whitestone electoral division.
A map showing these electoral divisions can be found at https://consultation.lgbce.org.uk/node/3224