Wirral's Labour-Con coalition denies Greens fair share of chairs

This amendment is about democracy, fairness, power and honesty.

Democracy

Over 80,000 people who live in Wirral voted for 66 local councillors in democratic elections just two weeks ago.

41% voted Labour – electing 30 councillors2
5% voted Conservative – electing 17 councillors
22% voted Green – electing 13 councillors
11% voted LibDem – electing 6 councillors here

Fairness

Wirral Council has 6 important decision-making policy committees and 5 regulatory committees, including Constitution & Standards committee. Continuing the fair and proportional representation we’ve had recently, of 11 Committee Chairs, would be 5 chairs for Labour, 3 for Conservative, 2 for Greens and 1 Liberal Democrat. For the last 3 years, all Political parties on Wirral have supported fair sharing of committee chairs and vice chairs. Its fair and its worked well. So why change it this time?

The Council’s constitution allows it and this amendment would enshrine more fairness into the constitution.

Power

The proposals for the Council meeting later today are not fair and not proportionate. They are disrespectful to Wirral voters. We can all see Labour and Conservatives supporting each other in some kind of coalition of power.

Honesty

Voters want honesty from their elected politicians. You vote Green, you get Green.

We all saw the Tory Prime Minister being dishonest with voters – holding office parties when we couldn’t pay our last respects to our nearest and dearest.

Despite the Labour label, what you get with Labour is not what’s on the tin. Their election leaflets showed if you peel back a Green you get a Conservative underneath. Actually here, what you are seeing is that if you vote Labour, you get a Labour-Conservative coalition.

Proportional Representation

We are asking for this unfairness to stop, this mistreatment to stop – and to have proportional representation of committee Chairs and Vice Chairs. This amendment to the constitution would enshrine that – the same as we do for membership of committees. It would stop mistreatment by the largest parties against the smaller parties. We urge all councillors of all Parties to support it.

Labour and Conservative councillors voted together against this proposal. Green and LibDem councillors voted to support it.