It should have been the easiest meeting of the year. The Annual Town Meeting is where anybody in the town is welcome to turn up to the Town Hall and talk about what’s been good and bad, what they wanted last year and whether we’ve delivered it this year. I was very happy with that because for the last 4 years we’ve said what we’ll do and we’ve done it and the people who turned up asked us to do stuff and we did that too. And even better, because there’s an election this year the meeting fell in the period known as ‘purdah’ that’s when you’re not meant to talk about ‘politics’ for fear of prejudicing the outcome. But then the Tories turned up….

Happy was I that ‘the B word’ (that’s ‘Brexit’ not ‘Bloody Wigan’) was not even remotely connected with Town Council elections and even happier was I that I could talk about the Councils achievements without even mentioning ‘the P word’…..or so I thought. I should have noticed that in a room full of 20+ people there were 12 members of the public, 12 sitting councillors and 17 prospective council candidates. And 4 of them Tories. Fronted by the Duchess of Durleigh herself, absent from the town council after a 4 year rest (for us) she’d rallied the blue rinse brigades and parked them back on our lawn. Neatly mowed though it was.

P is for Policing

No sooner had our popular young Mayor Diogo introduced Police Officer Ryan Edwards -and we have a Police person to every meeting as the public requested – no sooner had he outlined the issues in the town, the problems with resources, the troublespots, the operations to deal with them,  the Tories were in there ‘ah but is it though?! Is it resources or is it management issues…yes.. shouldn’t you just be managing what you’ve got better than you are…and where’s all these police that Sue Mountstevens said we’d have…yes…why aren’t there 300 more police in Bridgwater town centre like we’re paying for’ (or something)’…and that was it, the election was back on “I’m not having this” said Eastover councillor Tony Heywood “these are funding cuts from central Government! By cutting vital public services the Tories have created the conditions in which crime can thrive and leaving people more vulnerable to violence and harm” . “They’re huge cuts!” said Cllr Mick Lerry (Victoria) “21,000 Police officers have been cut by the Tories and recorded crime is rising at the fastest rate in a decade. 659 Police officers and 116 police community support officers in the Avon and Somerset area alone”.

“Well, I’ll be off then” said an always polite Sgt Ryan. “You’re welcome to stay for the rest of the meeting” offered Diogo. “Well, thanks but there’s a bit of crime out there to go and deal with” the officer said politely, edging out of the door and slightly speeding up as he went with that gradual increase of pace sound effect you often get on Roadrunner cartoons.

L is for Leadership

“So, I’d first like to thank all the councillors that won’t be here in future” said Diogo (looking pleadingly in certain directions) “I mean, thanks for the work you’ve all put in on behalf of the town. And now over to council Leader, Cllr Smedley to sum up the year.”

I made a snap judgement that the best way to get through this was by not drawing breath and at the same time handing out a few cross party compliments, giving me time while the victims tried to work out if I actually meant them.

But. It was the easiest thing in the world. When Bridgwater Town Councillors took office in 2015, 14 of the 16 were Labour and the 1 Con and 1 Lib couldn’t even form a political group (you need 2 for that) (and don;t forget, one of them was a libdem). But the 14 councillors were a total cross section of the Bridgwater community anyway and we had exactly the same debates you’d expect in homes, pubs and massage parlours across the town . Then, being a party that believes in Unity, we’d agree and carry out the decision. Maybe they should have let US sort out Brexit! (Don’t mention Brexit, I mentioned it once but I think I got away with it…)

C is for Community

Every years annual town meeting we ask the public what they expect for the next year. They tell us. We do it. We did it. Last year they wanted the Police at every meeting -they came. They wanted us to campaign to keep the Post Office in the town centre. We did and last month we got the Regional managers down to speak at our Town Development Forum to give that commitment.

They wanted us to monitor the chaos of the EDF roadworks and get something back for the community out of the Hinkley project to mitigate against the increased lorry loads, empty white busses and congested streets. Priority 3. And we make our councillors work – so it was  Hamp’s Leigh Redman who took this project into his portfolio. Leigh is very thorough and operates in the public domain through social media and personal contact. Recognised as one of our most communicative and informative councillors, he has been delegated to keep on top of the EDF issue, holding them to account and pursuing CIM bids where possible. That’s Community Impact Mitigation money that EDF offers back to us to make amends where they’ve made a mess. Cycle paths and routeways in south Bridgwater, street enhancements in Fore street due any day and compensatory offers for people on the through routes have all been achieved with Town Council pressure.

In the same vein people wanted to know if the so called ‘Celebration Mile’ was just a collective figment of the imagination. They wanted it to become a reality and not just talk. To make sure this happened we had to work with Sedgemoor and County.  Apart from the Fore street enhancements, the elements of the CM (and it is exactly a mile from Railway station to Docks) are now in place and ready to deliver. Railway station upgrade with a proper bus-rail interface, sorting out the traffic in St john st, the Town bridge (already lit up as our former town clerk had pushed for) and the new Northgate project about to start this year with the Docks themselves a project for 2020.

In the same vein another demand from last year was to support the increase in numbers of stopping trains at Bridgwater. Eastover’s Councillor Tony Heywood has been pivotal in pushing for this, chairing our Transport Forum and encouraging support for the dynamic ‘Friends of Bridgwater Station’ group.  More trains is not in our gift to deliver, but we sent the necessary letters and told the necessary people what our town needed and the people wanted.

T is for Trinity (well, it’s Easter)

People raised issues with the state of Trinity Hall. We looked into it. There were cleanliness issue and also lack of use issues. Maybe related. Again it was Cllr Leigh Redman sent in as troubleshooter in chief to find solutions. There were quite a lot of public halls offering the same only better hire space, so we had to find something different. Leigh brought in ‘On Your Bike’ the community cycle group who train up unemployed people to service, repair and recycle (yes, not just a pun) bikes and encouraging Bridgwater – long time the most cycle friendly town in Somerset anyway, to re-investigate its relationship with that most green and environmentally  compatible form of transport. And of course bring an income into the town council.

P is for Partnership

Last year the public asked us if we could do more to support community radio. An odd request in isolation, so we took it as part of our major push for a united cultural approach as a key regenerative area that Bridgwater people are particularly good at. Sedgemoor FM is based at the YMCA (try 104.2) and is brilliant. They are a key part of the Bridgwater Cultural Partnership. Eastover councillor Tony Heywood Chairs this organisation designed to bring together all the cultural partners in one big BCP -the Art Centre, the Engine Room, the Library, Museum, Carnival, College and our radio station. Our main cultural achievement is clearly  kick starting the now annual Quayside Festival and by specifically funding BCP participation.

E is for Environment (and hopefully not ‘End of the World’)

Right now we’re in the middle of a massive upsurge in global awareness of climate change issues. Last year the people of Bridgwater told us they wanted us to campaign against single use plastics, the throwaway society and campaign for extra recycling. It’s been one of our priorities. Cllr Kathy Pearce (Westover) has led on the Environment issues. The Town Council was the first in Somerset to declare a ban on Fracking and the first in Sedgemoor to declare a Climate Change emergency. Kath said at the time that these policies mustn’t just sit on the shelf but we have to make them work. That of course won’t be by May 2^nd, so let’s hope we have some more time afterwards.

R is for Regeneration

People have been keen for us to ensure the Northgate project was what we all wanted. When Sedgemoor demolished the popular Splash leisure pool there was an outcry and Town and District were at daggers drawn in opposition to it’s closure and the proposals to build a giant Tesco on the site, so when the ‘supermarket sweep’ inevitably failed we set 4 tests for the future.  Any new project had to be leisure based, the green space had to be preserved, the project mustn’t adversely effect the town centre and any retail element had to be minimal and complimentary. This has been our key priority to environmentally friendly town centre regeneration and the fight to ensure these 4 objectives still held good has been at the forefront. And we did it. We worked in partnership, we held people to account and we pressed our case. The new Northgate development starting this year will include all of those elements and we’ve involved local people every step of the way plus we’ve retained the popular local Scott Cinemas as part of the project as the people wanted.

T is (also) for Tourism

On top of this we’d set our own priorities. Top of this list was Tourism. We really had made a positive push to promote our town with our new brand new first ever in fact Bridgwater Tourism guide, put together by a working party of councillors, the public and the business community and now circulating some 10,000 copies the length and breadth of the country talking up our town promoting our waterways our canals, rivers, docks and coastal paths and making the case for a Bridgwater tourism offer to be taken seriously while kickstarting a legacy for the people who actually live here.

O is for..oh God it’s the Tories again

It had been 20 minutes so I thought I’d better draw breath. Ohhhhh no. Bad move. I just had to mention the concerns from one member of the public last year that we ‘should monitor discrimination at the 1610 swimming pool in Chilton’. In like Flint (the stone age axe, not the detective) was the Duchess “What’s this discrimination? What do you mean? There isn’t any? I’d like to know what there is. Because there isn’t any”. Well, no there isn’t anyway, because we investigated it as we said we would and found there isn’t any. But there might have been…….. Ok….good, so that’s sorted…No it wasn’t…”And what about this stairlift?!” Yes, we had a stairlift installed so people could use the upper floors of the Town Hall so we can bring the building back into totally accessible public use. “Well, I’m told that people can’t use it” Well, they can use it “Well, what’s the point of a stairlift if people can’t use it!” Well, they can use it. For new Town Clerk David Mears it was his first Annual meeting and he chose now to make a timely intervention “Maybe I could explain how it works after the meeting”. Oh thank goodness for that. I mean, yes that’s best. Everybody happy? Looks nervously around. Good.

4 is for….4 More Years

It had been a good year for the Town Council and in fact a good 4 years. We’d increased the precept modestly where needed in order to provide services that the towns people wanted, we’d rescued the countries first Art Centre from closure, we’d set up a Youth Council and given it funding to allocate, our tireless young Mayor had opened up the council to the wider world and reached places that 15^th century Mayors never knew might have existed (that’s Facebook mainly) and we’d promoted the town above and beyond the usual remit while at the same time maintaining funding to our estates and their community centres. What’s not to like!…(glances nervously towards the grumpily shuffling blue benches)…well, actually, Nothing. We’ve done a good job, Well done us.

This is OUR Bridgwater