- but unfortunately not  towards us Liberal Democrats. We and the Independents have slightly improved our position, with 13 and 10 seats each; Labour now only has 1. The Conservatives, with 56 out of 80 seats, constitute 70% of the Council. At first glance everything looked  much the same for yesterday’s Annual Meeting as it did in May.

Nevertheless if we could not shift the previous leadership, the prospect of accounting to residents for the failures of the last twelve years - which we did our best to point out strongly - appears to have galvanised this huge majority party to move from a sort of ‘grow-your-own’ opposition which was starting to emerge particularly in relation to Youth Services and Childrens Services into an internal revolution.

Andrew Povey was elected as the new Leader of the Conservative Group before the election. While the internal politics are not know to me, there was a notable lack of fulsome praise and good wishes from his predecessor, Nick Skellett, who did not attend yesterday’s meeting. 

Yesterday the extent of the shift of power and support within the majority group began to become clearer; and Andrew Povey put forward a number of radical proposals, many of which would have been - virtually have been - pooh-poohed by the previous administration when we backed them.

For me what looked like being a boring, routine meeting turned into an enjoyable drama with strong comedic elements.

Not everyone will be equally interested in all of this, so as usual here is a list of headings so that you can skip down as you like. (I’m sorry I can’t manage same-page hyperlinks on this system)

• Geoff Marlowe - New Chairman from the Old Guard? 
• The Not-so-retiring Chairman - Angela Speaks Her Mind
• Election of the New Leader - and a fresh voice in the wilderness
• The Report of the Leader - so what can we find not to like?
• Keeping things in proportion
• Lunch 

Geoff Marlowe - New Chairman from the Old Guard?    

The Chairman’s role is largely ceremonial, except for when he’s Chairing meetings of Full Council - and then he is by convention fair and non-partizan between political parties. Nevertheless his is chosen by and from the majority party.

Angela Fraser, the previous Chairman, was re-elected to the Council but the Conservatives put forward last year’s Vice Chairman, Geoff Marlowe, to replace her this year.  (Geoff Marlowe represent The Byfleets.)

In the customary laudatory nomination speech, Andrew Povey noted among other things that Geoff had been an RAF fighter pilot early in his career, and suggested that ‘a little bit of military discipline might be helpful … shooting members down in flames if they get too unruly.’ (Many a time Angela Fraser made the plea that we should get through the business quickly so that we could finish before lunch. We rarely did.)

Geoff’s acceptance speech, made from the solid back-to-the-wall chairman’s dais, picked up the flying ace theme: ‘ … one of the things you learn is to watch your six-o’clock … I have no problem here. You can be attacked from the rear, I can not.’

I am not sure who he though was at risk of attack from the back here. It could have been all Councillors. But it was also the case that Andrew Povey had kept his customary seat on the front bench in the middle of the chamber and straight ahead of the Chairman.

The Vice Chairman is Lavinia Sealy,  representing Bisley, Chobham and West End. I have found her fairly formidable, and I am glad her efforts are often channelled into supporting such issues as for Voluntary Services and increasing Youth Facilities - it takes energy to oppose her. 

• The Not-so-retiring Chairman - Angela Speaks Her Mind

There was then a vote of thanks to Angela Fraser as retiring Chairman, and she had her chance to respond. Mention had been made of  the Thames Young Mariners and visit to them, which in the context of explaining that she would stand on a boat or a chair or a table in order to speak out, allowed her to continue: “I don’t believe in health and safety … I don’t believe in equality and diversity … and when there is a change in Government … “ - unfortunately my jaw was dropping here to the point where my note-taking became ineffective, and I can’t give you the exact following words but it was to the effect that Things Should Change.

We got a reference to the prayers that start each meeting - attendance optional now, I’m glad to say - and a quote from the bible: ” … and if a Kingdom be divided against itself that Kingdom cannot stand, and if a house be divided against itself that house cannot stand … ”

And almost the final shot: ”I’m not going to be a silent member, I’m not giving up any of my charity and voluntary jobs … I’ll try not to be too much of a nuisance; it depends, just how hard I try.“ 

The significance/threat  of the equality and diversity cracks and not ‘being too much of a nuisance’ became clearer later.

• Election of the New Leader - and a fresh voice in the wilderness

No surprises: Andrew Povey, with the support of the entire Conservative group. It was especially significant because this is the first Council under the Strong Leader and Cabinet Model (see my 11 December posting here)

The coronation was briefly interrupted by a new voice from the RA/Independent Group, Eber Kington from Epsom and Ewell North, noting again that Surrey is the ‘worst Council in England’ (strictly the worst County Council) and railing against four more years of Conservative leadership, where they ‘move the furniture, swap around a few of the politicians, and see if anyone notices the difference’.

At first I took the Chairman’s response to be a dig at returning opposition Councillors, but It’s hard to be sure: ‘Thank you, Mr. Kington. We have needed an opposition around here for a long time.’

• The Report of the Leader - so what can we find not to like?

The official write-up is on the SCC website here ; as I write it’s getting late and this is a long posting, so I’ll just give you some of the bits from my notebook that I found especially interesting or indicative.

Dr. Povey wants to ‘bring a fresh approach’ - to show ‘that we are listening to our residents’, and to achieve the ‘value for money … members of the public want to see.’

He referred to the new arrangements that give him a term of four years and increased powers, acknowledging it ‘does mean that I get to choose my Deputy Leader and Cabinet’ .

(The term ‘cabinet’ now replaces ‘Executive’.)

He named his Deputy as David Hodge, and confirmed that Peter Martin will continue to be responsible for Children’s Services. Other names were not forthcoming - the list was supposed to have been printed, but we didn’t have it. We do know that now ‘all cabinet members must complete equality and diversity training.’ (c.f. Angela’s earlier outburst, but Surrey has been criticised on this front in the past.)

There are moves toward localism - the expectation of more ‘grassroots’ involvement of Councillors with such matters as road maintenance and HGV licenses in their area, with the Local Committees having oversight. There’s also a cautious move towards giving Local Committees more powers in relation to services for young people: ‘instead of just nothing the Youth Development Plan … [they] … will have the power to approve it’.

With the new cabinet model there will be changes in where power lies. Andrew Povey has kept some significant decisions for himself; others will be delegated to Cabinet members - but there was a positive statement that ‘all decisions will be made in public’.

Quality Assurance and Zero Based Budgeting both got a look in; in terms of policy areas we got ’I think Surrey is a wonderful place to live and that’s my starting point as Leader’, though following that came a welcoming sentence saying Dr. Povey intends to ‘also spend a little more time thinking about sustainability and climate change’ giving it a ‘higher profile’.

There were major intiatives promised on speeding and traffic; burseries to help encourage the ‘higher calibre of graduates’ in social work, favouring where possible ‘those with a home base in Surrey’ and offering them the opportunity to work for Surrey during vacations; and a commitment to ‘reduce or remove reliance on Energy from Waste plants in Surrey’ (A reversal of the thinking coming from the old leadership; moreover the additional comment that ‘we want to be world class’ in the context of waste technology suggests the possibility of the more progressive approach we have been suggesting for some years.)

Finally came undertakings about how much of this would be achieved or under way in the first 100 days. (What is the magic of 100 days? Why is it so popular?)

• Keeping things in proportion  

Next we had to get safely past the Annual review of Proportionality. To improve the quality of scrutiny, the the new Leadership has reduced the number of Members on scrutiny committees - perhaps to encourage us to concentrate our efforts more intensely. (’Durr! Read the papers!)

Allocation of places to opposition parties had been more generous than strictly required, leaving the Conservatives a couple or so seats short. (Since they fill all the Cabinet positions, removing pressure on Committee places, this shouldn’t actually leave Conservative back-benchers short of work.)

The oddity of this particular vote is that even one person voting against the proposals means all the arrangements have to be redrawn on the basis of strict proportionality.

So we in the Opposition weren’t about to vote against it; the risk came from the Conservatives own benches. Angela Fraser spoke at some length against this ‘curtailment of the majority’, concluding ’I cannot support this, but I will not vote against it.’

Tory discipline held. This time.

• Lunch.

Silver service again, in the Ashcombe room. Wine served before, two sorts of locally-produced wine from Denbies vinyard with. A three course menu of Salmon Parpadelle; Surrey rack of lamb; and Lemon Tart. All followed by coffee with mints, toast to the Queen, and a speech given by the High Sheriff.

New members I talked to were experiencing the kind of culture shock that has led me to write up these lunches - paid for with your money - regularly.

Thank you, but I don’t know how many more of them I can eat. I may have to stop. I hope you won’t be too disappointed in me.