Cross councillor quits (From Stroud News and Journal)

Cross councillor quits

STROUD'S Green Party couldn't run a whelk stall according to town councillor Charlie Burling who has resigned after a blistering attack on the council.

Labour councillor Mr Bruling who is chairman of the council's planning committee threw in the towel at a meeting on Monday night

"It's not to spend more time with family, it's not for work commitment, it's for vengeance and spite," he told fellow members:

After the meeting he told the SNJ the comment had been a joke but that behind it lay "sheer frustration."

He said: "The frustration I've got is that you can't drive anything through. The meetings go on for about three hours. It's interminable and quite frankly nobody can make a proper decision. It's petty gesture politics and really I find it very difficult to chair a meeting like that.

"It's symptomatic of that town council, no focus and micro-management to a level where nothing gets done."

He said the "whole culture" needed to change.

"You need to kick them all out and start again with proper people. The Green party couldn't run a whelk stall because they would argue about the quality of the whelks."

But newly appointed chairman Carol Kambites (Green) said: "Charlie Burling is fairly new to the council and I think came on thinking he could kick us all into touch and get it all running his way. He used to be on a big council in London and I think he's found it very difficult to adjust.

"I think people work very hard for the people of Stroud. We do our best against sometimes adverse circumstances and I think what Charlie Burling is fairly frustrated about is how much time things take and it frustrated me when I started but I think it's something you have to accept and work with.

"We try and work with other people and other councils and that is productive but it takes time.

"I just don't think he has the patience to work with that. I hope he will come to terms with it and work with it but I think while you are railing against things all the time and trying to get everything to happen yesterday you don't get anywhere.

"We've never worked through confrontational politics in Stroud. We have arguments but generally speaking we try and work together."