Dissidence and drama at the cricket ground

Brighton and Hove is getting used to this sort of drama every February.

With a minority administration at the helm of the city council, trying to get anything agreed by all 54 members is an achievement.

Which is why as the clock ticked towards 11 on Thursday night as the budget was approved, the leaders of the three parties on the local authority went away satisfied.

But who was the winner?

The evening started with councillors on a sticky wicket – and not just because proceedings were held at the Sussex County Cricket Ground.

The decision to hold the meeting there rather than at one of the three town halls in the city was down to accessibility.

With reductions in spending to adult social care, a number of interested parties wanting to attending were in wheelchairs.

With Portslade Town Hall too small, Hove being refurbished and Brighton only able to give two people with mobility issues access, a change of venue was required.

But the cost – £2,500 according to officials; £4,500 according to senior politicians – was hardly welcomed on a night when dozens would lose their jobs and millions would be taken out of the town hall budget.

Council leader Warren Morgan was clear on the need for setting a legal budget.

In his quiet unassuming but very effective way, he mapped out why the council needed to look forward and be businesslike in its approach – even if that meant some valuable but non-statutory services would go.

Then it was on to Conservative group leader Geoffrey Theobald, who thrives on such occasions.

Standing there with a slight breeze from the heater blowing through his hair, he resembled Gandalf in the dwarf mine shouting “though shall not pass” to anyone in the vicinity.

Obdurate and stubborn, it was clear this gentleman was not for turning.

Green convenor Phelim Mac Cafferty was the final group leader to speak – full of his usual passion and giving a Churchillian V to authority and austerity.

The position of his party was made clear from the start – no amendments which basically meant “we don’t want to be a part of any of this”.

There were a few laughs along the way.

Everyone’s favourite Tory-councillor-they-love-to-hate Tony Janio stood up to a chorus of jeers – and that was before he revealed a tie with Ronald Reagan’s face on it.

Then Labour councillor Penny Gilbey’s attempt at a speech full of drama on the importance of trade union reps fell flat as she misplaced the paper she’d written her speech on.

But The main moment came from the unison Unison choir (they were GMB members actually), who disrupted proceedings with a rendition of “solidarity for ever” to the tune of “glory glory hallelujah”.

Several attempts to waft them on failed.

But eventually, councillors got down to business.

Vote time came.

And with the Greens making it clear they would vote against everything, it was down to Labour and the Conservatives to find some middle ground.

One Tory member I spoke to halfway through the meeting said they would need Labour to back “four or five” of their amendments before they would vote for the budget.

Stalemate and Groundhog Day loomed – as did another bill of thousands for room hire if councillors could not sort anything out.

As it was, council leader Morgan turned into broker and ceded ground to the Tories, meaning that noise patrol teams, grass verge cutting and support for mental health teams was restored.

But all of this came at a cost – with the council finding the money out of the fund it provides to train union officials.

A tough job has now been made even tougher for the Labour leader.

Watching the parties stream out of the room, members of the Conservative opposition looked the happiest, smug that everything they asked for they had wangled out of the minority administration.

Labour’s lot seemed content they escaped without too many battle scars while the Greens, as they were most of the night, looked like they wished they were not there in the first place.

Someone said to me the city loses again with politicians’ bickering coming above the good of everyone else.

But on reflection, I don’t think it does.

Making tough decisions and even tougher deals is politics after all.

Some people out there may want all of our elected officials to be like the protesting choir and sing in unison.

If the immediate past teaches us anything, dissidence and drama is what Brighton and Hove politics does best.

AWAY from politics and an even barmier situation has been evolving in my garden this winter.

My first attempts to grow veg in the garden have left me scratching my head – and not just because of the weird and wonderful shapes of the edible roots.

All winter, the time of year when nothing is supposed to grow, I have been harvesting a regular crop of spring onions. Balmy indeed.