Cannock Chase Tories emerge from long-running council meeting

Councilor Darrell Mawle introduced the motion raising concerns about the condition of roads in the ward at Wednesday’s meeting, following a similar point made by Green Party colleagues on neighboring Stafford Borough Council last month.

However, almost three hours into the full council meeting in Cannock, which began at 18:00, decided to withdraw his motion and instead present it at the next session, which is not scheduled to take place until December 4. He made his decision just before 9pm Wednesday followed a mass walkout by Conservative councilors after all members were presented with a four-page amendment to his motion tabled by Labor cabinet member David Williams.

Conservative group leader Olivia Lyons expressed concerns that more time would be needed to fully consider the 11 a.m. amendment. All but one Tory councilor left the council chamber during the meeting.

An earlier motion, tabled by Cllr Lyons in response to controversial national plans to test winter fuel payments for pensioners, also resulted in a lengthy amendment tabled at the meeting by Labor members. On this occasion, the session was briefly adjourned to give members time to review the three-page document they had just received.

However, council leader Tony Johnson said members of the opposition group “occasionally” presented lengthy motions at full meetings. Meanwhile, the leader of the Green Party group, councilor Andrea Muckley, called on members to treat each other with respect.

The practice of submitting amendments to applications without notice was questioned by councilors on Wednesday. However, they were told this was allowed under the council’s constitution.

The motion tabled by Cllr Mawle stated: “The condition of our district highways is currently critical. Road users risk damaging their vehicles and injuring themselves when traveling on our roads and this is unacceptable.

“It’s time we all held the county council and its contractors to account and demanded that our roads be given higher priority and higher quality work. By declaring a road emergency, we must put pressure on the county council and government to respond to the concerns of our residents.”