Twickenham's Wider View

Local Action

Delivering On Our Promises 

A message from Councillor Lord True,
Leader of the Council

                                    

“Our new Conservative Council promised to put people first and sweep away bossy Town-Hall-Knows-Best attitudes.  But with Britain still plunging into debt at £16 million an hour, we all know we can’t go on blowing our children’s money.  So, yes, we have made economies but in the right places.

                  

The previous Council                                What a refreshing contrast in 2010.
let us all down in 2006.

“Our first act was to cut top Councillor’s allowances, stop the free food the last Council voted for its own Members and end their lavish subsidies for staff car parking.  We cut spending on ticket-happy wardens and unwanted, congestion-causing traffic schemes.  And we ended glossy Council magazines delivering propaganda on the rates.

 "This meant we could freeze Council Tax this May – and we are on course to do that again in 2012.

                   

“We also did what no other Council has done – consult every household on local priorities.  So far over 15,000 people have contributed ideas.  This year we will publish improvement plans for each local village, designed not in the Town Hall but by you, the public.  Helping us come together as communities is this Council’s key aim.

“As promised we scrapped unfair tax surcharges on family cars in CPZs.  This year the Richmond Card will enable 30 minute free parking for shoppers which will breathe life into our high streets and help small shops.

                      

“We are investing in more school places and progressing plans to bring sixth forms to Borough schools.

“Our new centre of excellence for the care of dementia sufferers will be among the best in Britain.

“We will continue to cherish our environment, resist garden grabbing and spend more on the care of our precious parks and open spaces.

“We are also reversing years of neglect of basic road and pavement repairs.

                     

“We have kept weekly refuse collections, introduced recycling for more plastics, and taken recycling to flats.

“With our Regional and National Government’s help we have stopped both charges in Royal Parks and Heathrow expansion.

                    

London Assembly Member
Tony Arbour fights for us
against Heathrow expansion.

“These are the priorities you told us you wanted in surveys across the Borough.  Your ideas will be our guide in the years ahead.”

                                                                                                      Cllr Lord True.

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We said we would - and we did!