Dear Sir,
When a Councillor reports a local problem to Durham County Council, the case is logged on the Council’s Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system. This does not include complaints to livin or the police, nor cases where an experienced or senior councillor might bypass the system and go straight to the officers.
Nevertheless, it is a proxy indicator of how hard a local councillor is working to look after their patch.
AYCLIFFE NORTH & MIDDRIDGE WARD
Aycliffe North & Middridge Ward has three councillors, one Labour (Cllr John D Clare) and two Conservatives (Cllrs Scott Durham and Paul Howell).
As you may have seen, during the recent election it was claimed that Labour has been neglecting Aycliffe North & Middridge Ward. When we saw this we immediately submitted a Freedom of Information request to DCC to supply the number of cases logged on the CRM system.
THE TABLE SHOWS THE RESULTS
In the 34 months May 2017 to February 2020, Cllr Durham reported 4 CRM cases, Cllr Howell 16, and Labour Cllr John D Clare 463.
When we spoke to Cllr Clare about this he reminded us that there is much more to his councillor’s role than reporting things like potholes and fly-tipping. However, the information totally refutes the claim that Labour is neglecting Aycliffe North & Middridge Ward.
In the 2017 local elections, the people of Aycliffe North & Middridge Ward rejected two of the experienced Labour candidates, and voted instead for two unknown Conservative councillors from Darlington. We presume people believed that they would do a better job than Labour. What actually happened, it seems, was that they left Labour Councillor John D Clare to do it all.
Sedgefield CLP
Campaigns Team
