iFAQs Archives - Page 3 of 4 - The Political Medway

March 18, 2019March 19, 2019

iFAQ: Let’s be frank(lin), part II

Following our previous iFAQ on Cllr Franklin, several councillors contacted us to say that while they may have a view on the situation, they felt unable to do so while an investigation was ongoing. That’s fair enough, so following the end of the investigation, we contacted all of the backbench Medway Conservatives again. Surely they would be happy to share their opinions this time around? We sent each of them this question:

Now that Cllr Franklin has been expelled from the Conservative Party, what are your views on how the situation has been handled over the past three years?

As usual, we told everyone that their answers would be published entirely unedited. They are presented below in the order they were received.

March 11, 2019March 11, 2019

iFAQ: Medway Commercial Group

Following on from the ongoing arguments surrounding problems within Medway Commercial Group, we sent the following question to all councillors:

Do you feel Medway Commercial Group continues to provide good value for money for Medway taxpayers?

As usual, we told everyone that their answers would be published entirely unedited. They are presented below in the order they were received.

March 4, 2019March 3, 2019

iFAQ: Pentagon purchase

Following on from Medway Council’s decision to pursue a purchase of the Pentagon Centre in Chatham, we sent the following question to relevant portfolio holders, ward councillors, those seeking to represent the ward, and other local organisations:

Do you believe £45m to purchase the Pentagon Shopping Centre is a good use of council funds and why?

As usual, we told everyone that their answers would be published entirely unedited. They are presented below in the order they were received.

February 25, 2019February 25, 2019

iFAQs: The view from the gallery

Due to unforeseen, er, ‘technical problems’, we don’t have one of our usual inFrequently Answered Questions posts this week. To fill the gap though, we decided to answer some of the questions we’ve previously sent to councillors ourselves because we also have opinions you know and we are never above making this about us. We look forward to you telling us how wrong we are in the comments below.

February 18, 2019February 20, 2019

iFAQ: Let’s be frank(lin)

Following on from Medway Conservatives taking three years to suspend Cllr Franklin over his offensive tweeting, we decided to keep the iFAQ relevant this week, by asking this question to all councillors:

What acceptable reasons are there for a political party taking three years to take any action against a councillor engaging in hate speech online after it is highlighted in a full council meeting?

As usual, we told all councillors that their answers would be published entirely unedited. They are presented below in the order they were received.

February 11, 2019February 10, 2019

iFAQ: Updating democracy

For our inFrequently Answered Questions this week, we emailed all political parties standing candidates in the upcoming elections a set of three questions on local democracy. For some reason we don’t fully understand, two Conservatives replied despite us only reaching out to their one contact address. As usual, all responses are published unedited below.

January 28, 2019January 27, 2019

iFAQ: So predictable?

For this week’s iFAQ, we decided to ask all councillors a question about the state of democracy in Medway. Given the predictability of the ebb and flow of council meetings, and how it’s usually fairly easy to guess the outcome to any given question, concerns have been raised about how democratic our local structures are. As such, all councillors received the following question:

If it’s possible to accurately predict the response to every question and motion at Medway Council meetings, what does this say about the state of democracy in Medway?

As usual, all councillors were told that their responses would be printed entirely unedited, with the results presented below in the order they were received:

January 7, 2019January 7, 2019

iFAQs: Power to the People

For this week’s iFAQ, we have tried something a little different. Rather than emailing councillors or other relevant individuals with questions for them to answer, we decided to carry out an experiment to see how responsive each local party would be to random members of the public emailing them about local issues.

December 31, 2018December 30, 2018

iFAQ: Something positive for 2019

For the final iFAQ of the year, we decided to ask all 55 councillors three simple questions. In the festive spirit, we kept these questions fairly straightforward and on a positive note as we move into a new year.

Readers, a grand total of three councillors replied. As such, we now present those answers in full. They probably aren’t the three you expect either.

December 10, 2018December 10, 2018

iFAQs: Big Responses in Little Parties

One of our ~~popular~~ features on The Political Medway is inFrequently Answered Questions, where we’d send off questions to relevant political figures and hope that we might occasionally get a reply. This week, we decided to contact the smaller parties who stood in Medway in 2015, but didn’t gain any representation on the council. As usual, we print all of their responses below entirely unedited.