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The Week

Reviewing the Boundary Review
On Tuesday, the Boundary Commission for England unveiled their proposed new constituency boundaries. There were no huge changes for Medway, but a fair number of little ones. Higham will be brought into the Rochester and Strood constituency, Lordswood and Capstone will move to Gillingham and Rainham, and Chatham and Aylesford is set to become Chatham and the Mallings. The proposed boundaries are now subject to a lengthy consultation period, so it’ll be next year before we hear any final plans.

Radicalised French Radicals
It’s been a whirlwind week for the internal machinations of the Labour Party. We reported earlier in the week on the suspension of long time member and Momentum activist Alan Higgins, who was planning to stand as the Labour candidate for Strood South. Since this, Medway Momentum endorsed a new candidate, Brian Kelly, but now Higgins has been reinstated by the party, so we’ve no idea what’s going on there now.

Cherry picked
In a rare bout of organisation, the Medway Lib Dems managed to be the first party to select their candidate for the Strood South by-election. In an even more unusual step, they’ve selected a new – and young – candidate, 18 year old activist Isabelle Cherry. Cherry’s campaign will apparently focus on issues like school improvement, litter, and public transport, so all fairly safe, but at the least the Medway Lib Dems are putting up a fight once again.

Return of the Iles
In perhaps the least surprising Strood South selection, the Conservatives have selected Josie Iles as their candidate for the Strood South by-election. Iles is a former mayor of Medway, and was the Councillor for Strood South up until losing her seat to UKIP last year. Going into the election, she remains the odds on favourite to retake the seat.

Other Strood South candidates
Not much else to report on the Strood South by-election front, despite the fact that the election is a mere 31 days until the election takes place. UKIP have two candidates to choose between (one being former local chairman Chris Spalding), Medway Labour have about 800 people putting themselves forward, and the Greens apparently have a candidate, but are busy filling out the paperwork to announce who it is.

Councillor allowances
As per their legal obligations, Medway Council recently published the details of councillor allowances paid for 2015-2016. The small problem with this is that they seemingly did a horrifically sloppy job with it, as Medway blogger Alan Collins covered in forensic detail. The sheer number of errors in the document raises serious concerns about the openness and transparency of Medway Council.

Cabinet reshuffle
Following last week’s sad passing of Councillor Mike O’Brien, a necessary reshuffle took this week within the Cabinet. Councillor Andrew Mackness will take over O’Brien’s education portfolio, with new Councillor Martin Potter taking on the new portfolio of educational improvement. The former corporate services portfolio of Councillor Mackness will be split amongst several other Cabinet members.

Medway MPs in Parliament
Remarkably, Rochester and Strood MP Kelly Tolhurst raised concerns in Parliament about the consequences that the EU referendum that she voted for has had on small businesses in her constituency. Meanwhile, Gillingham and Rainham MP Rehman Chishti once again spent his time banging on about laser pens.

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The Week

Cllr Brown-Reckless resigns from Medway Council
In a move that surprised absolutely no one, UKIP councillor for Strood South Catriona Brown-Reckless this week resigned from the council, having been elected only 16 months ago. This triggers a by-election in the Strood South ward, with a three way fight between UKIP, the Conservatives, and Labour for the seat taking place on October 20.

Remembering Mike O’Brien
Sad news this week as councillor Mike O’Brien, Conservative representative of Rainham Central and portfolio holder for Children’s Services, passed away. Mike had been a longstanding member of the local political scene, first being elected to Gillingham Borough Council in 1976 and Kent County Council in 1979.

Cabinet record
Not for the first time, the ruling Cabinet of Medway Council managed to conduct their business in record time this week. Despite having to discuss discretionary business rates relief for local charities and not for profit organisations, government proposals on the distribution of business rates, and a recruitment freeze, they managed to have everything wrapped up in 15 minutes. Because that’s how open and transparent democracy is done.

Boundary review
Plans that could quite literally change the shape of Medway politics will be unveiled on Tuesday, as the Boundary Commission release the first stage of their 2018 boundary review. The review is intended to reduce parliament to 600 seats from 650, and create constituencies of roughly equal size. Reasonable enough at first glance, but previous proposals have suggested moving Hempstead & Wigmore into Chatham and Aylesford, and Luton & Wayfield into Gillingham and Rainham. We’ll be pouring over the proposals in detail once they’re made available.

Local plan
The local plan stumbled forward slightly this week, with a meeting held in parliament to discuss it between Rochester and Strood MP Kelly Tolhurst and, er, six other Conservative councillors. Given that the local plan is a vital document that will shape the direction of Medway over the coming years, it’s a shame that the direction is seemingly being directed by the Conservative benches and not a cross-party group.

Medway Labour website hackwatch, day 7182
After months and months of the Medway Labour website being hacked by someone dodgy, and the party doing nothing to fix or take down the site, councillor Tristan Osborne declared this week that something new is on the way! While we’re delighted to hear that something is actually happening, the Medway Labour group will have to excuse us if we don’t expect much this side of Christmas.

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Remembering Mike O’Brien

We’re saddened to hear that Councillor Mike O’Brien has passed away. Mike was always a thoroughly decent man, and his presence on the council will be missed.

Mark Templeton, the former Senior Press Officer at Medway Council, shares his memories of his friend:

Mike O’Brien was a truly wonderful man. Yes, that’s the sort of thing you always hear at these sad and difficult times but he really was.

On my first day at work at Medway Council he made a bee-line for me – and hardly a day went past in the two years I was there that we didn’t talk.

Mike loved his work with the media and he always believed he should be held to account being in such a high-profile role. He never wanted to hide or dodge the tough questions, in fact he wanted to face those difficult times head-on because he knew being a politician meant taking the rough with the smooth.

He thrived on his cabinet education post. He wanted to make a difference to the young people of Medway and he did. Many children will have seen him at their school. When we used to go to schools for media interviews he would always spend time – away from the media glare – talking to pupils about their hopes and aspirations.

Whatever subject we were talking about he always turned it back to his family. He was a proud family man, forever talking to me about wife Sheila, his children and, more than anything else, his grandchildren who he doted on.

There was nothing unusual about Mike texting me at all hours of the day if he had something on his mind. 5.30 in the morning ahead of a live radio interview would be his favourite time to text – I once made the mistake of telling him I got up early and from then on I was fair game to him.

One Sunday afternoon, a text message alert flashed up from Mike. My first thought was what’s the problem? It read: “That was a fantastic goal by Rooney”. From then on in, hardly a match passed when we didn’t comment on it either by text or through social media, which he also loved.

Mike stood out for me as a politician with his integrity and desire to be completely transparent and the fact he truly  had young people at his heart. He wanted them to do well and was always telling them how important education was to their future. But it was as a family man I admired him most because of that smile he had every time he talked about them.

I last saw him six months ago at my leaving do when he came with wife Sheila. I would have thought there was something wrong if he had not asked me for that selfie which he put up on social media. We kept in touch after I left and  although I’ve lost friends through this awful illness before, he’s the one that never once lost that smile.

Myself and a colleague had a nickname for him. We called him Granddad Mike. That was because he wasn’t just a work colleague to us, he felt like a member of our family.

I never told him that nickname. I wish I had now. He’d have loved it.