John Williams defends his record at Taunton Deane Borough Council following petition

Cllr John Williams (Conservative) has broken his silence to hit back at Cllr Ian Morrell (Independent) who has started a petition calling for a vote of no confidence.

Now, Cllr Williams has released a lengthy statement addressing concerns raised by Cllr Morrell, ranging from inactivity at Firepool to the merger of Taunton Deane and West Somerset Councils.

READ MORE: Shock bid launched to oust council leader John Williams

"I refer to the proposed vote of no confidence in me as circulated by Cllr Ian Morrell (July 24), about which I have remained silent until now," Cllr Williams said.

"I must say that I find this unilateral, unwarranted attack, on the properly elected administration of this council extremely disappointing and hopefully it will be resoundingly rejected by members.

"I am also concerned that I am being portrayed as defiant and arrogant, hanging on to my post - nothing could be further from the truth.

"I am elected by my members and can be removed by my members.

"As a group, elections are held annually when members decide if I should continue or replace me and the last vote was as recent as May this year.

"What I have said is that it is totally unacceptable that a councillor, not even one of our group, should try and dictate to members who should be the leader of the council when it has been decided collectively among our group."

Mr Williams went on to address the set of eight reasons Cllr Morrell wants to provoke a vote of no confidence in the leader at October's full council meeting.

1. Abolition of Taunton Deane as a borough 

"It has been made clear to all councillors that the borough status ceases with the end of Taunton Deane Borough Council but it is taken as a given that, provided sufficient councillos vote for reinstatement of the borough, then a new borough status is secured.

"If Cllr Morrell is saying we should not be abolishing Taunton Deane then can he be honest and say how he will replace the £3.1 million per annum savings that accrue with the formation of the single council? A question I have asked many times with only silence in response."

2. Over a decade’s inaction on the regeneration of Firepool

"I fully recognise the concern about lack of action and a lot of effort has and still is going into deliver. But whoever was driving it, it would remain painfully slow until we actually start developing on the site.

"As for 10 years of my alleged inactivity, hardly, as it was the Lib Dem administration that signed up our developer for Firepool in 2008 but by 2012 it became obvious the scheme prepared was not attracting investors so we had to 'rethink' the development which took us back to base with the Town Centre Rethink plans.

"We now have outline planning consent which is a truly mixed use development. Neither administration was helped by the disastrous worldwide recession deterring investment nationally."

3. Expenditure of over £10 million on Vision for Taunton consultants

"I can only suggest this an embellishment of the facts, which in reality must include all the money we secured from the South West Regional Development Agency for the actual development or procurement for projects in Taunton such as:

• assisting Somerset County Cricket Club to expand and remain in Taunton;
• regeneration works to Somerset Square
• Major works to Goodland Gardens;
• regeneration works to Castle Green;
• procurement of land on Firepool;
• flood relief works at Longrun Meadow and footbridges.

"So not surprising £10 million was spent and it would have been closely monitored by the South West Regional Development Agency to ensure it was being spent wisely."

4. Development of homes without workable economic strategy to create new employment

"Coincidentally Taunton is at its highest number of employed persons on record and we have also recently approved a 65-acre employment site adjacent to Junction 25 under a Local Development Order process that facilitates quick and certain development for would-be investors. 

"Cllr Morrell was not supportive of this scheme despite its obvious benefits in terms of speed of approval."

5. Council re-organisations that lead to more redundancies

"We have been absolutely clear from the outset that transformation to reduce administration costs whilst delivering economical and efficient services was always at the heart of our scheme.

"The estimated costs are in our business case approved by full council in early 2016. What Cllr Morrell omits to add is that payback of redundancy costs is achieved in 2.6 years and we benefit from the full savings of £3.1 million per annum.

"Again Cllr Morrell was not supportive even though it ensured that as a new authority we could look forward to a viable and sustainable future."

6. An increase in the staff pension liability to £111 million

"This is completely spurious. Neither the council nor I as leader have any control over pension liabilities - these are determined by independent actuaries who assess the value of pension holdings and advise if it requires higher contributions or not.

"Liability in fact dropped in the year March 2017 to 2018 by £6 million to £93 million as valued by the actuary.

7. Failure of the Southwest One Project with IBM

"Not sure why this is supposedly all my fault as it was signed up in 2007 by the then LibDem administration - I was supportive - but then we managed it through the worldwide calamitous recession.

"Despite this we, TDBC, came out of it with £1.15 million gain. Not bad taking account the circumstances."

8. Unnecessary risk by borrowing £30 million in the last 18 months

"I have been quite clear that we, Taunton Deane Borough Council, have no borrowing on our general fund, so zero funds borrowed, not the £30 million suggested.

"In trying to fabricate the faults Cllr Morrell has conveniently overlooked the fact that our administration have had to manage our budget through the loss of near 60 per cent of our central government funding for the time we have been in office, caused by the worst peace-time recession in living memory.

"Despite this we have used New Homes Bonus to set aside £16.6 million for infrastructure and growth, and development projects.

"A lot of councils have used NHB to prop up their day to day spending, with no investment in vital development projects as we have.

"I am also proud to say that our administration has managed the financial crisis without cutting those vital front line services we know our communities enjoy, we still have lovely parks and green spaces, swimming pools, leisure facilities and a wonderful display of flowers in our town. The changes planned will allow this to continue."

Mr Williams added: "All this and ensuring we continue planning and investing for our future.

"These spurious claims and the attack on our very democracy need rebutting and quickly."