News Last update: 20 August 2010  

With great sadness we record that Councillor John Bartlett died on 17 August. An architect by profession, John served as a Borough Councillor for over 10 years, representing constituents in St George’s Hill Ward and the interests of all Elmbridge residents with immense dedication and expertise. His contribution to the Borough on so many issues will be greatly missed

There were some problems at Polling Stations on 6 May, Election Day, the worst being at The Furrows in Walton and at an Oatlands Park Polling Station, where there were Parliamentary and Borough Council elections and a County Council by-election simultaneously. At each of these two Polling Stations, apparently around 30 voters were turned away at 10pm unable to vote.

Despite the problems, the outcomes of the three Elections for which votes were cast at these Polling Stations leave little room to argue that they were in practice affected by the delays and queues there. We are not questioning the results themselves. The issue concerns effective disenfranchisement of voters through bureaucratic delays.

Elmbridge Borough Council's Chief Executive Rob Moran, in his capacity as the Returning Officer for Elmbridge, has issued a statement apologising for the problems and undertaking to investigate what went wrong. He arranged a meeting on the morning of 13th May for Group Leaders among Councillors at which he outlined the background to the problems. Residents' leaders requested that the findings from the investigation, when complete, should be presented to the Council's Overview and Scrutiny Committee, so that the findings and recommendations will be fully transparent and in the public domain.

Thank you to the many volunteers who helped our campaigns for the Borough Council elections in individual wards. Residents' Group member associations and Independents lost just one seat to the Conservatives, in St. George's Hill, Weybridge. The Group now musters 20 councillors in all.

We welcome the arrival of our three newly elected Residents Group Councillors, Sandra Dennis in Thames Ditton, Frank Dabell in Hinchley Wood, and Melvyn Mills in Walton Central. Sandra polled the second highest number of votes of all councillors elected in the borough, and along with Frank gained the votes of more than half the people living in his ward. These are rare expressions of popular support for candidates standing for the first time.

The Conservative Leader-elect has stated to the press that his new Administration will concentrate on value for money, keeping council tax as low as possible while preserving services, and being an inclusive Administration. These are aims shared by Residents who look forward to a new era where real and constructive attention is paid to local concerns represented by ward councillors - irrespective of party.