27 July 2023
There are a number of consultations taking place right now and over the coming weeks, so I will take the opportunity to share the details of a few of them in this month’s column. Starting with the much-publicised proposal to close the Faversham Household Waste Recycling Centre (or tip, if you prefer the much shorter name for it!)
I was hoping to be able to share details of KCC’s Tip consultation in this month, but sadly KCC have taken a late decision to push back the start date to late July, so we are still in the dark about what exactly the consultation will look like. A new proposal went to the Environment and Transport Committee at KCC earlier in the month which now has four options on the table rather than three. Sadly Faversham is STILL lined up for closure in all four options.
Over the past few weeks I have been working with a cross party group of KCC and Faversham Town councillors, to oppose the closure. We organised a small protest outside County Hall ahead of the last full council meeting on 11th July and managed to get coverage in Kent Online and were also featured on BBC South East News. We are planning another protest at the full council meeting on 21st September, which I will share more details of next month.
** There will also be a public meeting to discuss the consultation at the Assembly Rooms in Faversham at 7pm on Tuesday 8th August. **
When it finally goes live, the consultation will be available to respond to at https://letstalk.kent.gov.uk/
In the meantime, there are some other consultations on the same page which you may be interested in responding to:
The Community Wardens consultation has just opened. This is a service which provides 70 wardens across the county to be visible in local communities and help combat loneliness and isolation. KCC are currently proposing to cut £1m from this service, which would cut the total number of wardens across the county from 70 down to 38. There are currently four wardens across Swale, so this would very likely reduce to two or three if the cuts went ahead.
In addition to this, the ’emerging’ Local Transport Plan is also being consulted on. This is a critical point for roads and transport as KCC tries to balance an increasing number of vehicles on the road with a need to work towards net zero and a crumbling road network (especially in rural areas). The more people that can feed back to this consultation, the better.
And finally (and possibly most importantly), KCC have just opened their 2024-25 Budget Consultation, which seeks views on the areas residents consider most important for KCC to focus their limited resources on.
All of these consultations can be found at https://letstalk.kent.gov.uk/
Swale Borough Councillor for Boughton & Courtenay
Kent County Councillor for Swale East
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