Call for more benches in Worthing town centre rejected

Labour councillors after their call for more benches in the centre of Worthing was rejected by Tory-controlled Worthing Borough CouncilLabour councillors after their call for more benches in the centre of Worthing was rejected by Tory-controlled Worthing Borough Council
Labour councillors after their call for more benches in the centre of Worthing was rejected by Tory-controlled Worthing Borough Council
Worthing’s Labour councillors sat down for what they believed after their proposal to spend £20,000 on benches and planters for a busy shopping area was voted down.

At a borough council meeting last week, Helen Silman (Lab, Heene) suggested that the money could be added to the £425,900 being carried over to the revenue budget for 2019/20, and could pay for 12 planters and 12 benches in Montague Place, along with five years of maintenance.

While Labour and Lib Dem councillors all liked the idea and said the seating was wanted by residents, their Tory counterparts dismissed it, calling it a ‘knee-jerk reaction’ to the council having a bit of money left to spend.

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Annoyed with the outcome, and accusing the Conservatives of using the idea as a political football, eight Labour councillors headed to Montague Place and sat on the ground to highlight the lack of seating in the area.

During the meeting, Steve Waight (Con, Goring) said every councillor could have spoken to their residents and then asked for money based on what people wanted.

He added: “We could all do that. What we actually need, though, is to look at the position of the council and the fairly limited funds we’ve got.

“We know about the low reserves that this council has. We’ve also been told about the increased risk to this council by the investment portfolio that we’ve got.

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“But none of that is taken into account in terms of this proposal. It’s just ‘there’s some money here, let’s spend it on benches’.

“That’s the issue I’ve got. If you’re seriously looking to run a council you need to do a bit more work than what you’ve done on this. You need to have a strategy. You need to have an end point and a procedure to get there.

“Just to turn up and say let’s spend £20,000 on this really isn’t going to get you anywhere.

“The reality is there are a number of other priorities that this council could have considered, which many members would consider to be more important than benches.”

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