Darren Fower LibDem Leader talks to the BBC’s Paul Stainton about the new Peterborough Cabinet posts and other political topics from a Liberal Democrat viewpoint. Broadcast at 08:35 on Wednesday 19th May 2010 in the Peterborough Breakfast Show on BBC Radio Cambridgeshire.
STAINTON: Now on yesterday’s show we heard from Peterborough City Council Leader Marco Cereste, many times, as he announced his Cabinet for the next term in office. We’ve already heard from the Cabinet Member for the Environment this morning, Samantha Dalton. There was also a new role for former Mayor Irene Walsh as Marco explained.
CERESTE: (TAPE) We’ve had two new Cabinet Members. One is Councillor Samantha Dalton who will look after the Environment and the Environment Capital portfolio and the other is Councillor Irene Walsh and she will look after Women’s Enterprise, Community Cohesion, HR, Health and Safety and so on.
STAINTON: (STUDIO) The other big change of course is that Marco Cereste will now look after the portfolio for Growth and Strategic Development for the city. Councillor Darren Fower is the Leader of Peterborough’s Liberal Democrats and joins us now. Good morning Darren.
FOWER: Good morning Paul.
STAINTON: You must be disappointed in this new era of collegiate politics, of coalition politics, that not one Liberal Democrat was invited in to this Peterborough Cabinet.
FOWER: Well it was disappointing, and again this year we stood up, and we made the point that as one of the smallest local authorities in the country we thought it made absolutely no sense whatsoever, and didn’t consider it fair to the local taxpayer, that we had the maximum number of Cabinet posts, which in essence means a handful of Conservative councillors get a significant amount of dosh on top of their basic salary. Continue reading “Darren Fower LibDem on the Peterborough Cabinet Reshuffle”