Keeping Labour local? Anyone told the AM?

I attended a PACT (Partnerships & Communities Together) meeting in Treforest earlier this week as part of a plan to find out a little more about what is going on in wards across the area. According to the South wales Police website these meetings “are intended to give you an opportunity to highlight the community issues that are having an impact on your quality of life and to assist in deciding which issues are dealt with as priorities.”

They are usually attended by community Police officers or Community Support officers and the local ward Councillor(s). It was by and large unexciting, full of the usual complaints about youth annoyance / rubbish collections / grass or tree cutting.

The ward Councillor, a Labour representative was obviously a little taken aback to see me there, along with a local Welsh Lib Dem colleague. Aware that there is a town council election coming up in that ward soon couldn’t resist the temptation, from the Chair, to have a couple of cheap political digs.

He referred on several occasions to the fact that he lives in the ward - oddly enough he didn’t mention that he has recently obtained planning permission to build a house in Ynysybwl.

There was a veiled reference to the fact that the previous incumbent – a Welsh Liberal Democrat Councillor – didn’t.  Then came the classic line that ‘we’ need representatives to live in the area they represent.

What made this quite so hypocritical?   Well sat next to Cllr Powderhill, and looking a little like a rabbit caught in the headlights was one of the Treforest Town Councillors - Lewis Fackrell.

He was co-opted by the Labour members of Pontypridd Town Council when insufficient candidates came forward in May 2012.  He lives, and stood for election, in Trallwn.  Oops!
 
So is Cllr Powderhill saying that was wrong – why then did he back him?  Another example of the sickening Labour hypocrisy in RCT.

He may also want to have a word with the Assembly Member for Pontypridd.  Mick Antoniw lives in Newport, having rented a house for a couple of months just to have a Pontypridd constituency address to put on his ballot paper.

I trust Cllr Powderhill will bear this in mind in future.