If you stand up to poor service, high taxes or waste, it is possible to win

Mark Wallace of the TaxPayers' Alliance argues that standing up to poor service in local government can work.

Yesterday, the Leader of Herefordshire County Council published an apology on this site that is not only welcome but gives some encouragement to all those campaigning for better local government.

Councillor Phillips was apologising to a local resident, Mr Hubbard, who had been sent a threatening letter ordering him to stop cutting the grass verge outside his home. His public-spirited behaviour, the letter suggested, was harming the appearance of the street by showing up the poor maintenance of the other verges, which the council had allowed to become overgrown, and he was ordered to stop.

Mr Hubbard’s experience is unfortunately not an uncommon one. All too often council officials become too fond of throwing their weight around and find it easiest to throw it at law-abiding soft targets rather than at truly problematic residents. He should have been congratulated and thanked for his efforts to make the street a nicer place, not threatened.

The outcome of this case is a pleasing one, though – and Councillor Phillips is to be congratulated for having the good sense to set this right and the decency to apologise. There is a lesson for all of us, too: if you stand up and object to poor service, high taxes or waste in your council, it is possible to win.

Sorry, Mr Hubbard. Herefordshire Council leader on the lesson to be learnt.

After Brian Hubbard was sent a threatening letter for doing some volunteer gardening, Cllr Roger Phillips Conservative leader of Herefordshire, the Council responsible, on why it must never happen again.

As Leader of Herefordshire Council I shared everyone’s dismay when I read the story of Mr Brian Hubbard who, in tending and tidying a piece of public land to the front of his home, was sent an over-zealous and unacceptable letter from the council's public rights of way department saying he was encroaching on the land. The actions of Mr Hubbard are those we all admire and would wish to see commonplace in every community. Although the council moved immediately to apologise and retract the letter, the damage was done.

It is a challenge of course for every large organisation, particularly one that provides up to a thousand different services, mostly very professionally as a matter of routine, to ensure that one individual in one department does not do something that potentially impacts the reputation of every other hard working member of staff. Yes, we do have guidelines and policies in place - but that sometimes is not enough to counter a shortage of common sense.

I have instigated a review of what happened and expect measures to be put in place to ensure that this will be the last letter of this nature and tone that is issued to a respected and law abiding member of the community.

Herefordshire gardening response

Cllr Roger Phillips, the Conservative leader of Herefordshire Council has emailed in response to the story about the pensioner threatened for gardening on the Council owned verge of grass outside his home.

He says:

"I was unaware of this situation  and  I am following  it up. If people want to mow grassland and verges outside their homes as a general principal  common sense would indicate no one or body should have a problem. I need to understand off our officers how this letter was issued.
"Letters of apology  have been sent to  the residents affected. I am checking numbers but I think is in the region of single figures."

Losing the gardening vote in Herefordshire

Friday's Telegraph as well as other papers have reported on the plight Brian Hubbard who routinely weeds and mows the grass verge outside his home. He also picks up any litter and the grass cuttings left behind. The land is owned by the Conservative controlled Herefordshire Council. The problem is that taking pride he has made the area too tidy and it shows up the other land where only the Council does the gardening. The Council have sent him a letter accusing him of "encroaching" on council land and been told that he must stop tending to the grass and add bafflingly that he must "return the area to its original state within 28 days" or the Council will do as and charge him the expense.

Having a Conservative administration at a Town hall should mean that bureaucracy and unnecessary state interference are banished, that community pride and voluntary endeavour are celebrated and encouraged rather than stamped on, that politically correct jobsworths are invited to seek employment elsewhere.

This doesn't seem to have happened in Herefordshire. Even now the issue has come to light there is a grudging half apology "if Mr Hubbard feels the letter was heavy handed." They offer to meet him no doubt to explain why they are right and he is wrong and should stop mowing the lawn.

Who is running the Council? The councillors or the Council Officers? Why is the officer who sent this absurd letter still drawing a salary at the Council Taxpayers expense? Why hasn't Mr Hubbard been sent a medal? To paraphrase Neil Kinnock: It starts with councillors not wishing to micro manage, deferring to the professionalism of officers, wishing to loyally defend council officers in public. Then it ends in the chaos, the grotesque chaos, of a Conservative Council, a Conservative Council, writing letters to pensioners denouncing them for weeding their gardens.