LYNDEN Stowe has spent 12 years as a councillor, nine of which he has been leader of Cotswold District Council (CDC). Reporter Jack Pitts went to talk to him about parking, planning and why people from the Cotswolds should once again vote Conservative.

 

Born and bred in Mickleton, north of Chipping Camden, 53-year-old Lynden Stowe has been leading the council for nine years.

His biggest achievement, he said, is “getting to grips with council tax” and helping to put money back in people’s pockets.

He said: “When the Conservatives first took control in 2003, council tax had been going up at up to 10 per cent a year; we have brought that right down.

“And we’ve done that without having to cut any frontline services.

“We’ll always be about keeping council tax low.

In their recent manifesto the Conservatives pledged to continue this trend by freezing car parking and green bin charges until at least 2020.

The Conservatives have brought down costs with efficiency savings, most noticeably by sharing administration costs with other districts.

For example, sharing CDC owned waste disposal company UBICO with Cheltenham Borough Council.

CDC has also moved towards sharing staff.

“We share about 90 posts – most of our senior management – and we are able to do that because we have a good officer team”, said Lynden.

The council’s last four years will perhaps be most associated with the local plan and the accompanying housing developments which have spilt opinion in the Cotswolds.

“I think it has been a difficult process when clearly one of our aspirations will always be to protect the Area of Natural Outstanding Beauty.”

At times, Lynden said, he felt like his hands were tied by central government.

“Democracy went out of the window,” he said. “Everywhere needs housing, everybody knows that, but what the government have started doing is giving less thought to the environmental benefit and more to the economic benefit.

“The government gets it right sometime but, I think, the government gets it wrong sometimes too.

“They made a big strategic decision to make lots of houses. Not only to house people but because they believed at the time that it would boost the economy.

“They should allow district councils more authority in determining housing.”

For Lynden, parking is never far from the agenda.

“We want to look at the options for parking in Cirencester and we will be commissioning work to see if we can create a two deck car park in the town centre, maybe in Waterloo Car Park,” he said.

“The problem with Cirencester will always be the archaeology, so building upwards makes sense.

“But we’d have to make sure that whatever part of town it is has the right investment so that we enhance the local area.”

Of the 34 Conservative candidates in the District Elections on May 7, 16 are sitting councillors and 18 are not.

There are a few to look out for, he said.

“David Henson [St Michael’s Ward] is really good, he’s young, dynamic and has a lot of life experience,” he said.

“As is Tina Stevenson [Tetbury with Upton Ward] who runs the pink cabs, she’s got small business experience and is very community minded.”

With Lib Dem popularity growing, is Lynden still confident of a Conservative win?

“It’s never a foregone conclusion in politics. But I think we have earned people’s trust. They know we have worked very hard over the past few years”

Ukip and the Green Party are fielding record numbers of candidates this time around. Fringe parties getting more involved in district elections is positive, according to Lynden, and is good for democracy.

He said: “If you have fought an election campaign you can go out and say ‘I won the election’, you do not get that if nobody could be bothered to stand against you.”