Last week saw Theresa May become our new Prime Minister and she moved quickly to form a new cabinet and government. While Labour remain in chaos and are bitterly divided both nationally and locally, it is now business as usual for the Conservative government following last month’s referendum.
Locally for the Conservatives, it is also business as usual and I’d like to highlight a major consultation that West Sussex County Council is carrying out over the summer. From the 5th of July until the 30th of August, the County Council are asking for your views on what matters to you. The results of this consultation will feed into how the County Council decides its priorities and spends your money over the next two years.
West Sussex County Council provides the majority of our local government services with more than £500 million of services delivered to over 820,000 residents across West Sussex every day of the year. This type of extensive consultation was last carried out in 2014 and the County Council listened carefully to what you thought they should focus their efforts on. The three priorities that came from that consultation and have been enacted on were the following:
• Giving children the best start in life and supporting them to achieve their potential.
• Championing the West Sussex Economy to boost job opportunities.
• Supporting our elderly residents to remain independent in later life.
As a Conservative Council that listens to residents rather than telling residents what they should be thinking, West Sussex County Council is keen to ensure that their focus continues to reflect what residents want. This is particularly important given that there are significant challenges ahead, especially around how services are paid for. The consultation also asks what level of council tax rise you feel we should have levied next year.
The consultation can be easily accessed via the homepage of the County Council’s website. I am keen that as many Crawley residents as possible take part so that our input is significant and so that we ensure our priorities are strongly reflected.