The mercury rises at County Hall as Reform party sets out its plans

Opposition parties question 'savings' claims

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After the euphoria of victory in the Garden of England, the Reform party is beginning to grasp that with victory comes the rather trickier business of running what is the largest council in the country.

The party has already has already had an unwelcome taste of internal dissent with the alleged ‘sacking’ of one of its new county councillors and the suspension of another facing charges of threatening to kill his wife.

Like its predecessor Ukip, the party’s approach to these ‘local difficulties’ is to try and ignore them, something it achieves quite successfully - on others, less so. The new administration is finding its feet and has the advantage of a huge majority - which, to be fair, also brings it problems.

In its first meeting of the full council this week, the party leader went out of her way to emphasise that she was developing an exciting programme of activities.

That most of these decisions also appealed to the party’s core vote was not a co-incidence. It knows that it is in prime position to consolidate its power base in Kent.

So, we were treated to a series of pronouncements in a speech that did not shy away from spelling it like it is. Or is at least in Reform party’s eyes.

In the efforts to stop KCC’s debts from rising, the leader announced that the authority was looking to block the sale of Invicta House that had been agreed by the former Tory administration.

And there was further good news - apparently - on the efforts to reduce the level of debt.

This had reduced by some £16 million, a saving of £2000 per day in interest payments alone. The “no more borrowing” policy would reduce this debt even further by over £33 million by next March.

The opposition parties suspect a sleight of hand with these savings but with no papers available to check the claims, it was impossible to say.

Some of these actions would normally be subject to the rules around transparency and involve executive decision-making. Perhaps they will be. Otherwise, we could be in for a lengthy time-span.

The sweltering temperature in the council chamber led to officials wheeling in two high-powered air conditioners but the noise distorted the webcast feed and were switched off - not before the chairman Cllr Palmer slipped in the old joke about the hot air caused by elected members.

Slightly more serious were comments made by the leader Linden Kemkaran about the continuing arrival of irregular migrants on small boats. That’s standard stuff from the Reform party playbook but provocative all the same.

She said men from “deeply misogynistic” and “unenlightened cultures” were “invading” the county.

This was lapped up by the Reform party backbenchers, who to a man and to a woman were continuing to abide by the sartorial code requiring them to wear something a shade of turquoise.

It rather made them look like the cabin crew of a low-cost budget airline.

Still, the meeting offered a glimpse into the party’s approach to its challenges - even if one or two of its members were absent due to certain other pressing matters.

Chin chi