Why do technical issues matter?

This week, we have seen a complaint about a Councillor not declaring interests properly.

The district council (very quickly) dismissed the complaint and the county council is yet to determine but there has been a predictable collective groan and eye rolling from people who “hate politicking”.

It is important to remember though that these minute details are extremely important when maintaining confidence in the political process. What our elected representative interests are is paramount to ensuring that the public at large can see that decisions are being made in a free and fair way.

I must stress that it is absolutely right and proper that a councillor can have private financial interests. There is nothing wrong with a councillor being a director of a company, a controlling shareholder or manage a portfolio of interests. All that needs to be done is for these interests to be declared clearly, unambiguously for all to see.

For those that feel this doesn’t matter, I wholeheartedly disagree. Failure to declare interests means that waters get muddied and decision making processes become opaque. To allow a non declaration to pass is to allow shoddiness to prevail. The people of South Kesteven, Lincolnshire and the UK deserve better.

Yes, there are bigger problems than this but this IS a problem. Therefore this problem needs to be resolved. Simply asserting we should ignore it is playing right into the hands of people who are more than happy that the majority of citizens do not engage with the democratic vote.

The complaint was right to be made. I would hope that robust investigations are held at both councils and recommendations are made. That way we can move on with more confidence that our elected representatives are working for everyone in their community rather than focusing on short term financial goals.