100 days of Reform UK at Kent County Council

KentOnline / KMTV

But do people in Maidstone know what they've achieved during that time?

Transcript

00:00How are we, alright?

00:01Happy to see you.

00:02Happy to see you.

00:03Happy to see you.

00:04A week is a long time in British politics.

00:08What about 100 days?

00:11That's the milestone that Reform UK has just hit at Kent County Council over several months,

00:19defined by high-profile visits, calls for cost savings and fierce debate on everything

00:26from flags to trans library books.

00:30For journalists like myself, Reform's sweeping victory in May was something of a seismic shift

00:37in Kent's political landscape.

00:39Well, after 100 days here at County Hall, do people here in Maidstone feel that political

00:47earthquake on their doorstep?

00:50And do they actually know what Reform has done in that time?

00:56I haven't noticed any changes whatsoever immediately.

01:00No changes at all.

01:01Have you heard much about what they've done?

01:03I've heard bits and pieces about commentary on the OSA, but other than that, nothing about

01:10what they're doing locally.

01:12I've lived here for about 25 years, so yeah.

01:15And you don't know anything about what they've done in their first 100 days?

01:19No, I don't.

01:20We need a change, and I think it's good, but to say what he, she, or what they have done

01:27in the last 100 days, I'm not so sure.

01:29I suppose I haven't really seen any changes in Maidstone itself, but then perhaps I've

01:32not been paying much attention.

01:34Because I suppose I'm a bit against Reform in principle, so I'm a bit negative towards

01:39us generally.

01:40Trying to sort of reduce the waste in council spending and sorts, that's a good aim, but

01:46I've no idea how far they've got with that.

01:48It's early days, isn't it?

01:49I'm sure they've got a lot of work to do.

01:51Maidstone divided or in the dark then.

01:55Something that doesn't surprise opposition leader Anthony Hook.

02:00If people in Kent don't know what the council is doing, that in itself tells a story about

02:05Reform's failure to communicate, failure to inspire people.

02:09And I think our staff should have been treated better.

02:11We should have had meetings right from an earlier stage with fuller agendas addressing

02:16all the issues that people in Kent care about.

02:18So has it been a rocky start for the new administration?

02:22Well, the group's chief whip, Maxwell Harrison, only has one way of describing that.

02:29Nonsense.

02:30I think the idea that we council meetings is for the birds.

02:32You only see it on a fringe of the left who are complaining about it online.

02:36When we got in, we had a very large cohort of individuals, many of whom had never been

02:41in elected politics before.

02:42This is not a joke.

02:43This is real people's lives.

02:44We had to make sure that our councillors were trained, that we knew what was going on.

02:48Actually, we could understand the scale of the issues.

02:50So yes, maybe it took us a little bit of time to start our first full council meeting,

02:54but we're actually taking the job seriously.

02:56The government management was always going to bring fresh controversies, and with local

03:02government reorganisation speeding into gear in the coming months, the next 100 days could

03:10be even more contentious than the last, even if most people in Maidstone wouldn't know it.

03:18Oli Leader at County Hall.

03:20NEWS%.

03:21NEWSCANY.

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