Linden Kemkaran addressed the full council

The Leader of Kent County Council (KCC) Linden Kemkaran has addressed Members at a meeting of full council.

She focussed on the lack of government financial support for local councils and the delay to the fair funding announcement, as well as KCC’s business case for Local Government Reorganisation and the Strategic Statement.

The Reform UK Group on Kent County Council put forward a motion to approve the Strategic Statement, Reforming Kent 2025-2028. The motion was voted through with 53 Members voting in favour and 21 against. There were 3 abstentions.

The Leader’s speech in full is as follows:

“The local government finance system is broken and experts are queuing up to give the Chancellor advice. Sadly, she doesn’t seem to want to hear any of it. If I had her number I’d call her up and say: “Hi Rachel, it’s Linden. Yes, that Linden from Kent. Word of advice, perhaps if you spent less time spreading misinformation about Kent County Council, and concentrated on fixing local government finance instead, everyone would be better off.

“If anyone has her number, send it to me after this meeting.

“Because it’s beyond a joke. Councils nationally have overspent by:

• Over 5% on adult social care
• Over 14% on children’s social care
• Over 25% on home-to-school transport for children with SEND

“This is national and it is unsustainable. And still, local councils have heard nothing about their funding settlement and the Government keeps pushing back any announcement from early November, to mid-November, to the end of the month.

“This really does not help councils plan their budgets.

“On Tuesday, when the Chancellor made a disparaging and misleading reference to this council, apparently making plans for council tax rises, she forgot to add that her own published figures already presume that every single council in the country sets the maximum council tax increase.

“It is odd that KCC was singled out for attack by the Chancellor and yet, and yet, we have not had to apply to the government for Exceptional Financial Support, unlike Labour-run Birmingham £180 million, Labour-run Bradford £127 million, and Labour-run Medway, who got an £18.4 million bail out.

“Conservative-run Solihull got £32 million and Liberal Democrat-run Windsor & Maidenhead got £41 million to keep them afloat.

“Of course, KCC is grappling with how to deliver the necessary savings this year. At the end of quarter one, KCC was already overspent by 1.8%, a figure that we, the new administration, only got sight of in mid-August. However, it’s all relative! Compare us to Labour-run Haringey who were overspent by 10% during the same period.

“But no, none of those councils got a mention by the Chancellor, just us here at KCC. I wonder why that was?

“The main items for today are KCC’s strategic business case for our plan for Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) and the Strategic Statement.

“Both of these are hugely important and deserve as much time as we can give them because this is the best forum for the people of Kent to see how their elected representatives make these decisions on their behalf.

“On Monday of this week we held our third LGR & Devolution Committee meeting and it is clearer than ever that our KCC option, 1A, is the best option for Kent.

“KCC has put together its own business case and it shows the vast, projected cost of LGR, something that has not been made available to us from Central Government. The business case also shows that Option 1A is the least likely to involve a hike in council tax across the county to pay the cost of the disaggregation of core services.

“The lack of time and the lack of proper public engagement is nothing short of scandalous and for that, the Government is squarely to blame. But, despite all the hurdles, we have come up with a plan that is the most sensible of the lot and I hope to win majority support for it going forward.

“The Strategic Statement is our vision for what a Reform-led administration means for Kent. You’ll notice that it is much slimmer than previous documents. That is because we are very clear in what we stand for and what we want to achieve, and we have no time for waffle.

“In the statement you’ll notice that we are openly encouraging personal responsibility over too much reliance on the state.

“We take a ‘Kent-first’ approach when it comes to working with local businesses, and there’ll be a new emphasis on early years help to help parents understand and follow through on their responsibilities to their own children.

“Our elderly will benefit from AI and preventative measures to keep them independent for longer.

"Our plan to reform Kent’s roads is a big success story with over 22,000 potholes repaired since we took over.

“After nearly 30 years of managed decline under the Conservatives, my Cabinet and Deputy Cabinet Members for Highways are turning this around by patching over 250,000 square metres of roads and resurfacing more than 210,000 square metres of Kent’s thoroughfares. They regularly receive emails from grateful residents who are noticing driving on properly repaired roads for the first time in many years.

“I recently visited the Eurotunnel in Folkestone and was given a tour of the new Entry, Exit System (EES) that is being rolled out. I was very pleased to see that Eurotunnel has made such a large investment into ensuring that passengers will not be too inconvenienced by these new EU rules.

“During my visit we discussed the issues surrounding the transportation of freight and congestion on Kent’s motorways. Now, it turns out there are two things stopping freight coming all the way through Kent via train – overhead gantries and mismatching rail gauges -which proper investment could fix.

“I have written to the Department for Transport to raise this issue and ask that they address this with the urgency that it requires to get lorries off our roads. And next week I am attending the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Thames Estuary Fair Growth to pursue this matter further.

“While on the subject of transport, I’m delighted with KCC’s recent success in helping to persuade the ORR (Office of Road and Rail) that Virgin, who have promised me personally that they will stop in Kent, should be awarded the franchise on International Rail Services.

“My event at Ashford and Ebbsfleet International stations in September no doubt went some way to persuading the Rail Minister, Lord Hendy, to come to this decision.

“It was the very first time that all the major players had been brought together in one place and it showcased perfectly the ability of KCC to organise such an event, and, the beauty of cross-party cooperation. Something I am all in favour of to benefit the people of Kent.

“I have also been spending time with our farmers and agricultural and horticultural workers with a visit to NIAB (National Institute of Agricultural Botany) at East Malling to discuss soft fruit and wine, and a round-table event at Hole Park near Cranbrook which brought together land owners and farmers.

“I have already written to the Chancellor to ask her to urgently reconsider her farm inheritance tax. This tax is ruinous in so many ways and it demonstrates the complete lack of connection between Westminster and real life.

“Kent comprises 62% farmland and accounts for 40% of the country’s soft fruit industry, it’s a crucially important sector and I will do everything I can to draw attention to the issues facing it under this government.

“So as we, as an administration, reach our six month anniversary and as we enter a period of remembrance you may remember that in my first speech as Leader I referenced my son who had just begun phase one of his Army training.

“Well, he’s been pushed to his limits: he’s been beaten up, been sleep deprived, he’s come under fire, ambushed …the similarities to my job are quite astonishing!

“But last week I had my proud mum moment watching him successfully pass out and as I listened to the commanding officer’s speech it transpired that just 23% of recruits from his original platoon had made it, because it is tough.

“Along the way some had quit because they couldn’t hack it. Others had been thrown out for bad behaviour, because they simply weren’t good enough, weren’t team players, not up to the challenge, or simply unable or unwilling to accept discipline.

“And of course, to be a successful, winning team, you need all those things and more.

“And it did make me reflect on my own troops and the journey we have been on since winning in May.

“Sitting here now, six months on, like my son’s platoon, we too may be slightly leaner in number, but believe me, we are much stronger and we are totally battle-fit.”

Soirce: Kent County Council