Council ‘looks stupid’ over candidate that never was
FURIOUS council bosses said a Walsall by-election won by a candidate who could not take up her seat has left them looking “stupid”.
The authority’s ruling Tory administration has demanded the national Labour Party pay around £20,000 costs for the ballot held in December for the vacant Pleck seat.
Simran Cheema “won” the seat for Labour with 698 votes ahead of Conservative Mohammed Saghir who polled 382 votes.
But she could not take up the role of councillor as she had been employed by the authority’s library service at the time of her nomination.
Walsall Council leader Mike Bird said the seat – which became vacant following the death of deputy mayor Harbans Singh Sarohi – was due for election in May this year anyway and branded the whole situation a waste of time, money and effort as well as misleading for voters.
But councillor Aftab Nawaz, Walsall Labour leader, said his group, the Pleck branch and regional Labour were not even informed the election had been called.
However, two Labour Party members, one of which Councillor Bird said was Walsall South MP Valerie Vaz, had called for the by-election to take place.
At a full council meeting, a motion was passed calling on Labour to reimburse the costs of hosting the election.
Councillor Bird said: “I have to say I’ve never been in a position where
You tell me one reason why the people of Pleck should go out and vote again? It was appalling Walsall Council leader Mike Bird, left
we are looking stupid, to say the least. Why would you have a by-election a few weeks before the election was due to be held for the gentleman who sadly passed away?
“What a damn waste of time, money, effort and indeed misleading the people of the Pleck ward thinking they are going to go out and cast their vote and they’re going to get somebody elected to represent them.
“Well, it didn’t happen did it?
Because the candidate wasn’t valid.
“I was reliably informed that because that candidate was an employee of the council it was the first of a criminal offence. We had advice that we should pursue that but of course we wouldn’t.
“We saw this lady very sadly was ill informed by the national Labour party and I take the blame away from colleagues who are here from the Labour group.
“It was said to me she had resigned verbally but then you get the situation, is she still an employee if she has to work her notice?
“What a travesty. You say to me we’ve got to encourage people to vote, well you tell me one reason why the people of Pleck should go out and vote again? It was appalling.”
Councillor Nawaz replied: “The candidate we chose was a good candidate and in her decency, as soon as she realised she wasn’t eligible, she put her hands up and made everybody aware that she wouldn’t accept the councillorship if she was elected.
“Indeed, before the postal votes landed on people’s front doors and before they went to the ballot box, they knew if they voted for her, she wouldn’t accept it.
“So the people of Pleck had a
chance to choose between a Conservative or nothing and they chose nothing.
“But the Pleck branch of the Labour Party wasn’t aware of this election being called, they weren’t informed or notified about it. The Labour group was not informed or consulted.
“There were two individuals who called the election. They called it correctly without any consultation with us. That isn’t good and we weren’t happy about it.”