Political Viewpoint

BY James Miller Leader of Southend’s Confelicity Party.
A new set of proposals from the Southend Confelicity Party aims to reshape how Southend-on-Sea City Council operates, placing transparency, accountability and cost-cutting at the centre of local debate.
At the heart of our plan is a push to make council spending far more visible to residents. Currently, expenditure below £500 is not routinely published, leaving gaps in what residents can see. The information already exists, it is just a case of showing it. We believe residents should be able to trace how their taxes are used and what outcomes those decisions are meant to achieve.
We are making these proposals against a backdrop where we believe significant sums of public money have been wasted by Southend Labour. We point to a £100m highways contract going to Marlborough without it going out to tender (based on an FOI), £10 million spent on the loss making Victoria Shopping Centre and then another £4 million on repairs, almost £15 million on consultancy fees on Better Queensway without a single new property to show for it, and now the Queensway underpass is closed as a result otherwise they would have had to pay the money back, £10 million earmarked for the Seaway car park to building a cinema next to a cinema, £1 million on parks with barely an improvement, £1.3 million on a set of toilets, £100K on City Day that, aside from the voluntary participants, was not much more than a party political broadcast, and £3.5 million spent on new pier trains that are, as we speak, laying dormant in bubble wrap as they don’t work.
Linked to this is our call to freeze Council Tax increases until residents are given a full breakdown of spending priorities and expected results.
We are calling for a review of senior executives’ pay, with the possibility of freezing or cutting salaries. We disagree about the need to pay almost £250K to attract good people for the top jobs. We estimate that a 10 per cent reduction in executive remuneration could save around £200,000. At a time of sky rocketing bills, we believe we need leaders who lead by example.
Extending this theme, we would like to return the councillor role to voluntary, and all Confelicity candidates, if elected, will do so on this basis. We recognise this may prompt debate about who can afford to stand for office, but that did not seem to matter to Labour when a £5,000 minimum deposit was set for anyone wishing to run for Mayor of Essex!
We also want to reassess the council’s external partnerships to ensure better value and accountability. For example, two partners for Better Queensway have either gone bust or pulled out, and somehow the partners involved in adult and child social care are taking around 70% of the council budget. While we recognise the statutory and moral duty to ensure people are taken care of, that does not mean to say we should be ripped off doing it. Something is wrong here and we need to know because we cannot carry on like this.
We plan to improve financial transparency around council-run events. For example, Southend Labour initially pocketed the money for the poppy event on the Pier after suggesting the money raised was needed for maintenance. They then backpedaled after pressure from Kursaal Confelicity candidate Lee Clark and other Southend residents changed their minds.
We propose, going forward, the requirement that all council directors live locally, ensuring decision-makers have a direct stake in the community they serve.
We would end working from home where it is not absolutely necessary, reflecting our preference for a more visible and accessible workforce. As a result, we would retain the Civic Centre as the central hub of council activity and not sell it for flats as has been proposed.
We also take a firm stance on local democracy. The only reason, I believe, Southend Labour went ahead with these elections is because they were pressured into it by strong party opposition.
Where issues within the council’s remit have a significant impact on local people, we would hold local referendums. There are cost implications, but certain issues cannot be left to just 51 councillors. For instance, the Labour, Liberal Democrat and Cllr Martin Terry’s non-independent Independent Group administration were all in favour of cheerleading the green belt land by Bournes Green Chase to the New Towns Taskforce to concrete over 10,000 unaffordable houses not prioritised for local people.
I hardly know any local residents in favour and a local referendum would be worth its weight in gold were there indisputable evidence we didn’t want it. How could the Labour, Lib Dem and Indie coalition sell us down the river in those circumstances?
In regard to transparency in general, Southend Labour struggle desperately and is something we’d look to change. They want to demolish Southend Hospital under the premise it is “at the end of its life” and the same with Southchurch Library, even though FOIs to the Mid and South Essex NHS Foundation Trust and Southend Council, respectively, categorically contradict this position.
They are also guilty of organising the Chief Operations Officer of the University of Essex to showcase the assets of the Southend Campus to an ‘invite only’ audience at their so called ‘Southend Investment Summit’, despite numerous public posts stating how much they’re doing to save it! Treachery, some would call it.
Taken together, we believe this package represents a broad attempt to reshape local governance around transparency, cost control and public involvement. We recognise that not everyone will agree with every proposal, but we are committed to starting an open and honest conversation about the future of our city.
We have much more in our manifesto too, which has been developed over four years of monthly meetings and agreed unanimously by Southend residents. We are proud to say we are the party for Southend residents: www.southendconfelicityparty.co.uk/localmanifesto2026
Picture: James Miller
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