So who is representing the residents of Bickley?
>> 12 November, 2009
In May 2006 residents of Bickley ward in Bromley elected three Conservative councillors to represent them: Colin Bloom, Gordon Jenkins and Catherine Rideout.
In August Colin Bloom announced on his blog that he was giving up being a councillor at the May 2010 elections to concentrate on getting elected as the MP for Erith and Thamesmead.
So then there was 2 (although Cllr Bloom still gets paid his allowance by the Council Taxpayers of Bromley, and assuming the local elections are on the same day as the General Election what he is really saying is that he is concentrating on his parliamentary ambitions, not on Bickley, now).
That will be the same Gordon Jenkins that the Council Taxpayers of Bromley are paying to be a Bromley councillor, and the residents of Bickley will rightly be expecting to represent them.
In fact Gordon Jenkins is so heavily involved in Eastbourne Conservatives that he is listed on their website as an officer of the local party
DEPUTY CHAIR MEMBERSHIP AND FUNDRAISING
Gordon Jenkins
cllrgordonjenkins@yahoo.co.uk
The irony of this leaflet is that the Conservative MP for Eastbourne, also pictured on the page, lives to the best of my knowledge in Bromley...
So then there was one...
The residents of Bickley therefore are effectively left with only one councillor representing them for the next 6 months, while the other 2 have bunked off to further their political careers elsewhere. Now if I was a Bickley resident, I would be pretty cross, and be picking up the phone to Gordon Jenkin's mobile, which is listed both on the Bromley website and in the Eastbourne leaflet as 07771 760159, to tell him what I think.
Of course we are just hitting the 6 month period where if a councillor quits there is no by-election.
Bromley councillors receive a basic allowance of £10,658.84. So two absent councillors for 6 months will be receiving at least that much.
Now let us say they show up for the odd meeting. I suggest that they each contribute about 80% of their allowance for the next 6 months, say £4,000 each, to a charity. How about the Royal British Legion .OK, the residents of Bromley will still be out of pocket, but at least it would be doing the decent thing.
Funnily, some people may recall another Conservative upping and moving to Sussex before the last Bromley elections.
In the mean time this is the remaining Conservative councillor for Bickley:
| Ward: Bickley Party: Conservative Party Address: c/o Members Room, Bromley Civic Centre, Bromley, BR1 3UH Telephone: 020 8466 6506 Email: catherine.rideout@bromley.gov.uk Surgery Details: The Surgery is held at The Choir Vestry, St George's Church Hall, Bickley Park Road between 10am and 12 noon on the last Saturday of each month (excluding August and December). | ![]() |





