Council Tax - Hypocrite Green Councillor Hayden Cannot Justify Not Paying!

Green Councillor
Francis Hayden

We reported on Green Councillor Francis Hayden who was banned from voting on Mendip residents' council tax for 2021-22.

Why was he banned? Because he hadn't paid his council tax.

Councillor Hayden is Councillor for Cranmore, Doulting and Nunney on Mendip District Council in Somerset. The ward is between Shepton Mallet and Frome.

We asked Councillor Hayden a set of questions to see if he could justify his failure(s) to pay council tax.

Although he replied, he couldn't justify them. We offered him a right of reply, but he did not answer all of the questions (see below). 

He barely even answered any of them, instead providing pathetic and facetious non-answers.

But Councillor Hayden reckons that his fellow Mendip councillors support his non-payment of council tax. He hasn't provided any evidence. But one Lib Dem Mendip Councillor has leapt to his defence...

It is Frome Councillor Helen Sprawson-White. She is one of the fake independents who used to be Lib Dem, then Independent, then Lib Dem again - despite telling us by email that she would not join any political party! She claimed our pointing out his non-payment of council tax was:

"Below the belt, this year has been incredibly tough financially on many people due to the pandemic; Francis was incredibly honest by stating he was in arrears - not through choice. He didn’t have to declare his personal circumstances he could have abstained."

Not only is her defence lacking in credibility. It is incorrect.  

He was barred from voting at all, by law. And by senior council officers! He cannot abstain, because he cannot vote at all! An abstention IS a vote.

Do you think that Mendip councillors should be supporting a councillor that does not pay their council tax?

One member of the public told us that the Greens are:

"Footpads, vagabonds and hypocrites".

Do you agree?

It seems that Mendip residents are outraged by the increases to council tax. All you need to do is listen to and read the comments from residents of Frome and other parts of the Mendip area such as Evercreech, where Cabinet Member for Finance Councillor Barry O'Leary is the ward councillor.

We asked Councillor Hayden the following questions:

Q1. We like to offer the right of reply to councillors, so would you like to give the public an explanation, and how much you owed Mendip District Council at the time of the meeting?

Councillor Hayden did not tell us how much money he owed on his council tax, or whether he still owes the council tax.

Q2. Would you like to let everyone know whether you will be paying your council tax in the future?

Cllr Hayden also did not say whether he would pay it back.

What did he say, instead of providing some justification. Apparently, he thinks it is OK for him not to pay his council tax:

"there is a global corona virus pandemic going on and that some industries have been hit particularly hard. My own income depends on catering for weddings, parties and music festivals (including Glastonbury) all of which have been cancelled for the last year. Many of my friends have wound up their businesses altogether and are surviving on Universal Credit. Others have adapted and are keeping going on life support with loans, grants, overdrafts, mortgage holidays and, when the worst comes to the worst, delayed bills."

It seems to be lost on Councillor Hayden that he is a councillor, and not separate to your council tax. Councillor Hayden is one of the Mendip councillors that voted on OUR council tax in 2020/21.

Councillors vote on our council tax. Councillors SET THE COUNCIL TAX.

He voted to increase YOUR council tax - but did not pay it himself. 

We think that he should resign. So we asked him whether he would...

Q3. Or will you be resigning your seat, which would seem reasonable?

Of course, Councillor Hayden did not answer this question.

Q4. If you had been able to vote on the council tax setting, how would you have voted? I note that despite being in an "opposition" party, that you voted FOR the council tax setting last year - ANOTHER increase.

Would you have gone along with your Group Leader Shane Collins, who despite being the Leader of an Opposition Group voted FOR the Lib Dems Council Tax increase? 

Of course, Councillor Hayden did not answer these questions either. 

As the Green Group Leader Councillor Shane Collins, voted for the council tax to go up, is it safe to say that Cllr Hayden would have done so, if he was not banned? 

We do not know for sure, because Councillor Hayden did not answer. But it is a reasonable conclusion, because of what he said instead of answering our question. And in the light of the fact that Hayden had voted for an increase the year before, in 2020:

"When it comes to the level of Council Tax we should pay, you will be aware (or at least you should be) that over recent years the government in Westminster has stopped contributing to our income altogether and that as a result our budget has been slashed by around 30%. Under the circumstances I take considerable pride in the services that Mendip continues to be able to offer, especially to the people who need those services most, and perhaps I could offer you the chance to explain if we were to reduce our budget even further which of these services you think should be cut."

So Councillor Hayden does not even think to mention that the budget could be spent more wisely. 

Councillor Hayden even takes pride in Mendip District Council.

At the Council meeting, Hayden did not speak against the increase. He took no action.

Most residents don't take pride. Residents are appalled at Mendip's performance and the increase to council tax by all councils in Somerset.

Try telling Mendip's residents of Councillor Hayden's "pride" when:

• residents' bins were not collected, and if they were, we had to wait THREE WEEKS
  
• residents' recycling was not done, and/or not done properly
  
• we are paying more council tax
• volunteer residents are having to clear up the litter on the streets of Frome that is not collected by Mendip District Council, whose job it is to do this
  
• residents are having pay more to bury the dead
• residents are having to pay more so that Councillor Barry O'Leary and the other Liberal Democrat councillors who run Mendip, can gamble millions of pounds of public money on "property investment"
  

We think that Councillor Hayden will find that residents do not support his view.

He is trying to defend the indefensible.

And again, we point out that Liberal Democrat and Green councillors in Mendip are one and the same.  

They appear to have had a secret deal on where to stand candidates in the 2019 District council elections - and where to not stand candidates - as told to us by a Liberal Democrat but denied by Greens. Just look at the candidate lists - you will see the pattern of collusion.

Some kind of pact continues to this day, with Lib Dems and Greens voting together on increasing your council tax. The Tories did too!

What is the point of voting out the Tories if you just get more incompetence or corruption as with the Tories?

Somerset residents deserve better than Lib Dem, Green or Tory, same old story. 

Whether the rosette is Yellow, Orange, Green or Blue, they all do the same to you.