Wednesday 3 April 2013

Defend Warrington Councillor Kevin Bennett - facing disciplinary action for opposing cuts

Another councillor faces disciplinary action by the Labour Party this week - for opposing the cuts.

Kevin Bennett is a councillor in Fairfield and Howley in Warrington, and is a former member of UNITE's Executive Council.  He defied the Labour whip and voted against the cuts at a meeting in early March.

Kevin has explained his views clearly:

"We need to send a strong message of defiance to this idealistic, uncaring Tory led coalition government and show the people of Warrington that we have got the guts to stand up to them.
"I expressed my views on what I believe to be the views of many people, on having to implement cuts which are not of our making.  It is wrong that we should be in the firing line when all of this is a result of vicious funding cuts by this Tory led coalition government.
"This council could safeguard jobs and services for the next 12 months by using reserves and borrowing.  This would buy time to build a fight-back against this Tory led coalition government.  The Labour council's Executive Members and Portfolio holders are refusing to even consider this option.
"There is a definite correlation between the worst cuts and deprivation and I see it in my ward.  There must be NO compulsory redundancies within the council workforce, and we must fight to keep our services 'in house'.  Once they're gone they're gone and probably won't save us money."
Kevin is part of a small but growing band of councillors standing up against the cuts and who deserve our support.

There's a protest in support of Kevin at Warrington town hall 6-6:30pm, Thursday 4th April.  The town hall is on Sankey Street (WA1 1SR), a few minutes from Warrington Bank Quay station.  Go along and let the Labour group know that disciplinary action against Kevin would be intolerable.



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