Council Leader: ‘I Look Forward To Working With Cllr Rooth’

Published on: 25 Jul, 2018
Updated on: 27 Jul, 2018

Cllrs Tony Rooth and Paul Spooner

Council Leader Paul Spooner says he is looking forward to continuing to work with Cllr Tony Rooth despite his deselection last night from all the Guildford Borough Council committees.

See: Borough Council Chooses the ‘Nuclear Option’ Over Committee Appointments

The removal of Rooth from the committees followed his resignation in May from the Conservative group and votes taken during last night’s full council meeting on various options for his continued membership. But in each vote, it required only one councillor to disagree for Rooth to be barred.

Paul Spooner voted to allow Rooth to continue on the Planning Committee and appeared to commiserate with Rooth, placing a hand on his shoulder, during a meeting adjournment, called to allow consideration of the impact of the three votes the council had taken.

However, some senior Tories, Cllrs Furniss, Ellwood, and Manning appeared determined to keep Rooth off the Planning Committee which he obviously regarded as the main prize.

Cllr Spooner told The Guildford Dragon NEWS this evening (July 25, 2018): “We have to work within the legislative framework and there was a range of views expressed at Full Council.

“It was surprising that a councillor [Lib Dem, Julia McShane] voted against option B [to allow Rooth to continue on other committees] but as a free vote that was always going to be a risk for Cllr Rooth and following his withdrawal of his own amendment that was unfortunate, in my opinion.

“Several members voted against Option A [to keep Rooth on planning] or abstained. As I stated last night, good ideas come from people and not parties and I look forward to continuing to work with Cllr Rooth as happened today when he attended the Housing and Development Management Board this afternoon.”

Responses to Council Leader: ‘I Look Forward To Working With Cllr Rooth’

John Williams Reply

July 27, 2018 at 11:15 am

But will Cllr Tony Rooth look forward to working with Cllr Spooner?

I watched the council debate and was frankly appalled by the conduct of some members especially Cllr Matt Furniss. He effectively vetoed Rooth’s continuation on the Planning committee as only one “against” vote was required. It did not matter which way Spooner voted as Furniss had already done the dirty work.

So I looked back to see if Messrs Spooner and Rooth had previously worked together.

Spooner sacked Rooth as housing lead councillor in May 2017. At the Executive on 27th March 2018, Spooner removed Rooth as chairman of the Housing Board. Rooth objected partly because Spooner had sacked him with immediate effect by email with, apparently, no face to face discussion. Sounds like Trump sacking people by Tweet!

Now Rooth has been sacked from the Planning Committee although many councillors cross-party praised his expertise. So how keen will Rooth be to work with Spooner who has sacked him three times, twice himself and the third time through his sidekick Furniss?