Representing residents is the main duty of councillors. However, it’s not only by attending the nine full or extraordinary council meetings from June 2014 to April 2015, as portrayed in your article (‘Let the records show who turned up for meetings’, Enfield Independent, April 22), that councillors conduct that duty.
On most, if not on all working days, and late into the night, there are several meetings in the civic centre and across the borough attended by councillors. Some of these meetings are recorded by council officers, the majority are not. In addition to these meetings, on weekends, Labour councillors hold surgeries and visit residents. That’s why the article in the Enfield Independent is misleading.
From recorded meetings alone, some Labour councillors will attend more than 40 meetings in the year. But that’s only one measure of councillors conducting their duties.
Labour councillors are resolute in holding their surgeries. Without appointment, residents turn up to bring their concerns to councillors. A better measure of performance is how accessible they are to residents and how they resolve residents’ concerns.
If you live in Bowes and would like to see me or one of my ward colleagues, just turn up at our weekly Saturday surgery. Similarly, across the borough, in Turkey Street ward, if you want to see Cllr Katherine Chibah, or one of the other Labour councillors, again, just turn up to their weekly surgery.
Cllr Achilleas Georgiou
Lab/Bowes ward Enfield Borough Council
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