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Kirklees Council reached a standstill following a turbulent annual meeting that ended with the postponement of key votes, leaving the authority without a leader or a clear majority. This was the council’s first full session since Reform UK emerged as the largest group - however, the vote was abandoned after some new councillors, including Reform leader Sarah Wood, admitted they didn't understand all the rules. 0:01 | James O'Brien reacts to the chaotic meeting. 4:01 | Robert Jenrick says the media is 'playing a game'. 4:58 | Councillor Tanisha Bramwell, who was at the meeting, explains why she appeared so angry. 8:38 | Matthew Wright says he has 'some sympathy' for the Reform councillors. 8:58 | Journalist David Maddox says 'local government is not easy.' Listen to the full show on the all-new LBC App: https://app.af.lbc.co.uk/btnc/thenewlbcapp #jamesobrien #reform #LBC #reform #reformuk #nigelfarage #farage #ukpolitics #uknews LBC is the home of live debate around news and current affairs in the UK. Join in the conversation and listen at https://www.lbc.co.uk/ Sign up to LBC’s weekly newsletter here: https://l-bc.co/signup
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0:00
Do you remember being told that you could find out what sort of national government reform would provide
0:04
by watching how well they did in councils? I could not agree more. It's not often I agree with that outfit, but I think they're absolutely right
0:11
You've got to watch very closely what they're doing in councils to get an idea of what they might be like at the national level
0:17
And here is a little clip from Kirkley's council meeting on the 20th of May
0:21
featuring two of their newly elected councillors. And then at the end of the clip, you'll hear Councillor Tanisha Bramwell
0:27
who is one of the Kirkleys' independents. But the two voices you'll hear first belong to newly elected reform councillors
0:34
Sarah Wood and Robert Butler. And trust me, this is very special
0:39
I don't understand the constitution. I have not had sufficient time to read that as yet
0:46
I don't understand what standing orders are, what they're made up of, nor do I understand what an amendment is
0:52
There is a possibility that we might vote for something that we don't understand at the moment
0:57
and whereas ignorance is not a defence, risk should be mitigated. I genuinely don't understand all the standing orders
1:05
I know you may be specifically talking about one specific thing, but frankly, our ignorance, as new councillors
1:12
I do not believe this is in any way democratic, because we are being manoeuvred with a game play that we don't know the rules
1:21
Even if you were to slow down and describe it properly, you would be describing to us the course of action that Councillor Bolt and maybe others do wish to take
1:31
We don't understand the constitution. We don't understand the standing orders. We understand that just because we don't understand it, that it may not be constitutional
1:41
But we are at a disadvantage and we do not necessarily know what we are voting for
1:47
And therefore, this we consider not to be a democratic process. We are willing and able to take the time to understand those things, but it is unreasonable for a chamber not to allow 43 new councillors to understand the rules of the game
2:07
If you wish to proceed, then we can't stop you, but do know that this will be seen by the Kirkley's constituents
2:16
and we will make sure that it is understood by the Kirkley's constituents
2:21
that we were not able to engage democratically. I think it's absolutely unfair for any councillor
2:29
that's been elected, newly elected, however, I was in the councillor eight months ago
2:33
When you are elected, you have to prioritise educating yourself on how to be the best councillor and representative for your area
2:41
That's on you. To call that, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but to call that unconstitutional is absolutely incorrect
2:47
and it's not right. and we will also make sure that our residents are absolutely aware
2:52
of who has confidence in this chamber. I mean, I'm quite... My mouth stopped working
3:02
I pay quite close attention to this stuff and they keep coming It literally an argument It as if it twitters in human form I don understand anything So you should all be banned from doing any counselling
3:14
We've got to shut down the council because me and my colleagues don't understand anything. And when she said out loud, even if you explained it really slowly, we still wouldn't understand it
3:22
So I used to have this catchphrase during Brexit, right? I'd say, I can explain it to you. I can't understand it for you
3:29
That catchphrase just came to life in Kirk Lees. that catchphrase has now assumed human form
3:35
I can explain it to you but I can't understand it for you Tanisha Bramwell who you heard at the end
3:39
just dropping some very simple truths will be joining Ben Kentish who is standing in for Lewis Goodall on Sunday morning
3:45
more joy from Kirk that's it, that's what happens when you elect Nigel Farage fans
3:51
they start complaining about the fact that they don't understand anything and therefore everybody else
3:57
should be prevented from doing their elected duties Councillor Tanisha Bramwell is the independent councillor for Dewsbury West
4:05
who made those comments at that council meeting. Great to have you on the programme station
4:10
Thanks for coming on. You heard Robert Jemmerich, or you might have heard Robert Jemmerich a few minutes ago
4:15
responding to my question about the incident involving you and some of his colleagues
4:20
This was what he had to say. I understand the game that the media wants to play
4:24
You want to criticise reform, but it's clearly not working with... I don't want to criticise anybody
4:27
I'm simply asking your interpretation of that clip. It's clearly not working with the public
4:31
because the public are voting for reform. They did it at the local elections. That doesn't mean we shouldn't hold you accountable when you win power
4:37
They see reform in local government and they want more of it. So his response was that, you know, they haven't had long
4:42
It takes a while for people to get up to speed. These are normal people who aren't sort of professional politicians
4:46
Give them a bit longer. What's your sort of assessment of what happened? Because you're quite irate, if I may say, in that video
4:53
You're not impressed with some of the reform members of your council. It wasn't
4:58
I wasn't supposed to be that way, I assure you. So what people don't know is if they haven't watched the full meeting is my response was I was responding to Councillor Wood who said we will ensure that residents will know exactly what's happened today in this chamber
5:12
And it was her opinion and she was saying it as a fact. So that was my fear to have that narrative put out there about myself and my colleagues
5:20
But in terms of the reformed councillors, there are a lot of new reformed councillors
5:24
There are a lot of new councillors, point blank, and they do deserve that breathing space to get to know the role a little bit better
5:30
But those councillors are not attempting to lead the cabinet or the chair of overview and scrutiny
5:36
and they're not attempting to lead the council as the leader or the deputy leader
5:41
So it's okay in one breath to say, okay, we need time, but then in another breath to say, we don't need time and we should have these seats
5:46
It completely contradicts and it doesn't make any sense. Were you surprised that having stepped forward saying, right, make me council leader, she and her proposed deputy hadn't appeared to have read any of the rules of the council that they seek to lead
6:01
I was surprised because Councillor Wood is not new to politics. Some people don't know this. She actually stood as a parliamentary seat in 2019
6:09
So her saying that she new to the council role is absolutely true But new into politics that not true So for someone that been seeking a political role for some time you would get to know the basics So for her to stand up and say that blatantly in a meeting and say we don know which way we voting we don know
6:24
this, we don't know that, those are questions that should have been posed to the legal officer prior to the meeting and not during the meeting. So again, a lot of confusion
6:31
Do you see it as sort of representative of a wider issue or would that be unfair? I couldn't comment because I've not looked into it to have an opinion on that, but I can only
6:39
comment on what I've seen so far, you know, in our council and some of the feedback that we've
6:44
had from a lot of people that have voted reform is give them a chance. Are you willing to work
6:48
with them? We've made it very clear we will not be supporting independence, will not be supporting
6:52
a reform council. We wouldn't support any party or non-political party that would stand up and say
6:57
we don't understand how the council runs and want to run it. That's point blank. We wouldn't support
7:01
that. But we would work with anyone and we'll communicate with anyone to bring a positive
7:06
solution for our residents. And I think people need to differentiate that. We will communicate
7:11
and work with, but we wouldn't vote for those people to lead based on their lack of knowledge
7:15
at the time. How long did it take you to get up to speed on these things when you were a councillor? Because, you know, reading the rules seems like a fairly basic thing to do if I was elected as a
7:24
councillor. You know, I can't lie. Even someone like myself, I'm very, very interested in politics
7:29
It did take me some time to understand. And the Constitution can change and vary. And we're going
7:34
to take it upon ourselves to make sure that we're reading up on that. However, I attended council
7:39
meetings and I scrutinised and I attended cabinet meetings two years prior to being elected or even
7:44
standing for a seat because it interested me. I run a charity in my other heart. So I wanted to
7:48
know why is it that I'm doing the groundwork? Where are these mistakes failing? So I educated
7:52
myself on that a long time prior. Obviously, some people just didn't have the time to do that or
7:56
they're not in that scenario to do that. Is it they didn't have the time or do you worry that
8:00
some of these, the reform councillors that we're talking about, perhaps, you know, give the impression
8:04
that they weren't taking their responsibilities as seriously as you do? No, I absolutely agree. I
8:08
think they did have the time in this instance, especially because a lot of councillors have
8:13
we have a one-week induction with Kirkland's council, and those officers are fantastic
8:17
When I needed to learn and I needed to make sure that I would keep it to speed, I asked those questions to those officers and they pointed me in the right direction
8:24
as I'm sure they would any new councillor. So they did have the induction, they did have two
8:28
week to read up on it. We did receive a pack of the day that we all won, including the AGM agenda
8:32
and what that means and what that process looks like. So they did have that time
8:37
I have some sympathy with her because she's new to the job. And I was thinking when you start a
8:44
new job, it takes about three months before you feel comfortable with your legs under the desk. But maybe she should have learned a little bit about local government before standing
8:52
Well, actually, I have a lot of sympathy. I cut my teeth for covering local government
8:58
back in the day and it's uh you know these things are not easy this is you know this is the issue
9:04
of insurgency parties actually you know because if you have an insurgency party you're essentially
9:11
electing a lot of people who have no history work you know working in these councils no knowledge
9:18
of um nothing at all and then and they coming in with people who don have that knowledge and history because you know with the old parties you have kind of turnovers of councillors But there would have been people who would have been there for years who could have taken them under their wing and shown them
9:34
Died them through, yeah. And so, you know, the really worrying aspect of this is that, you know, the next general election in Parliament
9:44
we're looking at similar insurgency situations and we're going to get schools and schools
9:53
maybe hundreds of MPs from parties with no real history or understanding
9:58
going into Parliament and having exactly the same problem. Although there's a counter-argument of sorts, isn't there
10:06
that you're going to end up potentially with more real people than career politicians
10:14
we've had journalists, George Osborne, journalists serving as Chancellor of the Exchequer
10:19
I'm a journalist. I can barely add up. We accepted him. No one is Prime Minister until they're Prime Minister
10:28
You can't train for that job, per se. But I can equally see that in any other world
10:36
in any other career, if you applied for a job and you didn't understand the very basics
10:42
the fundamentals of what that job required, you wouldn't last very long
10:47
Yeah, but to be fair, people like George Osborne or, you know, David Cameron or even Tony Blair back in the day
10:53
when they became MPs, they joined people who'd been MPs for, in some cases, decades, in certain years
11:00
who knew the ropes, who understood the inner workings. There's a lot of training that goes on
11:05
In fact, one of the problems with the Starmer, one of the many, many problems with the Starmer government
11:09
is that there were a whole lot of new MPs in 24
11:13
who were just immediately given ministerial jobs and hadn't had that either
11:19
And, you know, but it's, you know, as I say, this is a problem with, you know
11:25
it's all very well to talk about draining the swamp and bringing in fresh blood and bringing in real people
11:31
If you don't have people who know the system, who have been there, who understand the rules
11:37
who understand the intricacies of these things, because councils and parliament, you know
11:42
his democratic bodies are complex things. I know that to be true, but, you know
11:48
there's this lazy phrase, the blob for the civil service, and Farage has made no secret of his desire
11:56
to sort of smash the blob. He's not the first to say it. Do you think he'll get very far
12:01
No, I don't, for exactly that reason. And, you know, if Farage succeeds
12:07
I personally don't think he will. I think it's all overrated, but that's a different conversation
12:12
But if he succeeds, he's going to have all these MPs who are just like those poor councillors in Kirk Lees
12:18
haven't got a clue what they're doing. And he's going to need people who actually know what they're doing
12:23
which means, just like governments before, he's going to have to have experienced civil servants
12:27
who actually understand what is going on, who incidentally will run circles around him
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