I’ve had to make a few educated guesses, but I reckon the average age of a Redruth Town Councillor is currently over 60. Six of our councillors are retired. At 46, and as a mother of two lads in their 20s, I’m something of a spring chicken on the council. I know, I know… I’m hardly young, but you get the idea.
In terms of gender, with one seat currently vacant, women actually outnumber men 7 to 6. We’ll have to see what the upcoming by-election brings, there are three candidates: two men and one woman. Two of them, I suspect, are over 60, and one is a mere 21!
But why is the council made up the way it is? Is it the time commitment? A stage-of-life thing? Retired people aren’t necessarily more invested in their towns than younger people. As a parent, you may have less time, but arguably more reason,to want your community to thrive. Or is it that people simply don’t know how to get involved? Maybe it’s the pomp and formality, I mean, I never imagined myself sitting on a PTA (mainly because both my boys were nightmares at school). But do councils feel like they’re only for certain “types” of people? Because they really shouldn’t.
We need to make the environment more welcoming and less… hierarchical. Let’s be honest, council chambers do have a bit of a school assembly feel to them, if school assemblies were run by people who love reminising and voting!
Councillors for life…
Many councillors are now in their third, fourth, or even fifth term. One’s just embarked on his tenth. Sometimes I genuinely wonder why some are still there. They seem more focused on wrapping meetings up as fast as possible, and a lot of “debate” ends up being a sort of nostalgic one-upmanship about how things were done in the ’00s. Those who’ve been around for decades don’t seem to think it’s time to step aside to make room for new voices. Their experience is seen as invaluable; by them, at least. But no one is irreplaceable.
When incumbents lost their seats at the last election, it was declared a great “shame”, as if it were our fault for daring to stand against them. When we first joined, we were “welcomed” through gritted teeth. “It’s great to have some new people standing,” they said. Though you had to wonder who, exactly, they expected to step aside to make space…
Just yesterday we were pondering whether it would be possible to limit how many terms someone can serve. There’s already a rule, quite a recent one, that a mayor can only serve for two years in a row. Could we do something similar for councillors? I mean, the US President can only serve two terms (slightly bigger job, granted, but the principle stands). Sadly, a bit of digging revealed that UK law allows anyone who meets the criteria to stand again and again… and again.
The best we could do is a voluntary approach, perhaps a statement of intent that encourages councillors to step down after, say, two terms to allow space for fresh voices. But honestly, I can’t imagine many of the current crop signing up to that.
New and not really welcome…
When we joined, there were all sorts of warnings about the dangers of “too many new councillors”, as if we were some sort of rogue element. Offers of help were few and far between. The induction felt more like indoctrination. I was even told: “When we first started this council, there were loads of busybodies who wanted to change the world. They soon realised they were only on Redruth Town Council and just getting on everyone’s nerves, they didn’t last long.”
The message was clear: This is the way things are. Don’t rock the boat.
But entering a space and being told “there’s no room for debate” is difficult, especially for younger generations. Yes, change is uncomfortable. And yes, everything is decided by vote, and I’m often outnumbered. But the Nolan Principles remind us that the first rule of public service is selflessness: acting solely in the public interest. And that includes building a council that is diverse and representative. I’m determined to help make that happen.
And who’s actually responsible for encouraging people to run? If you’re happy sitting on the council forever, why would you actively encourage others to stand and risk losing your seat?
There’s a narrative that younger people, or anyone outside the retired demographic, just aren’t interested. But it’s a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you make the environment unwelcoming, rigid, and obscure, of course people won’t be interested.
We need to do more…
We can’t control who stands for election, but we can influence the culture. The council could do a lot more. Right now, we do the bare minimum. When a seat recently became available, I think there was one Facebook post and an announcement on the council website (probably because we legally had to). We could and should be more open, more welcoming, and more transparent.
Meetings shouldn’t be shackled to “the way we’ve always done it.” That benefits no one. Mentoring should be structured and meaningful, not just left to chance.
Ha! This blog was meant to inspire people to stand for council. Maybe it still will, if only because people read it and think, “Wow… this could be done so much better.”
And you know what? It absolutely could.
It hasn’t been easy, but we’ve had some wins. I think it’s time I started sharing them…
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