All Stand

It's a quintessential axiom that committees both aspire to epitomise democratic procedure, whilst simultaneously impeding progress and decision-making. That's why private industry endows an executive with power to take decisions on the spot, and then face their board, where the quality of their decisions will be examined. 

In small groups, vesting power in the Executive also helps things happen quickly.  But the most significant committees for most people in Llandudno and Conwy are the town and county councils, neither of which - it seems - can take meaningful decisions rapidly, and the larger of which is still without a CEO, the newly appointed one still suspended on full pay. That in itself is a bad state of affairs, since he's entitled to either be charged or exonerated with a great deal more alacrity than shown thus far.

Town councils, however, are notorious, and Llandudno is no exception.  It was revealed today on the Llandudno local forum that significant amounts of time were expended in October last year as they deliberated over the momentous matter of when the tea break should be.

It's easy to see this sort of thing as typical small-town lunacy, but the reality is that there's no great competition for council places. Young, committed, intelligent and resourceful individuals don't want anything to do with it, and individuals like John Oddy and Jason Weyman are the exception. We need more like them, but that will only happen if the right people can be persuaded to stand.