How Visionary Councillors Shape Our Communities
To become a councillor is pretty simple if you’re organised, passionate and have some time on your hands. You don’t receive a salary but can claim expenses (including for childcare and carers, if needed). And you don’t have to belong to a political party, you can be independent if preferred.
No matter who dropped it, it’s the council’s responsibility to remove litter on public land (or serve litter abatement orders on private land). Report this and other issues to Fix My Street.
If planting green spaces, read up on pet-friendly gardens and wildlife-friendly gardens. If planting trees, know of trees to avoid near horses (including yew, oak and sycamore).
How Your Local (confusing) Councils Work
Between them, councils run around 800 services across England. At time of writing, several local elections are being postpones, due to the councils being merged, to make things simpler. But it’s likely that parish councils will remain as is.
- County councils cover education, transport, planning, fire/safety, social care, libraries, refuse and trading standards.
- District/city councils cover rubbish/recycling, Council tax & planning
- Parish (village) councils cover allotments, public clocks, bus shelters, community centres, play areas, neighbour planning and grants for local charities). They can also fine people for litter, graffiti, fly-posting and not picking up dog poop.
The National Association for Local Councils has good information. The laws to become a councillor are pretty simple, and depending on the council size, your councils could be responsible for:
- Allotments
- Car parks
- Celebrations
- Community buses
- Community & leisure Centres
- Litter bins
- Parks & open spaces
- Public toilets
- Street lights
- Suitable housing
- Solar panels
- Town planning
- Police & Health services
Write to Them is an open source website (meaning other countries can use the software to create something similar) that lets you know your local or national MP, then write to them.
Councillors Are Very, Very Important!
Councils can create good or bad decisions that affect people’s lives. Recently, some councils have actually used funds to help ‘top up’ those in limbo, who missed out on the Winter Fuel Allowance.
People need fire stations and local food shops. They don’t ‘need’ factory-farmed bacon and take-a-break magazines.
In Northern England, some campaigners took a battered mattress around in a van, dumped it on people’s doors and then took photos, and sent them into the council to complain, then won the election! Around the time of the MP expenses scandal, one person was asking what should be done. He simply replied ‘Give us better politicians’. 101 Ways to Win an Election
Why Have Councils (if governments override them?)
A shocking story has just been announced, which has wide implications for council democracy nationwide. But first, a little background:
If you’ve ever read Paul Kingsnorth’s book Real England, you’ll know about the Norfolk town of Sheringham, a lovely little place with lots of independent shops and over 40 independent food shops.
The town sits on the North Norfolk coast, and became well-known in the news, for having a gigantic 13-year battle with Tesco, over plans to build a giant supermarket, when locals (mostly) didn’t want it.
When Paul wrote the book (over 10 years ago), the case was ongoing. It carried on, and a local entrepreneur even stepped in and offered to open a locally-owned supermarket, to answer all the reasons the council was giving for ‘locals to have a big place to shop for food’.
And can you believe it? The council at the time voted it down, and chose Tesco.
Today, the supermarket is busy, but of course many local shops have gone to the wall. But no fear, you can pop in and get your ‘blue plastic token’ to pop in a box to help the local community, that Tesco has helped to destroy.
The Pizza Chain vs Council vs Government
But what has just happened in July 2025 is even more concerning. Again, Dominoes Pizza (responsible for all those littered white plastic sauce pots on streets) applied to open a chain.
And again, the locals said no, because many local shops have already gone to the wall, and Sheringham already has over 40 independent food outlets, so no more are needed, period.
This time (thankfully) the council sided with the people, and refused planning permission in May 2025.
So the pizza chain went to the national government planners, and protested.
And in July, the national government overrode the local council, and now the town is going to get a pizza chain that it doesn’t want.
So even if it’s just a minority and tourists who use it, the town is going to have more indie outlets go out of business, and lots more litter to clean up (paid for by their council tax presumably).
The world has gone made. Hopefully locals (unlike what happened with Tesco) will do a mass boycott. The argument for Tesco was that the town needed a place to buy affordable food. But Dominoes Pizza (a whopping £16 for a bit of dough and a few toppings) is not a necessity. So hopefully the outcome this time will be different.
