Meet the Bedford Labour Councillor the Luton Labour Party want to throw off the Police Authority

Meet Councillor Colleen Atkins MBE. She is a Bedford councillor, a member of the Labour Party, and is currently Portfolio Holder for Performance and External Relations in the administration of Bedford’s Liberal Democrat elected Mayor Dave Hodgson. She is also one of the two Bedford Council representatives on the Bedfordshire Police Authority.

I’ve covered here before how the insistence by the Luton Labour Party that all three of Luton Council’s places on the Police Authority should be held by Labour members has ended in a row that has meant that Luton has currently no representation on the Authority. Something which, as far as I know, they are still insisting on.

The things is, as the Labour Party is only entitled to three places in total because of the balance of parties across Bedfordshire, if they get their way on this then Cllr Atkins would have to be thrown off. This doesn’t strike me as being very comradely behaviour on behalf of Luton Labour towards their brothers and sisters in Bedford.

I hope that before the next Luton council meeting on the 19th July Luton Labour comes to its senses and that they propose a compromise to that meeting. If not Luton risks a further few months of not being represented on this important body.

This content was originally posted on my old Strange Thoughts blog.