Marlborough needs to shout more about itself as Wiltshire’s hidden gem, declares new town clerk

Marlborough needs to beat the drum — and shout more about its excellence — as a hidden gem thriving in the heart of Wiltshire.

That is the encouraging view of Marlborough’s vivacious new town clerk, Shelley Parker, barely two weeks after arriving at the High Street council offices to find welcoming flowers from Marlborough’s mayor, Edwina Fogg, on her desk.

And then, hardly knowing anyone, facing her first her first full council meeting that very evening with the arduous task of setting its council tax precept for the coming financial year.

“Being thrown in at the deep end is the best way to come in,” she told Marlborough News Online.  “It’s sink or swim.  And I’ve enjoyed it.  I feel very honoured to be in a place like Marlborough.”

A former diplomat in her early fifties, petite Mrs Parker has been town clerk of Cricklade, just nineteen miles away, for the past four years, and now succeeds Derek Wolfe, Marlborough’s town clerk who tragically died last September.

In fact, she was runner-up when he was appointed in January last year and displays an admiration and knowledge of Marlborough, plus the devil in the detail of local government legislation likely to cause headaches in the future.

As for her new base, she declared: “I see Marlborough as a town that punches above its weight.  I do indeed.  I think it is a hidden gem in the middle of Wiltshire.  The town council should be shouting a lot more what it does so well.”

“You only have to walk up the High Street and look around to see what it does.  We have a fabulous grounds team who work extremely hard to keep everything clean and tidy, everything up to date with a head gardener we are very lucky to have wth a huge horticultural knowledge.”

“There have been lots of improvements with the floral arrangements in the High Street.  I come from Cricklade of course, which was the winner of the national Britain in Bloom competition.”

“So there’s huge scope there to do more.  Flowers encourage visitors to the town.  And it makes it look even better during the summer months.”

She was able to give immediate guidance to the finance committee’s accountant chairman, Councillor Andrew Ross, in setting a new rate – a nine pence a week increase for Band D council tax payers – having been through the process at Cricklade.

A new grant system enabled Marlborough to benefit by £31,253 to reduce its new budget to £421,000, and Mrs Parker added: “What incredible good value for money the residents here get.  Running a staff, running a number of services to keep the town clean and tidy, looking after the gardens, the public open spaces, recreation grounds, all the bus stops – that is what is achieved.”

But she is concerned that like Wiltshire Council itself, town and parish councils are facing a two per cent cap in increased expenditure in future years.

“Life is going to get tougher and that is quite scary,” she said.

“We shall have to have a big rethink about what local services people want and what we can afford.”

Meanwhile, she is looking forward to developing the council’s website to coincide with the forthcoming council elections in May, and be able to display much more information on it, the town council being obliged to be more open and transparent.

“Very soon there will be Localism legislation in place that means, for example, we have to put on the website everything that costs us more than £500, all meeting agendas and reports so we make everything much more understandable for local people,” she explained.

“And we shouldn’t be frightened of doing that.”

Last Thursday’s visit of the New Zealand Acting High Commissioner, Rob Taylor, for an event linking Marlborough with its namesake town across the ocean, was another eye opener for Mrs Parker of Marlborough’s historical and international links.

It was an event too where she felt comfortable as, during her years as a Foreign Office diplomat, she spent time at the British High Commission in Wellington, so was one of the handful of guests present who had visited New Zealand.

Yet her heart is in Wiltshire. “I came from Oxfordshire originally,” she revealed. “ But I feel local, actually.  I’m Wiltshire.”

 

The council elections in May will be a turning point says Shelley Parker While she believes the Conservative Party is well organised and financed in Wiltshire, Marlborough’s new town clerk believes the forthcoming parish, town and county council elections in May will be significant. Voters lack of trust in the political process may well result in some people refusing to vote and others choosing extremist rather than traditional parties to support. “There are lots of candidates now who have jumped ship from the parties they were affiliated to in the past and are now independents,” she pointed out. “So the outcome will be interesting.” Shelley Parker is attending a meeting this week of the Wiltshire Association of Local Councils to learn more about her tasks in the forthcoming lections, which could prove to be a turning point with councils now under the cosh of spending cuts. April 5 has been set as the nomination day for candidates in Marlborough and across the county and it is her hope that there will be a good cross-section of people standing as candidates. But she appreciates that the pressures of earning a living and raising children may will prevent young family members becoming candidates, retired people now forming the bulk of candidates standing. “I think we should be promoting the opportunity for local people to stand, a good mix of local people from all age groups and all walks to life gives you a good mix of people round the council table,” she said. “That would be the ideal.” And she added: “There are some real similarities and some great differences between Marlborough and Cricklade, which was an apolitical town council. “I gather that this council too is apolitical, but I haven’t been here long enough yet to say if that is the case.”