Rochford Life:  John, you’ve been Chairman of the Parish Council for how long now?
John: I’ve been Chairman for fourteen months, since Maureen passed away. Just before that I started to take over and do a bit of going out for her. Being Vice-Chairman, as a trainee, she was teaching me all she knew and she had so much to give. She really was an oracle, and a lot of us have lost out because of her going, she was really an incredible source of information. She knew how things should be. We had laughter with her and we got the work done quicker for that.

RL:  The fact that you were Vice-Chairman means that you were naturally lining up to be Chairman?  
John: It’s not guaranteed. The first year I was Vice-Chairman she stayed on another year so I was going to be Vice-Chairman for two years, before she died. But Maureen was on so many committees; she was instrumental in pushing a lot of people forward. I never thought I would do this.  

RL:  You’re a plasterer by trade, I believe you said earlier?
John: Yes, at least it is one of my trades. I am an engineer as well. I used to make propellers, prop-shafts, bearings, gate values and all that sort of thing, but I still do plastering full-time.  

RL:  So how do you manage to find time to do the work of a Councillor, and especially fulfil the Chairman’s role as well?
John: I don’t work.

RL:  So you give up your plastering to do this?
John: Sometimes yes. I had finished a job yesterday so it allowed me to come here and do all this sorting out the banners for the Farmers’ Market tomorrow morning, and tomorrow afternoon when it has finished I’ll take them down.

RL:  So why do you do it?
John: I don’t know. I just love doing it. I was asked to do it and I love it. I do other things as well. I help run a charity, TLC, Teddies for Loving Care, in A&E’s for children.  I was one of the founders for that, helping set it all up. It has been going for about eight years now; it’s all over Britain, in America, some in Australia. It’s a Masonic charity and it’s all internal money not external money. The money we make goes towards the Teddy Bears and each child that goes into A&E gets a Teddy Bear to keep.  

RL:  You are gearing up for the Farmer’s Market tomorrow by the look of it? What’s the thinking behind the Council promoting the Farmer’s Market?
John: So it keeps going. Maureen set it up and the people that have done it, have done it for the last ten years and have come to a point where they feel they need to be standing down, so it’s new faces needed, but the idea of us doing it is so it doesn’t get taken over by a private concern or get dumped. We try to focus on bringing in local people bringing in local produce. It’s not always cheap but you spend the money on quality food.

RL:  What sort of public things does the Chairman have to do?
John: Not a lot really. If I get invited I go. We have the Civic Service coming up, and I went to the Holocaust Service recently. I go to the CRUSE AGM (Bereavement Care) in Southend, which we support. For the past few years we’ve done a St. Georges Day Civic Service and Tea but because it falls on Easter Sunday this year it’s going to be moved to May 15th. It celebrates the community and the council. Generally though, things are fairly quiet at the present. We’re in a funny time at the moment with finances, and everybody is on a very subdued level. It actually hasn’t affected the Parish Council much because we’re within budget and we’ve not had to put our precept up. We’ve done everything we’ve been asked to do.  We’ve got one or two issues being sorted out, but it’s all being dealt with. People either haven’t got the finances or they have but they won’t spend because they don’t know what’s round the corner, so at the moment not a lot is happening.  

RL:  You are short of Councillors at the moment, I believe?
John: Yes, we are doing interviews for co-opting on the 6th.  We’ve got spaces for 3 or 4 more members,  and we’ve got about nine people thinking about coming on. The trouble is that sometimes people think they are going to come on to the Parish Council and be politicians but it’s not like that, and it’s sometimes difficult to explain to them that we’re not important enough to be listened to fully, although we are listened to.  

RL:  When you come to the end of your term, will you step down and hand it on to someone else, or would you like to stay on?
John: You can be on here as long as you like and as long as they want you to stay. If I’m asked, I suppose, I will stay.

RL:  You have two District Councillors who are also Parish Councillors. Do you find their insights as District Councillors helpful on the Parish Council?
John: Sometimes they can advise you and guide you, but other times they can’t say anything because they have to remain neutral on, say, Planning issues until the main District Council Meeting when they vote, so you can’t get anything off them on such issues. But they will advise you but whether you take the advice or not is up to you. They may present possibilities and you choose what you feel is right, but then it may come back from District totally different. They can afterwards explain why something went through or why it didn’t go through, and that can be helpful for the future.

RL: Well thank you very much John, for your time and for sharing so helpfully.