Parties split on Slough Mayor and deputy choices

Slough council has decided on a new mayor and deputy to be ‘the first and second citizens’ of the Borough – but concerns were raised about both for quite different reasons.

The Conservatives are heading up an administration alongside the Lib Dems who won three seats in the local elections. As such, the council's new leader is Dexter Smith. The vote in favour went through in short time. 

It was not such smooth sailing for the mayor and deputy nominations. Cllr Amjad Abbasi was the proposed mayor – a Lib Dem candidate who won a seat in the Elliman ward.

But the Labour opposition raised objections, questioning Cllr Abbasi’s lack of experience. This would be his first time as a councillor – and the annual meeting yesterday (Thursday, May 18), his first council meeting.

They suggested that a better choice would be someone who had some experience chairing a meeting – a key part of the role of mayor, whose job it was to chair the fractious meeting that very night.

But the Tories argued that Cllr Abbasi clearly had the full support of the people of Slough, since he was democratically elected.

The vote for Cllr Abbasi to become mayor went through, divided along party lines – with Tories and Lib Dems in favour and Labour against.

“These are beautiful moments for me, but the road ahead is very challenging,” Cllr Abbasi said, upon accepting his new role.

The choice of deputy mayor – who fills in for the mayor for official duties in their absence – was also contentious.

It was Balwinder Dhillon (Con, Upton) – who was a sitting councillor prior to the outgoing Labour administration. He served as a Conservative and Independent councillor in Upton from 2004-2011.

However, his time as councillor did contain some controversies. In 2010, he was suspended from the Conservative group, although the reasons of this were not made expressly clear by the party at the time. He continued to sit on the council as an independent after this.

Labour suggested that Cllr Dhillon might not meet the ‘calibre required’ to hold a position of such high esteem in the borough.

But leader of the Conservatives – and now, the leader of the council – Dexter Smith said this was ‘a red herring’.

His suspension from the Tories, being a party-political matter, had no bearing on his suitability to be deputy mayor, Cllr Smith indicated.

In fact, it was Labour councillor Rob Anderson who suggested that Cllr Dhillon’s suspension was due to having voted in favour of a Labour member taking a panel position, which went against what his own party wanted.

Once again, in the end Cllr Dhillon’s nomination went through, with councillors voting along party lines.