The residents of Mirfield lamented the loss of their urban district council, upon the formation of Kirklees way back in 1974. It wasn't long before locals looked for ways to redress that 'injustice' and after much hard work a Parish Council was formed in 1988, this evolved into today's Town Council.

All Town Councillors are volunteers and give up much of their free time to attend meetings, organise projects and undertake case work for residents.

The council comprises of 16 councillors (members) who serve a four year term of office. Elections for the whole council take place at the same time, unlike Kirklees which works on a rotating basis, and the next elections for the whole town council will be in 2011.

How we do it

The Town Council is both pro-active and re-active in carrying out its duties to Mirfield residents.

It was very pro-active when it introduced the Christmas Lights Event and in the early days Councillors actually erected the lights themselves! Health and Safety laws put a stop to this so nowadays specialist contractors are employed to do the work. Bringing back the Allotments into the ownership of our Town away from Kirklees is a second example. Mirfield Civic Sunday, Town clock maintenance, Mirfield Civic Dinner, the St. Georges Day celebrations and the Mirfield Remembrance Service were all pro-active actions by your Council.

On the re-active side the Council has responded to requests for financial support form many local community Groups. These have included Mirfield Free Grammar School, Battyeford Boys Club, G Sports, local churches, Upper Hopton Community Association etc, etc along with many items of sponsorship to fund raising by individuals.

Running along side this is the Council's general work that is carried out by the two main Committees. These are The Finance and General Purposes Committee and the Plans Scrutiny Committee.

The F&GP Committee is responsible for the financial well being of the Council by setting the rate precept and exercising budgetary control. It also responds to grant requests, oversees the Allotments and Christmas Lights, deals with Kirklees Council and Government directives and ensures that residents have access to all Council matters. It has introduced a policy that permits any member of the public to address any meeting that the Council holds to ensure this happens.

The Plans Scrutiny Committee makes representation to the Kirklees Planning Department on all applications in Mirfield. They pass on their views and those of residents and have been pro-active on many issues. Commenting on and resisting suggestions made by Kirklees Strategic Planners in the UDP and LDF documents is ongoing work on matters that will have major long term effects on Mirfield and its residents.

Mirfield Town Council accounts

Mirfield Town Council is funded by a levy or precept set against each house in the town and collected by Kirklees for the Town Council with the annual rates.

This year the people of Mirfield are paying a total of £41.000 to fund the administration and functions of the Town Council. For the first time in the memory of Mirfield Council, and probably any other, the budget was set without a single councillor voting against it!

Full details of the budget are available for residents, however to remind people, a quick breakdown is:

• 30% of the money is used on administration (clerk's wages, costs, election coverage etc).
• 30% of the budget funds regular projects which the council is involved in at this time of year residents will see the benefits in the hanging baskets around the town, the wonderful condition of Eastthorpe Gardens in the Town Centre, and from a contribution to churches for maintenance of the clocks in the town. Mirfield residents may also remember the impressive display of lights and activities over the Christmas period.
• The largest chunk of the budget, £13,000, is this year allocated for what Councillor Bolt referred to as community support, making grants to groups and causes in Mirfield, organising events such as the Civic Service. Money can be used for to form a partnership with other groups or Kirklees Council to boost projects in Mirfield, by partnership working it has been shown that the money the Town Council has can be increased in some cases by 4 times to help worthy causes.

A community fund has been set up, which this year was used to help residents oppose the proposed waste transfer station, it is hoped this can be built up to provide a help for some of the exciting projects which are happening in Mirfield.

To give an idea for an average household, if you pay Band D Council tax, you will pay £6.01 to the Town Council, or £2.65 per voter per year.

Not a lot if you think that this council has stopped developments in the town which masses of people objected to, funded improvements such as the Riverside walk, and the new Mirfield signs on each main entrance to the town.

Committees

To help run the council efficiently the council has two sub-committees:- the Plans Scrutiny and the Finance and General Purposes.

The Plans Scrutiny is chaired by Cllr John Nottingham who said:

"The Plans Scrutiny Committee is not a decision making body but does have a statutory right to be consulted by Kirklees Council on all Mirfield planning matters. The Committee meets monthly and tries to represent the townsfolk when making it's observations on planning applications. Foremost in it's mind is to protect the Green Belt, Open Spaces and the character of our town so that any new developments reflect all that is best in Mirfield.

We have conducted an extensive research in order to have a major input into the Kirklees Local Development Framework which is an outline plan for Mirfield's development over the next 20 years. A copy of this is available at the Council Offices for examination. The Committee welcomes the views of Mirfield residents and all are welcome at any of the meetings."

The Finance and General Purposes, under the watchful eye of Cllr Mark Hamilton who commented:

"The Town Council has recently taken back control from Kirklees of the three allotment sites in Mirfield it is presently looking at the sites, talking to the Allotments Society and trying to deal.

The function of Sub-Committees such as Finance or Plans is to reduce the workload into manageable blocks so that the whole Council doesn?t have to consider in detail every aspect of day-to-day running. Following investigation and discussion by the smaller committee, recommendations are made to full council and if they consider we have done our job correctly they vote and hopefully support our suggestions.

This year the committee has been given additional powers by the Town Council to decide on certain matters without referral to Town Council. These matters include pre-budgeted amounts such as the grants to Church clock maintenance and grants to local bodies for less than £1000. This is an attempt to reduce the amount of double discussion that quite often occurs when matters go from committee to Council. Rest assured, safeguards exist to stop any mistakes and the Town Clerk is ever wary with her advice.

Giving grants to local organisations is one of the better parts of the role. The task involves enhancing existing worthwhile schemes that may struggle for support from more traditional grant giving bodies and to energise schemes that might not otherwise take place. Grants are not given to merely boost the profits of what would be a successful event with or without the Council. Of course Mirfield residents can have confidence in the knowledge that the money they give in their precept is granted only to causes that directly benefit Mirfield residents.

Finance and Plans are also in the forefront of the task of informing residents about the duties and successes of the Town Council. Future projects include email access to Councillors, a website and a regular newsletter."

Mark says:

"The more you know about our work the more I am sure you will support us in continuing to keep Mirfield special."

Administrator to Mirfield Town Council:

The administration of the council, and ensuring that the councillors do nothing illegal(!) is carried out by Nicola Musgrove.

The Town Council are looking at the prospect of being designated as a Quality Town Council by the Government, to do this they need to demonstrate that they have proficient systems, communicate with the residents and certain other mandatory or discretionary tasks. It will take well over a year to progress through the various hoops the council has to jump through.

Ultimately it is hoped that achieving Quality status may allow Mirfield Town Council to persuade Kirklees to devolve some of its massive budgets and services down to the Town council, whilst not recreating the urban district it will be welcomed by many as local people having local control over local services.