Leading by Example

On Wednesday of last week I attended the memorial service of Gwilym Swift, known as Gwil. Perhaps not a name many are very familiar with but nevertheless a person who had a substantial impact on a large number of people's lives. It was a sad occasion particularly for his close family and friends but there is joy in the celebration of the life of a lovely man.

Gwil was of the era of James Herriot, working in the rural areas of Sussex for most of his life and becoming firmly established as the Burwash vet. In the first tribute at the service held in Burwash church Richard Brown, one of his business partners, described the development of Gwil's career and how he was keen to embrace new methods as soon as, if not before, they were widely accepted.

Gwil was a gentle, cultured, courteous, fair and generous man, not making him the obvious candidate for local politics. Yet he was overwhelmingly elected as Liberal Democrat District Councillor to serve Burwash in 1991 with one of the highest turnouts in the district, 60%. This was a truly resounding endorsement of him personally.

His period of office coincided with economic conditions similar to those which we are currently experiencing. While Gwil was Chairman of Rother District Council the ruling Conservative government introduced stringent capping of local authorities, the result being that 30 officers at Rother were made redundant. As a gesture of support during his term of office Gwil gave up the increase in his allowance and also the use of an official car.

Is this the sort of action which the electorate are looking for now? Liberal Democrats lead by example. Redundancies are being announced but we see no evidence of implementation of (omit "the") proposals for tackling the harmful bonus culture in the financial sector. Liberal Democrats were first to put forward these proposals which now both the Labour government and Tory opposition support.