Stock Options ballot cancelled

2.26.23pm UTC (GMT +0000) Thu 11th Jan 2007

Crawley Liberal Democrats supported the call for the Stock Options ballot to be cancelled at last night's Extraordinary Council meeting. As a result the ballot will not now take place.

Crawley Liberal Democrats have always recognised that, irrespective of the rights or wrongs of the vote, we always felt that the tenants would vote against. In the last month, amongst others, the Tenants Panel and the Government Office of the South East have also expressed "grave reservations" about the ballot.

Too much information emanating from Crawley Borough Council on this ballot can be described at best as misleading and incomplete. A typical example of this being the DVD to Council tenants on the Stock Options transfer that had totally incorrect information about the LifeLine Service. Even at last night's meeting questions were being raised as to the exact state of the Housing finances in respect of the ballot.

The Liberal Democrats have always supported the principle of the tenants making their own decisions about their future landlords. However to do this they must be given good quality factual information. This, the Borough Council failed to do.

We had no hesitation therefore in voting against the ballot going ahead.