Basildon local elections: everything you need to know

Elections will take place on May 3 where candidates from various parties will be battling it out for a seat on Basildon Council.

Your nearest polling station will be on your polling card - if you haven't received one this may be because you haven't registered to vote.

Here is a list of candidates standing in Basildon:

Labour

In May 2017 the Labour Party took back control of Basildon Council. After 15 years of the Conservatives protecting their own at the expense of the rest of the borough, it was time to level the playing field. 

We have managed the council’s finances effectively, protected services, cleaned up our forgotten estates, introduced increased enforcement on travellers occupying illegal encampments and developments, invested in new play equipment, protected women and girls from domestic violence, built council homes, and passed a local plan that means homes cannot be built without infrastructure.

We have five promises for in 2018. We will oppose the Conservative congestion charge, we will keep cleaning up the streets. Labour will build 600 council houses after building the first council homes in the borough for 25 years. 

We will work to reduce crime by campaigning to increase levels of policing after the Conservatives took 20,000 police off the streets. We have also increased funding for domestic violence prevention after eight years of Conservative cutbacks. 

Wickford Independents

Wickford Independents aim is to work hard for Wickford - and to keep national politics out of local Government. 

For the last year we have successfully worked with Labour, UKIP and other Independent councillors as the administration of Basildon Council, and made the council decision making more democratic by changing to a committee system. 

Achievements for the party include getting CCTV in parks and improved CCTV systems in high street areas. 

We will work with Conservative councillors if they put national politics onto the back burner.

We will not support any charge for the collection of green waste, or any change to the current black bag refuse collection service and will prioritise improving the market by pedestrianisation of the High Street on market days.

We will continue to work with the NHS to improve health care in Wickford and continue to be as strong as the courts will allow in dealing with unauthorised developments.

We pledge to work to improve early years provision in Wickford, to complete the regeneration of the High Street and The Broadway areas, work to provide affordable and social housing for our young people and continue to to be the hardest working councillors in Wickford. 

Conservatives

Basildon Conservative Party pledges include working to stop the Labour Party’s high tax and high spend approach. The Conservatives propose to freeze council tax not increase it. 

It is pledging Basildon homes for Basildon people, and to work to stop Labour giving our houses away to those from outside the borough by maintaining the seven year connection as the criteria for eligibility. 
It says it will continue to give Basildon residents preference for housing, stop Labour squandering resident’s money on vanity projects, such as the £400,000 on a council chamber. 

It will continue to invest in all parts of the borough, provide opportunity and prosperity for all residents – not just the few. 

The party says it will improve the recycle pink sack process, will reintroduce a zero tolerance approach to enforcement and unauthorised development and will actively use its powers to progress enforcement speedily through the courts.

The party is pledging to stop Labour giving green belt to the developers. 

The party believes infrastructure should come before housing developments, it will reject high density and low quality housing estates.

Independents

We, Kerry Smith and Imelda Clancy, believe a councillor’s first loyalty should be to their constituents. 

They should be free to keep their residents informed of developments affecting them and fight their corner for them. Only an independent councillor can promise to do this.

Political party councillors have to follow the party line, even to the detriment of their own constituents, or run the risk of de-selection.

We recently had an example of this in Basildon, when councillors voted to toe the party line about endorsing the provision of a traveller site in my Nethermayne Ward. The proposal was passed.

I stood shoulder to shoulder with the residents. Between us we mounted a hugely successful campaign to get the Nethermayne traveller site plan dropped.

Without an independent councillor the Nethermayne traveller site would have become a reality before the majority of the residents knew anything about it.

Ukip

UKIP believes that protection of our green spaces is a priority. We resist over-development and insist that infrastructure precedes development, to ensure air quality is not compromised. 

Targets for affordable homes, for local people and veterans first, will have to be met. The planning policies incorporated into the Draft Local Plan will give us more control over development.

We want a new secondary school and grammar school annex in the borough.

Money for local services and improvements should benefit all parts of the borough fairly and equitably. Essential services must be protected but council tax should be kept as low as possible.

Further waste facilities must be located elsewhere in the county, and not dumped in Basildon.

We will continue to deal effectively with illegal encampments, using the High Court injunction.

We put local people and communities first, and in control of what happens in their local area.

Democrats and Veterans Party

The Democrats and Veterans Party is committed to fighting for genuine independence for Britain. 

We believe it’s the British people, not the self-serving elite, who are best placed to make decisions. 

It will campaign tirelessly for those who have served the UK to be afforded the dignity and care they deserve. 

We will work to put UK veterans’ skills to good use in the public sector and with the training and education of our young people.

As well as helping UK veterans, a DVP government would prioritise the welfare system to help the elderly, disabled, and those in genuine need, through various mutual benefit programmes and other initiatives where veterans can be employed to help. 

We also pledges to always be a voice for the most vulnerable in the society, including those that work hard on low incomes and will also campaign for a coherent health policy that focuses on prevention rather than just cure. 

We believe in a controlled immigration system with work permits for those with skills the UK needs and that illegal immigration is a criminal offence.