Change isn’t coming. It is here.

Tim Aker’s new column on how Westminster decisions play out in real businesses and real communities across our county

Today, we’re welcoming the first column by Tim Aker, former UKIP MEP and Development Manager for the Federation of Small Businesses in Kent and Medway. Drawing on his years in election trenches and business battles, Tim will offer insider perspectives on the shifting state of British politics and business with the candour of someone on the front lines.

Change isn’t coming. It is here.

by Tim Aker

I guess the best way to begin this regular column is to introduce myself. I have a very interesting future behind me. I’ve been in the cut and thrust of politics for many years, far more than I ever anticipated. I was an MEP during Brexit. I was a parliamentary candidate in one of the closest fought races in 2015. I’ve been a local councillor dealing with the grassroots issues of politics: homelessness and housing, school places, care for the elderly. If pressed, the latter I found most rewarding. Helping individual residents with their issues and needs, genuinely changing lives and doing what we were elected to do: representation and delivery. I like to think I did alright. I was returned at my final election as an independent with the highest percentage and raw vote I achieved in all my council elections. It’s that one that mattered to me the most.

I can give you chapter and verse about the rest, but I’d rather direct you to the interview with the editor I gave a few months ago.

That was then, this is now.

Change has not only come to Kent, but it is also coming to the country.

Prior to the 1979 election, Prime Minister James Callaghan took his aide Bernard Donoghue to one side and confided in him that the future would be different. He felt the mood of change in the air, that the country was ready - and willing - for the economic, social and political change that was to come. And there was little that anyone could do about it.

That is happening now. The Reform tsunami in May heralded a complete clear out at County Hall. A new politics and way of doing things that doesn’t appear to be slowing down.

Change has already come to County Hall, with more to follow.

Kent’s political boundaries may soon change. Indeed, and most perplexing of all, it is something that people are generally interested in. I posted about it on my LinkedIn page, and, whether this says more about my other posts, it generated tens of thousands of impressions and is my best performing post to date.

Yet could it be stopped? This reorganisation was ushered in during the Christmas period last year, and the ministers who proposed it are no longer in place. More prescient are the concerns that the tax base will not be broad enough to maintain social and elderly care. There are concerns for the viability of any East Kent authority proposed under any recommended boundaries. Also, what about debt transfers? KCC and Medway have significant debt levels. What happens to that?