In the second of a two part interview (read Interview of Note: Tim Prater part 1), Kyle Hill chats to Tim Prater, Folkestone West’s newest county councillor about sitting on three councils, expenses and working in a minority.
Prater has shown in interest in politics since he became old enough to vote in 1991 and said he works by the mantra "don’t get mad, get even." While attending Aston University, Prater became involved with the Liberal Democrats, writing a news letter and set up phone fundraising operations during the late 1990s.
Since 2002, Prater has operated Prater Raines Ltd. with Web developer Matt Raines. The company has developed over 350 Web sites, principally for Liberal Democrat candidates and groups across the United Kingdom and Europe.
As a member of three councils, Prater says that it will be a challenge to manage his time between the three but that he will be able to provide a shortcut for discussing issues between bodies.
"I’m planning to go to those meetings as well so that when they’re bringing up issues that need assistance from Kent who deal with things like the highways–there’s a lot of road issues, a lot of parking issues, a lot of street light issues down here–they are things that I can take from those meetings and go back up the chain and say ‘here’s a real problem,’" Prater said.
Prater said that councils often don’t communicate with one another. As a short circuit, he adds, he will be able to communicate discussions from the county and district councils to his district’s town councils.
Following the substantial reduction of the Labour Party’s representation on the county council from 20 to two, Prater’s arrival adds to the LibDem’s count of seven councillors, placing them in the official opposition. With only ten of Kent’s 84 councillors not affiliated with the Tories, Prater says he and his colleagues will do their best to ensure their residents’ concerns are properly voiced.
"You can only bring up the issues which are in front of you and just make it as clear as you can," Prater said. "Often these things are not political. They are issues about management, they are issues about making sure the right thing is done. It’s often not a fundamental difference in opinion on some of these things."
Prater has experienced a similar minority situation on Shepway District Council, where the LibDems also have an official opposition with six members to the Tories’ 36.
"What you’re doing is watching what for the majority group is doing and pointing out when they’re making mistakes, and doing it in a way that is hopefully constructive but is equally forceful." Prater said. "Just because there are a lot of them doesn’t mean that they are right. Groupthink quite often sets in on these things, and it becomes very easy as a very big majority to think that because you come up with the idea that it has to be right, and there is always another way of doing something.
Prater said that several ideas the Conservatives will propose will be right for Kent or almost right but need some tweaking from the opposition.
"We’re going to be the ones who are sitting in the room who are reading things and going, ‘is there another way of doing it? Is there a problem with this? Would people understand this, and if they understand this, would they like it?" Prater said.
Prater said that with the word expenses mentioned often the past three weeks, he and fellow Shepway District councillor Tom McNeice have not been involved with excessive reimbursements.
"People say ‘you can claim expenses at district council, you can claim mileage allowances, you can claim food and subsistence allowances,’ and we can say ‘yeah, we can,’" Prater said. "In the last two years, neither of us have claimed a penny. And that does kill an argument very quickly."
Prater added that he does not plan to seek reimbursement for mileage and believes the basic allowance as a county councillor should cover mileage to and from Maidstone. He said that expense claims at the county and local level also should be made available for public review to determine whether a councillor’s claims are reasonable for the amount of work he or she does.
Prater maintains an office on Sandgate High Street and operates a personal Web site at http://www.prater.org.uk/. He says he can also be reached via Facebook or through his Twitter user name @timprater.
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