What did you make of Stone’s brand new Christmas lights? Some local town councillors certainly weren’t impressed.
Members of the town council’s general purposes committee discussed the lights at their meeting on Thursday night (8th January) after independent councillors Jill Hood, Rob Kenney and Mark Green submitted this Member Motion:
Christmas Lights – The following is a snag list of problems which occurred on and after the lights switch-on:
The plane tree lights were and still are working on one side only.
The lights over the High Street had only half a crossover of lights and did not reach fully across.
There were only two trees wrapped in the High Street.
Walton shops display was abysmal with what looked like ordinary light bulbs added at the last minute.
The Walton tree had its trunk wrapped but only a small area of each branch as the lights only went a little way across.
The Walton roundabout Christmas tree lights did not stretch to the end of its branches.
A number of areas had lights missing, specifically the Crown Hotel/The electricians shop. Lights were on and off at random with obvious timing problems.
We would like to ask the reason why the lights display was so poor on the night of the Christmas Switch On when problems should have been sorted out by that night?
Where is the Welcome to Stone strip? Even though lights have been added at a later date they are very small, poor quality and in all a very poor show.
Committee chairman Cllr Philip Jones said the council would be investigating the issues with the contractor.
A new Christmas lights contract – a joint one between Stone Town Council, Stafford Borough Council and Cannock Chase Council – was awarded in September 2014 following a competitive tendering process. From Christmas 2014 under the new contract, Blachere Illumination supply the lights and they are installed by Field and Lawn.
5 comments
Keith Woolley
For the sake of £170 the contract should have stayed with the local company, with local contractors for local tax payers.
How can the people of Stone be persuaded to shop locally, save food miles, use independent retailers and hence create local jobs … if the purse holders go outside the town in order to save the princely sum of £170?
Rob Kenney
Only the tendering process was a joint one. Stafford stayed with their previous contractor. Which is the same one Stone use to have. Have to say Stafford Christmas lights looked amazing compared to ours. The recommendation to use the new contractor was given by the chair of the Town And tourism committee based on the tendering process. A saving of £170. It was something the independent councillors questioned and would have preferred to have stayed with the previously used company who were more locally based and used local contractors
Keith Woolley
Who agreed the contract for the lights, and what was the payment profile?
If the account has yet to be paid, then the Councillors questions can be answered before payment….
If the account was pre paid … go back to who authorised the payment? And ask why?
Disgruntled Resident
I have to say that although we should change the lights every now and again and keep up with the times, I think these lights this Christmas were drab! They were boring to say the least. Where’s the colour? Why do we have to have the plain white and blue or red? I loved the string coloured bulb lights that flashed as they draped across the street. Not only the lights were drab but the Christmas trees that were outside the shops were pitiful- they all looked like they were dragged 200miles before putting into position.
Bring back something lovely please! Our town is cheery and we need Christmas lights that match!
Berlu
Really?