Cllr Steve Foulkes on being Mayor “it’s the first time in my life I’ve been genuinely liked as a politician”
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Annual Meeting of Wirral Council (Part 1) 18th May 2015
It was a return to the traditional venue of the Civic Hall at Wallasey Town Hall for the annual meeting of Wirral Council to elect a Mayor.
Outgoing Mayor Cllr Steve Foulkes started his last speech as Mayor by thanking many people who had helped him during his time as Mayor. Over £32,000 had been raised in support of the charities chosen by him (Stick ‘N’ Step, Clatterbridge Cancer Centre and Wirral Foodbank). He also made an appeal for councillors and employees of Wirral Council to enter the Mayor’s lottery.
Matthew Lewis (the Mayoral cadet) was then awarded a certificate by the Mayor (as pictured above).
Mayor Steve Foulkes continued by paying tribute to the Deputy Mayor and Deputy Mayoress. He said that meetings of all councillors had gone well this year as people had been polite to each other and respected each other. Together with the Deputy Mayor they had been to six hundred different engagements. He went on to say “and finally it’s the first time in my life I’ve been genuinely liked as a politician”. Highlights of his year included the Open Golf Championship and WWI commemorations and he referred to Wallasey Town Hall’s history during WWI as a hospital.
Here are two of the jokes he told:
“It’s only recently I heard the tale that we were mentioned in the Arthurian tale Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. You may remember that?
We’re described, the Wirral’s described as a mysterious, forested place inhabited by man and beast that God cannot love. It’s good to see the Wirral PR team still in action in the thirteenth century!”
followed by
“This story is about the river streets. A guy coming home, anyone know the river streets in the north end of Birkenhead? Yeah? A guy’s coming home, he’s a little bit tiddly, he finds a dead body of all things in the street.
So in the old days when we had phone boxes, he goes to the phone box and he rings up. ‘Yes sir, what’s the incident?’ He said, ‘I’ve found a dead body’ ‘Give me your name sir’ ‘Yes I’ll give you my name’ ‘Now we need to know exactly where the dead body is, where is it sir?’ He says ‘I found the dead body in Buccleuch Street’ ‘Well sir, I’m afraid you’re going to have to spell that for us, can you spell Buccleuch Street?’
Phone goes dead, two minutes later the guy comes back puffing and panting. ‘It’s alright la, I’ve dragged the body into Avon Street.'”
Cllr Jeff Green (Conservative Leader) proposed Cllr Les Rowlands as Mayor and gave people a few insights into Cllr Les Rowland’s childhood and career. He said the charities that Cllr Les Rowlands had picked for fundraising during his Mayoral year would be the Clatterbridge Hospitals League of Friends, North West Air Ambulance and the Alzheimer’s Society.
Cllr Phil Gilchrist (Lib Dem Leader) seconded Cllr Green’s nomination of Cllr Les Rowlands as Mayor.
As there were no other nominations Cllr Steve Foulkes declared Cllr Les Rowlands elected as Mayor. The meeting was then adjourned so that Cllr Les Rowlands could put on the Mayoral robes and return.
Continues at Mayor of Wirral Cllr Les Rowlands’ theme for the year will be the "growing elderly population on Wirral".
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