Blunt speaker leaves with last swipe at council

FROM his first day in office, Doncaster’s former mayor delighted in his blunt-speaking Yorkshire style, even when it landed him in situations that were far from comfortable.

But as of today, Peter Davies’s opinions will no longer be those of Yorkshire’s only elected mayor, but those of a 69-year-old grandfather from the town’s affluent suburb of Bessacarr.

When he was elected in 2009, Mr Davies was a political unknown, despite his son Philip being the Tory MP for Shipley. He stood for the English Democrat party and vowed to scrap “politically correct non-jobs”.

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He found such policies were legally frustrated and failed to stop the delivery of the town’s now almost complete Civic and Cultural Quarter for the same reason, despite dismissing it as “nonsense”.

But he was able to slash the mayor’s salary from £70,000-a-year to £30,000 and did away with a chauffeur-driven car used by his predecessor, Martin Winter.

Rising to national prominence when he gave an interview in which he said British families could “learn a thing or two from the Taliban”, Mr Davies’s profile grew both in Doncaster and across the country.

In a speech in reply to yesterday’s winner, Labour’s Ros Jones, Mr Davies could not resist a final controversial remark or two, dismissing the many council meetings he had attended in four years.

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“I will tell you a couple of things I will not miss,” he said. “I will not miss the council meetings, which were horrendous in the extreme more often than not.

“And I will admit this publicly for the first time, I will not miss attending Sheffield City Region and Local Enterprise Partnership meetings which were as boring as it comes.

“Doncaster does not really need Sheffield. Doncaster needs to be leading the field, not in some nebulous Sheffield organisation.”

The comments, made before Mr Davies wished his successor well in her new job, were reflective of his combative style, which as well as making him popular with some voters, drew equal disdain from others.

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He had no time for trade union arguments and fought off criticism of his plans to ask for volunteers to run libraries which he said the council could no longer run under Government cuts.

Campaign groups were set up to fight the idea and legal challenges mounted, but Mr Davies was prepared to defend the scheme nationally, and now neighbouring councils, including Sheffield, are following a similar path.

He made no secret of his love of horse racing, and led on the creation of a week of events around Doncaster’s famous St Leger racing festival, which yesterday he said was one of his biggest achievements as mayor.

But he was criticised by his opponents for failing to address some of the biggest issues Doncaster Council still faces, including its failing Children’s Services, which are being run under Government supervision.

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His perceived inability to work with senior officers, some of whom resigned, and fellow councillors, also led to a second Government intervention in the running of the council.

That intervention was supposed to end this summer, but it was recently announced the process would continue for at least another two years.

In 2010, the council under Mr Davies was condemned by Government ministers as the worst in England, and although improvements have been made, it is debatable how influential Mr Davies has been.

Divisive to the end, one of his final acts in office was to split with the party with which he had found success, the English Democrats, after expressing concerns that it was recruiting former members of the BNP.

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His political opponents attacked him for changing his colours, and some would argue that his decision to abandon the party led to his defeat, with the new English Democrat candidate David Allen winning 4,615 votes.

As yesterday’s poll proved, many thousands of people agreed with Peter Davies’s aims for Doncaster and the borough, and felt he should have been given four more years to make his wish list come true and deliver improvements demanded by Government.

But just before leaving the racecourse count yesterday, the former mayor said he was content with the result and content to leave politics.

Asked what the future held, he listed his five new priorities: “Retirement, racing, theatre, village cricket and the Thomas Hardy society.”

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