Sandwell Petitions Committee: Democracy, But With a Rubber Stamp and a Waiting Room

Sandwell Petitions Committee: Democracy, But With a Rubber Stamp and a Waiting Room

There is another meeting of Sandwell Council’s Cabinet Petitions Committee on Wednesday 15 July 2026 at 6pm.

Meeting papers here:
https://sandwell.moderngov.co.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=174&MId=7437&Ver=4

Now, in theory, a petitions committee sounds like a wonderful thing.

Residents get ignored through the usual channels, so they gather signatures, submit a petition, turn up at the Council House, and the mighty machinery of local democracy springs into action.

Lovely.

Except this is Sandwell.

So the machinery does not so much “spring into action” as cough, wheeze, ask for an officer update, place the matter into a future review, and then stamp something CLOSED before anyone has seen a spade, paintbrush, lamp column, barrier, camera, drain rod or actual solution.

Democracy with a rubber stamp.

Public engagement with a filing cabinet.

The Council says petitions are one of the ways residents can influence decision-making. Which is nice. Very warm. Very glossy brochure. Very “your voice matters” — terms and conditions apply, naturally.

But the papers for this meeting show the same old pattern.

Residents raise basic issues.

The Council turns them into process.

New administration, same conveyor belt?

This is now under the 2026/27 Reform administration.

The Committee membership has changed. Councillor Bob Jones is Chair and Cabinet Member for Environment and Enforcement. Ray Nock is Council Leader and Cabinet Member for Regeneration and Economic Growth. Other Cabinet members sit across finance, housing, customer services, children, adults, health, education and skills.

So this is no longer something the new administration can simply blame on the old lot.

Yes, the system has been inherited.

Yes, the culture was built long before May.

But once you sit in the chair, it becomes your chair.

And this Committee is a perfect opportunity for Reform to prove whether they are going to change Sandwell’s old way of working — or simply change the names on the nameplates while the same old municipal mincer keeps chewing up residents’ concerns.

The March meeting lasted 17 minutes

Let us start with something that jumped out immediately.

The minutes of the last Cabinet Petitions Committee show the meeting on 4 March 2026 started at 6.01pm and ended at 6.18pm.

Seventeen minutes.

That meeting covered matters including a waterlogged alleyway, Seymour Road traffic concerns, Church Road bins and street scene issues, Oldbury safety concerns following a sexual and physical attack, and Barker Street Car Park anti-social behaviour.

Seventeen minutes.

I have had longer waits for a kettle to boil while arguing with a teabag.

This is supposed to be a democratic committee dealing with residents who have gone to the effort of raising formal petitions. These are not people asking whether the Council House biscuits should be custard creams or bourbons. They are raising road safety, lighting, anti-social behaviour, fly-tipping, bins, pavements, drains and public safety.

If a petitions committee can process all that in 17 minutes, either Sandwell has discovered the secret of hyper-efficient local government — unlikely — or scrutiny is about as deep as a puddle in August.

Alma Avenue and Moat Road — yellow lines, but wait for the review

The first new petition is from 12 residents from Alma Avenue and Moat Road, asking for double yellow lines on Alma Avenue in Tipton.

The Council response is that a proposal for double yellow lines will be made for the junction of Alma Avenue and Moat Road in the next Tipton review. The Legal Order will be advertised. Objections can be made. If objections are received, they go to a future Decision Making Session. The next Tipton review is due to begin in September 2026.

Now, some of this is normal highways process. Traffic Regulation Orders do not happen by magic. There has to be advertising, consultation and legal process.

But residents need more than “wait for the review”.

They need to know what the actual problem is, whether officers have inspected the junction, whether visibility is poor, whether emergency access is affected, whether school traffic is involved, and when lines could realistically be painted if approved.

Because “September review” in Sandwell can sometimes mean “see you in the next geological period”.

West Park Road — apparently nobody has been hurt enough yet

The second new petition is from 31 residents around West Park Road, Smethwick, asking for traffic calming.

The Council response is basically this: road safety funding is prioritised where the most benefit can be achieved in reducing casualties. West Park Road has not been identified for funding this year because there have been no recorded collisions resulting in casualties in the last three years.

There may be an opportunity to seek Community Concern Site Project funding when tranche 2 becomes available towards the end of 2026.

In plain English:

Nobody has been officially injured recently enough, so please wait.

Now, collision data matters. Public money has to be prioritised. Nobody sensible disputes that.

But road safety should not only be reactive. Residents do not usually petition because they are bored and fancy a clipboard-based hobby. They petition because they see speeding, near misses, dangerous driving, pavement parking, school route risks, elderly residents struggling, children crossing, or drivers treating residential roads like a racetrack.

Are residents supposed to wait until somebody is knocked over before the spreadsheet lights up?

That is not prevention. That is municipal fortune-telling with casualties.

At the very least, the Council should be looking at lower-cost measures: speed monitoring, signage, road markings, police enforcement, community speed watch, ward-level options, or temporary interventions.

Instead, residents get the familiar Sandwell answer: not this year, maybe later, funding fairy permitting.

Old Warley and Perryfields — safety fears meet the ownership shuffle

The Old Warley petition remains one of the most serious.

Residents asked for street lighting and CCTV after a sexual and physical attack on a woman. They reported feeling unsafe. They asked for lighting in the alleyway between Perryfields Academy and Perryfields Primary School, and CCTV at Tame Road.

The Council installed a deployable CCTV camera. Later, it said no incidents had been detected and no incidents had been reported to the Council. The lighting was costed at around £31,299.

Then comes the classic Sandwell ownership shuffle.

Perryfields Academy holds the lease. The Council does not receive funding for maintenance of the school site. Funding rules mean the Council cannot simply use certain school condition money on an academy site. Therefore, the Academy Trust is apparently central to any decision.

Fine. That may be technically correct.

But residents are not asking for a bedtime story about leasehold arrangements and grant conditions.

They are asking to feel safe.

So the question should be simple:

Who is leading the solution?

Has Sandwell Council sat down with Perryfields Academy Trust, West Midlands Police, ward councillors, community safety officers and the relevant Cabinet Member?

Is there an action plan?

Is there a named lead?

Is there a timetable?

Or are residents just being told, in very official language, that their safety concerns are stuck somewhere between an academy lease, a funding rule and a committee update?

Because “the camera saw nothing” does not mean the community feels safe.

And “not our land” is not leadership.

Barker Street Car Park — barriers are tricky, so what is Plan B?

Residents around Barker Street Car Park raised concerns about anti-social behaviour, fly-tipping, noise, disorder and feeling unsafe.

They asked for the car park to be closed at night, or alternatively transferred to a community group to manage access.

Officers met residents. Residents asked about raised traffic barriers. The Council says barriers may be challenging due to the size and limitations of the carriageway.

And now we await another update.

This is where the Council needs to stop acting as if one difficult option ends the conversation.

If barriers are difficult, what else has been considered?

Lighting? CCTV? Patrols? Waste enforcement? Fly-tipping cameras? Police tasking? Public Space Protection Order powers? Timed restrictions? Better signage? Redesign? Community stewardship? Asset transfer feasibility?

Residents should not be left with “barriers are challenging” as though Moses has come down from the mountain with it carved into stone.

If there is anti-social behaviour and fly-tipping, then the Council should produce a proper options paper.

Not a shrug in a suit.

Oval Road, Tipton — the muddy alleyway saga

Then there is Oval Road, Tipton.

Residents reported that the alleyway between numbers 37 and 39 had become heavily waterlogged and muddy, creating hazardous conditions for residents and visitors.

At the March meeting, highways officers agreed to investigate and consider using “plainings” to help alleviate the problem. The July report says an update with further information and potential solutions will be provided at the meeting.

Again: why is this not in the public report?

This is not the Manhattan Project.

It is a muddy alleyway.

Who owns it?
Who maintains it?
Is it drainage?
Is it surfacing?
Is it run-off from adjacent land?
Are plainings suitable?
What will it cost?
When will it be done?

Residents should not need to take out a season ticket for committee updates just to find out whether an alleyway can be made safe.

Church Road — “ONLY material thing of substance”

Now we must return to the now infamous Church Road wording.

The papers repeat the line:

“ONLY material thing of substance is one-way street conversion for Church street.”

This is in relation to a petition where residents raised weekly refuse collections, blue recycling bag capacity, general waste collection, drains, streetlights, pavements, roundabouts, green spaces, photographs, documents and even audit-related concerns.

Yet somehow the phrase “ONLY material thing of substance” survives in the public papers.

Who wrote that?

Who checked it?

Who thought, “Yes, that is a respectful way to describe residents’ concerns”?

At best it is sloppy. At worst it reveals the mindset.

Residents raise a whole neighbourhood decline issue. The system reduces it to the bit it wants to process.

The rest? Apparently not “material”.

Tell that to the residents living with the drains, the lights, the pavements, the rubbish and the state of the street.

The petition was closed.

Of course it was.

In Sandwell, “closed” can mean fixed, rejected, delayed, absorbed, ignored, misunderstood, or quietly escorted to the civic cupboard of no return.

Seymour Road — parked inside a bigger scheme

Seymour Road residents asked for the road to become one-way due to illegal parking, congestion and road traffic collisions.

The response is that there are longer-term plans for a major highway infrastructure scheme along the A457 at the junction with Rood End Road. Seymour Road and surrounding streets will need to be considered as part of that wider scheme.

That may be technically sensible.

It may also be a perfect place to lose a local issue.

Because once a street problem gets absorbed into a bigger scheme, residents can be left waiting years while consultants consult, designers design, funding funds, reviews review, and reports report.

Meanwhile, the problem remains outside people’s homes.

What interim measures are being considered?

Has collision data been reviewed?

Has parking enforcement been increased?

Will residents be consulted before the wider scheme locks everything in?

When is anything actually happening?

“Considered through the scheme design process” sounds official.

It also sounds like a very comfortable long grass.

The real problem — petitions are treated as workflow, not accountability

The Committee should be where residents force action.

Instead, too often, it looks like where local concerns are converted into officer workflow.

Resident concern goes in.

A report comes out.

Words appear: investigated, reviewed, considered, future update, future funding, no current priority, petition closed.

Everyone nods.

The machine resets for the next batch.

That is not meaningful local democracy.

That is admin with microphones.

A petition is not just another service request. It is evidence that residents feel ignored, unsafe, frustrated or desperate enough to organise collectively.

That should carry weight.

It should trigger visible accountability.

It should produce clear action, named responsibility and a timescale.

Not a polite paragraph and a promise to report back at some unspecified point in the future.

What Reform should do now

The new administration has a chance here.

A simple, practical reform would be to publish a live petitions tracker.

Not a foggy appendix buried in committee papers.

A proper public tracker showing:

The petition.
The ward.
The number of signatures.
The issue raised.
The action promised.
The responsible officer.
The responsible Cabinet Member.
The target date.
The current status.
The delivery outcome.
Whether the head petitioner agrees the matter is resolved.

And most importantly:

Do not close petitions until the action is delivered, rejected with full reasons, or transferred into another public process with a clear timetable.

Because “we will consider it” is not a solution.

“Funding may become available” is not a solution.

“An update will be provided at the meeting” is not transparency.

And “petition closed” is not a magic spell that makes potholes, speeding, fly-tipping, dark alleyways or muddy footpaths disappear.

Although in Sandwell, you do sometimes wonder if they have tried.

Final thought

The residents bringing these petitions are not asking for palaces, gold-plated lampposts or diamond-encrusted yellow lines.

They are asking for basic things.

Safe roads.
Clear junctions.
Cleaner streets.
Working lighting.
Less anti-social behaviour.
A safe alleyway.
A Council that listens and follows through.

That is not unreasonable.

That is local government 101.

The Cabinet Petitions Committee should be a place where residents see their concerns taken seriously and converted into action.

At the moment, too much of it still feels like:

Speak now… and watch your problem get filed, stamped and parked.

Sandwell deserves better than democracy by rubber stamp.

Residents deserve more than another update.

They deserve action.

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