Lunch, speaker Cll Julien Brooks

MAYOR REFLECTS ON HIS YEAR

A small attendance at Tuesday’s lunchtime meeting of Henley Rotary Club at the Red Lion Hotel listened to Henley mayor, Cllr Julian Brookes, talk on “My year as Mayor.”

Pointing out that he did not hand over to his successor until May, he said it was really “the last 11 months,” and listed some of the “highs” that he particularly remembered. These included the charity dinner at the end of March, the “Heroes Return” of the Rio Olympians in September, the various Christmas festivities, the Traditional Boat Festival (when the Sea Cadets mounted a guard of honour for him) and the Remembrance Service.

Having visited every primary school (state and independent) in the town, he said he had always been impressed with the questions from the six- and seven-year-olds.

The diary had been particularly busy, he went on, the highlight having been on September 15 when he had had seven engagements.

He praised the great number of societies in Henley, including Rotary, and, in an amusing aside, he revealed that he had managed to persuade people to talk to him on the telephone if he said “the Mayor of Henley” rather than “Julian Brookes.”

He said he did not really have any low points, although he said chairing full council meetings was challenging and he had been criticised for letting councillors speak too long, but he believed in democracy. Answering a question later about whether a council with the status of a parish council should have so much politics, he agreed that the meetings were in fact as exciting as they had been described and he said “we do squabble.”

When he had been elected to the council two years ago, he had never considered becoming Mayor, but he had enjoyed it immensely. Asked whether he would ever do it again, he replied that the decision would also rest with his wife, who had had to undertake many duties as Mayoress that she had not expected to do. He also hoped that it would be possible to attract more professionals into council work.

Although he had not visited any of Henley’s four twin towns, he had received a delegation from Leichlingen in June and from Boroma in July.

Peter Thomson proposed the vote of thanks. In the unavoidable absence on business of the president, Lionel Scott, Maria Bunina, the club’s president-elect, took the chair.