The gathering of responsibility or, how one thing leads to another...

So, I've become the Chair of the Micro Councils Network of the National Association of Local Councils (NALC), right? Quite prestigious, I suppose, and a long way from being the Chair of a tiny Parish Council in deepest mid-Suffolk. But it only meets four times a year, and I have a professional team who are there to support me and organise things, so that's not too challenging, is it?

And, of course, that's probably too good to be true, isn't it? So, I shouldn't have been too surprised when I was invited to join the Smaller Councils Committee of NALC - after all, it is a platform on which to raise the issues of the Micro Council sector. How could I refuse? And, of course, I didn't.

What happened next was almost predictable. I was offered an induction into the work of the Committee from either a member of the professional team or the Vice Chair. My antennae twitched... "Vice Chair"? What happened to the Chair? So, I read the minutes of the recent committee meetings and discovered that there hadn't been a Chair since April - the Chair has to be a member of the National Assembly and nobody had come forward.

It wasn't long before the other shoe dropped, and an e-mail arrived from a senior colleague, asking me if I'd be willing to take on the role. I slept on it. And then I decided to go for it. Let's be honest, I'm fairly strongly of the view that there must be someone better qualified than I am, but there apparently isn't anyone and so, given that there should be a Chair, it seems that I am now (subject to a vote of the Committee, terms and conditions apply etc. etc) the Chair designate of the NALC Smaller Councils Committee, the voice of thousands of Town and Parish Councils across England whose electorate is less than 6,000. It would be reasonable to assume that Creeting St Peter qualifies...

I've had a conversation with my Vice Chair, who seems to be more than capable and offers a usefully different perspective - she's a Town Clerk - and I've started preparing for my first official meeting on 5 November, which should be interesting. It also means that, all being well, I'll be in post in time for the NALC Annual General Meeting two days later.

I haven't let the grass grow under my feet though. I was part of the two hour drop-in session at the ALDC stand at Federal Conference, talking to conference delegates about what we do and why Parish and Town Councils are such a good thing. We even offered some advice for councillors faced with challenging situations, which is sort of what NALC is there for. And I've given some thought as to what action Smaller Councils Committee could take to promote those parts of the NALC legislative agenda that particularly impact on our end of the sector.

So, the next few months could be interesting, as I settle into my new roles. At least there isn't anything else that I can be persuaded to take on, right?...