A Greenwich Council cabinet member has been sacked after not attending a meeting about budget cuts.
Ann-Marie Cousins, who was cabinet member for equality, culture and communities, lost her role after failing to attend a meeting of the cash-strapped council’s senior leadership team.
Labour councillors were told in an email from Anthony Okereke, the council leader, on Wednesday evening that Cousins had been “relieved of her position”. No replacement has yet been announced.
After word of her dismissal spread around the council, Cousins hit back in a late-night email, criticising Okereke for the decision.
The cabinet is the main decision-making body on the council, with its members receiving an extra £22,562 on top of their basic £11,256 allowance.
According to two sources, the Abbey Wood councillor had been expected to attend a meeting involving other cabinet members and senior officers about next year’s budget, which is expected to include further steep spending cuts.
But Cousins opted to meet an organisation involved with voluntary groups in Woolwich town centre instead, a meeting that was also in her diary. The Greenwich Wire understands that she was asked to come back to the town hall but declined.
Okereke later called Cousins into a meeting at the town hall and told him she would be dismissed, according to an email seen by The Greenwich Wire.
“I will be undertaking a cabinet reshuffle and Cllr Ann-Marie Cousins has been relieved of her role as a cabinet member,” Okereke said in an email to Greenwich’s 49 other Labour councillors.
“In the interests of fairness, I am keeping the reasons for this decision confidential.
“Cllr Cousins has made valuable contributions during her time in the cabinet, and I would like to thank her for her service and dedication.”
But Cousins had her say on the matter when she emailed her colleagues just after midnight, after having been to “an event at Woolwich Works and had an absolutely fabulous time”.
“As cabinet member I have decisions about what meetings to attend or not,” she said, and that she had a conflict with “either attending the Greenwich Senior Leadership team (GSLT) for yet another discussions about the same proposals that had been discussed numerous times since the previous cabinet [meeting]”, or to attend the meeting about a long-delayed scheme to held voluntary groups.
“I chose the latter which I learnt at the meeting with the leader is contrary to what he wanted (with no prior discussions with me) and as a consequence of this he has made this decision.
“I believe that I have attended all GSLTs bar this one today, possibly only not attended one informal cabinet meeting and attended all [public] cabinet meetings. So if today’s decison is deemed fair and reasonable – that’s fine. I’ve often told the leader that he lacks understanding of equity and equality – and possibly this demonstrates my point.”
Cousins said that there had been “no insistence” that she needed to be at the town hall meeting and added: “As a cabinet member I am paid £20k extra to be equal to directors and chief officers paid £160-£200k annually. What sort of level playing field is that.
“I am happy to live by the decision I made. My conscious [sic] is clear.”
On Thursday morning Cousins also sent a video of herself dancing at Woolwich Works the night before to a Labour councillors’ WhatsApp group. “Thanks to the few who have asked if I am ok,” she said. “I am fine!”
Cousins has had a colourful career after being first elected to the council in 2018, which did not stop her being appointed a cabinet member by Okereke when he became leader in May 2022.
In 2019 it emerged that she had sat as a magistrate in cases involving Greenwich Council after being elected, something that is forbidden under judiciary rules.
During the early stages of the coronavirus lockdown in 2020 she shared a petition on social media calling for a halt to 5G masts, something which has been the subject of conspiracy theories.
She also told a standards hearing that year that she was “not viewed as an equal” after a complaint was made about her conduct at a training session with young people who had been in council care. While complaints were made about four councillors, hers was the only one to progress to a hearing, after which she was offered training in the councillors’ code of conduct.
And in December 2021 she criticised vaccine passports on social media, calling them “discriminatory and illegal”, linking to a website called The Conservative Woman, which has been critical of Covid vaccines. Six months later she had been made cabinet member for community safety.
Okereke said in a statement on Wednesday afternoon: “Today I have undertaken a cabinet reshuffle and equality, culture and communities will no longer be the portfolio of Councillor Ann-Marie Cousins.
“I would like to thank Councillor Cousins for her two and a half years of service as a cabinet member covering the portfolios of community safety and enforcement and more recently equality, culture and communities.
“During her time on the cabinet, she delivered a number of missions set out in Our Greenwich. These include the launch of the council’s serious violence strategy, rolling out plans to make women and young girls in our borough feel safer and shoring up our local culture, heritage and tourism organisations.
“I look forward to her continuing to play an important role within the wider council and our local communities and I intend to make an announcement in relation to the new post holder for cabinet member for equality, culture and communities in the coming days.”
Cousins did not respond to a request for comment.
Follow The Greenwich Wire on Bluesky, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Threads. You can also sign up for WhatsApp alerts – or subscribe to our emails through the blue box above.
Comments are closed.