The woman at the helm of children’s services for the past six years will not stand for re-election.
Cllr Sandra Clark has represented Bradwell for eight years, but the 51-year-old nurse said juggling politics, paid work and parenthood has taken a toll on her health.
Though she has ‘loved’ being cabinet member for children’s service, she has tired of ‘personal attacks’ and ‘gutter politics’.
She stood for election to fight for better rights for her daughter Rachel, who has learning difficulties.
After her family impelled her to stand, it is family who have persuded her to stand down.
She has overseen a tumultuous period in the department: Government intervention in the underperforming department, a damning Ofsted report which put it as one of the four worst councils in Britain, and the abuse scandal at the Gatehouse School.
She said: “There will always be things in the children’s agenda that will crop up. But it’s how you will deal with it.
You’ve got to be there through good times as well as bad.
Gatehouse, it was a difficult time to be cabinet member.
The Ofsted reports threw up a false positive. I don’t think anyone expected that to be going on in Milton Keynes.” Cllr Clark says her ‘one regret’ is not implementing a new management structure sooner. She has since overseen the appointment of a new director of children’s services and four new assistant directors.
It is this shift, and an improvement in exam results, which she sees as her greatest achievements.
“When I came to the department it was an out-dated model, stuck in some timewarp.
It’s taken a change of culture to take it where it needs to be. I feel my legacy is the changing culturewithin the council.” Cllr Clark has most relished fending off the Government when it earmarked the Radcliffe School for academy status.
“It’s about knowing locally what’s right and an academy for that school was not right.
People said that we should let it become an academy - even in my own group they said then you can blame the Government. That’s not what I was appointed to do. The pressure was unbelievable.
But we stood up to them and now they’re eating humble pie.” She believes election system causes problems for the council.
“I think the biggest inhibitor to this authority making progress is elections happening every year for three out of four years. Trying to run a multi-million pound organisation with one eye on the election is madness. For example, I know I need to close some schools. No-one is going to be closing schools or reviewing transport policy.
No-one does anything controversial.
It may work for the councillors but it’s not working for the public.” Her plans for the future include joining a gym, spending time with her husband Scott and three children, and becoming a school governor.
Council leader Sam Crooks said: “I’m very sad. I think she’s done a remarkable job in very difficult circumstances.
What’s very noticeable is the way she’s gained the confidence of the improvment board. If we come out of imtervention in July that will be a tribute to her work. She’s turned up for meetings in uniform before, had to go on duty over night, and then the next morning rather than going to bed has gone to more meetings. I don’t know how she does it.”