Former councillor accuses Royal Borough of putting Tivoli before residents

A former councillor accused the Royal Borough of putting ‘Tivoli first rather than residents’ as discussions took place over a financial increase in the company’s grounds maintenance contract.

The contractor previously came under fire after complaints were made regarding the state of public grass areas, particularly cemeteries.

Since September 2021, work between the council and Tivoli has been ongoing to review the current contract and negotiate the cost of delivering the service.

Final negotiations show Tivoli will require an extra £200,000 for 2022/23 to deliver the contract at its current level, due to the increased costs of wages, inflation, fuel, materials, and equipment.

Former councillor Ed Wilson told a cabinet meeting on Thursday, September 29: “My view of this is that the Royal Borough is giving Tivoli another £200,000 for failing.

“For failing in cemeteries, failing on grass verges, for failing [at our] green spaces and yet this borough deems it fit to put Tivoli first rather than residents first.”

He added: “When we had the 40-degree heat, grass stopped growing, that certainly gave the contractors time to get in and do some work and things definitely, definitely did improve over the summer.

“I think everybody will acknowledge the great work that was done by the contractors during Her Majesty’s funeral.

“But I have to say, a lot of residents will be very bemused, some will be very confused why you are putting Tivoli first and residents second.”

Mr Wilson shared his suggestions about the maintenance of parks in the Royal Borough and encouraged the council to engage with charities to help with this matter.

Cllr David Coppinger, cabinet member for environmental services, parks & countryside and Maidenhead outlined a number of initiatives that council officers were following up on to offset the £200,000.

This included a joint project on mapping highway verges to make sure that they all had the ‘appropriate maintenance regimes’.

Cllr Coppinger told the meeting that it had been a ‘very difficult’ year due to issues with grounds maintenance and upkeep of cemeteries in the borough.

He added: “There is no doubt that Tivoli want to get it right and have shown us – not everywhere, not all the time – that they’ve got the capacity of doing it, but we’ve got a lot more to do to get it right.”