A TOWN council has been accused of ignoring the issues which matter most to its residents.

Alan Eldret, chairman of Frinton Residents’ Association, fears problems including potholes and street lighting are rarely raised at meetings of Frinton and Walton Town Council.

Speaking at the council’s final meeting of the year, Mr Eldret called for these issues to be included as regular items on the agenda.

He also cited problems residents have with dog walkers and horses along Frinton seafront.

“The key responsibility of all councillors is to represent their communities and bring their views into the council’s decision-making process - to be advocates of and for their communities,” he said.

“That is in the council’s constitution.

“As a residents’ association, we believe this town council is not always ensuring this is done.”

He added: “We get many issues raised by our members that we take up on their behalf and we do not always get enough support from this council.”

But mayor Iris Johnson said the town council suffers from a lack of support from both Tendring Council and Essex County Council.

She said: “They work against us in the main.

“A lot of the things you’ve mentioned, with pavements and streets and lighting, that’s not for this council.

“We do put our concerns forward to either of those councils, but they don’t want to work with us, they don’t come back and support us in any way whatsoever.”

Walton councillor Delyth Miles said the town council could not absolve itself of blame, and accused her fellow councillors of failing to back a £90,000 project to improve Walton’s Millennium Square.

In 2017 Tendring Council approved plans to spend the cash on revamping the square, but 75 residents signed a petition objecting to the scheme.

The plans were later thrown out when the petition was accepted by the council’s cabinet.

“This council is not without blame, we too have sat and propagated, said things and played around,” said Mrs Miles.

“We lost £90,000 of Tendring Council money towards smartening up Millennium Square - that was purely down to the prevarication of this council.”

Kirby councillor Robert Bucke hit back, accusing Tendring Council leader Neil Stock of recommending the scheme be refused.

“Councillor Stock recommended to cabinet and they decided not to proceed with the scheme, in spite of representations that were made to proceed with it,” he said.