Today is a very interesting day for me as it is my first day of not being a councillor and more importantly not being the leader of the county council. The sense of laying down a heavy load is very energising with the expectation of new challenges and opportunities ahead.

Perhaps even a glorious summer of cricket, tennis and gardening. Some chance looking at the weather. I am playing cricket for the county over 50 side this afternoon but the skies look grey.

Since the elections I have deliberately kept a low profile to allow all the new councillors to take up the slack without any interference from me. In my experience their is nothing worse than someone hanging around when you know they are going. I wish them all the best. In particular I wish Martin Curtis the very best of luck in his difficult task of running a minority executive.

I have changed my twitter name from cllrnickclarke to nickclarkecambs for obvious reasons but if I have sorted the technology out correctly current followers will remain attached.

My daughter was thrilled to bits with me not getting elected as it means we can go into business together. Brainstorming sessions abound. Loads of energy and ideas. A chip off the old block.

Politics has been a real break but I’m now looking forward to seeing what business opportunities or non exec positions might exist.

I fell into politics four years ago and have now fallen out. During that time I have tried to give 110 % effort and focussed on getting stuff done rather than the internal processes of political life. This approach was well received by the business community and by the general public but not so well by opposition politicians.

Clearly living 12 miles from my division was an issue that I recognised might trip me up and clearly it did. John Williams, the successful candidate, included a map of where I live on his leaflets just in case someone might not know 🙂

I fear that yesterdays council meeting signalled a big shift in attitude from getting things done for the people of Cambridgeshire to focussing in on councillors and how they wield power.

No one should be surprised by this as the minority parties smell blood. But it is a shame that a protest vote about immigration, which is a national issue, should derail an energetic and enthusiastic council that was gaining a national reputation for getting things done.

But as they say, thats democracy.