One of the most constant theological questions – and the one hardest to answer – is why do bad things happen to good people? 

The Bible is full of responses to this issue – think of Job and his less than thoughtful and useful mates. 

But in the case of Hadleigh, many of us are pondering a different but related matter: why is a good town represented by such a bad councillor? 

What has a community of roughly 10,000 souls with a vibrant civil society and one which opens its hearts, homes and purses to support those in need, whether homegrown or from far-flung parts of the world such as Ukraine, done to deserve Queenie Dawson as one of its Babergh representatives? 

Bad thing happening to good town

Now I suppose the obvious answer is: we – or a small percentage of this 'we' – voted for her. It's certainly true that in the May 2019 elections, Queenie beat off three other rivals. 

Yet her 236 votes paled into comparison to the 420 who voted against her 

Or indeed the nearly 1400 who could have voted, but decided to stay in and do their hair that day. Or who let the dog munch on their postal vote papers. 

In short, Queenie won the privilege to speak on behalf of the town having accrued the mighty mandate of 11.4% of the then electorate. 

But fair dos to her Hadleigh Maj: she won under the rules. It's what she's done since and how she's gone about it that has limbo lowered the political debate. 

Essentially Queenie's tenure over the last few years has been marked by inaccurate reports to Hadleigh Town Council, making up stuff about her erstwhile leader Generalissimo John Ward, bagging the kudos for initiatives she had little or nothing to do with (her 'public realm') and managing to split the Conservative group with Generalissimo and a few of his loyal Falangists joining the present Rainbow coalition. In the last example, m'lud, she found herself out on her tod and stripped of her cabinet responsibilities hence allowing plans to charge for short-term car parking to be resurrected. 

Queenie has previous form. This combination of political self-destruction and a fast and loose relationship with procedures and openness is all too evident in Queenie's backstory. 

She achieved the nearly impossible by losing to a Liberal Democrat when she contested Bath in 2005. And Queenie would have been removed from her role as a magistrate according to a disciplinary panel for using her position for personal advantage – had she not resigned before the judgement was issued. 

Now it appears that Queenie was the cause of August's Babergh planning committee having to be halted. Turns out it was – surprise, no actually not a surprise - she who had passed around a document not on the agenda on the issue being debated to other councillors. This is a big procedural no-no – a basic gaffe - not least as the committee operates within a quasi-legal environment. 

Queenie has been suspended from the committee as a result and will have to do time, er, sorry some training. Very embarrassing (it could have been financially costly) for Babergh and Hadleigh. 

Observers are genuinely split as to the reasons behind the Queenie modus operandi. Some speculate this is all a deliberate effort to push the boundaries as to what is and is not acceptable in local politics. 

Others are suggesting that Queenie, even in a time of prospective power cuts, isn't the brightest bulb and might be so out of her depths as to be officially 'off-grid'. 

But the real loser is Hadleigh. After the remote style of representational democracy pioneered from afar by Chernobyl Riley, the town desperately needed a serious political voice. 

Instead, we landed ourselves with Queenie. 

Now, I'm a sixteenth century soul at heart and have little time for contemporary party politics. But if the local Conservative Association doesn't persuade Queenie that now is the opportunity to spend more time with her ego and withdraw, I think others may act. 

I'm already hearing rumours that the non-Tory parties in the town might be looking to stand down and back a single unity Independent candidate to apply the guillotine to Queenie's ambitions, as well as those of Bolter Ferguson, back in the public eye from backing down in the face of Father Derek's pre-legal action in response to his very silly and untruthful accusations. 

Surely now is the time for Hadleigh to say out with the bad and in with, if not the good, then the slightly less-than-bad? 

*Dawson confirmed by Babergh as councillor removed from sitting on planning committee Full story here.