There were two AOB items introduced at the Cabinet meeting on the 29th March 2012. The first was about the future of the Pacific Road Arts Centre/Tramway/Museum and the second was on Compromise Contracts. As the reports aren’t on the Council’s website links are included below.
Pacific Road Arts Centre, Transport Museum and Tramway Birkenhead: Outcome of Tender Exercise
Page 1 of 9
Compromise Contracts
I attended a meeting (the first I could attend as only every third meeting was held in public) of the Wirral/LGA Improvement Board.
The first I heard about the “public meeting” of the Wirral/LGA Improvement Board was Monday evening at the Council Excellence Committee Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting.
If you check the calendar of public meetings for March on Wirral’s website, it’s not there.
As far as I know the notice board outside the Town Hall doesn’t list it either.
Even the agenda for this meeting, wasn’t published five working days before the meeting and the agenda as published on the Council website, which I finally found on the Council website after the meeting, had been published late (it’s supposed to be published five working days before the meeting) and only published the day before the meeting itself.
However on the agenda on the Council’s website (which is a copy of a fax), it’s very difficult to read the date, time and place of the meeting due to the coloured background. The one 4-page report to this public part of the meeting (Agenda Item 2), wasn’t published before the meeting and had exempt written all over it and “NOT FOR PUBLICATION”.
However, this is ironic considering the “NOT FOR PUBLICATION” bit as it was the already previously published notes of the meeting held on the 3rd February 2012 and notes of the meeting held on the 2nd March 2012 with two words added at the top “Progress Report”, and an extra one page, previously unpublished appendix 1 detailing “Wirral Improvement Priorities”. Sadly the Wirral Improvement Priorities weren’t published with the agenda before the meeting, but they are as follows (I’m basically typing up verbatim the original document below, although on the original the priorities are in a table). To be honest despite reading these a few times since returning from the meeting, actually understanding what the below truly means is eluding me. I understand the meaning of some but not all of it. Even the automatic proofreading flags up priorities 3 and 4.
WIRRAL IMPROVEMENT PRIORITIES
1. Corporate Plan
To put in place an agreed Corporate Plan that sets clear priorities reflecting a good understanding of citizens and customers views through consultation, participation and localism. Underpinned by rigorous performance management and performance appraisal arrangements.
2. Focus on critical service, areas safeguarding and developing the local economy.
Ensure that there is a clear organisational focus on critical service areas such as safeguarding (children and adults) and developing the local economy and ensuring that we improve the skills of local residents and stimulate the private sector to grow and create jobs.
3. Budget and financial stability
Clear longer term financial plan, linked to the Corporate plan, setting out how the Authority will respond to reducing levels of resources including the development and enhancement of the Strategic Change Programme and the development of a clear commissioning strategy for the Authority.
4. Corporate governance and decision making
Risk, whistleblowing, audit are strong. Agreed protocol on sharing information with Members. Clear Scheme of Delegation. Culture of openness rather than secrecy.
5. Leadership – political and managerial
Trust/respect between politicians and senior management. Strong strategic leadership and oversight of delivery. Development needs for Members and management identified and addressed. Strong corporate culture and cohesiveness.
Anyway the report on the meeting itself will form the basis of another blog post, well the three items the public were allowed to stay for.
Well apart from about seven minutes of exempt session, I was present during the whole of the Council Excellence meeting last night.
During those seven minutes (spent in the lobby), the Deputy Mayor of Wirral, Cllr Gerry Ellis arrived (the picture below isn’t from last night but a recent Area Forum that he chaired).
After the Deputy Mayor left to a Mayor’s dinner for Wirral Award recipients, Mike Collins of the Wirral Council’s Community Patrol arrived with a 13-year old youth in tow, who was there to apologise to the a member of the facilities staff because it was alleged he (that is the youth, rather than Mr. Collins or the Deputy Mayor) had thrown stones at cars in the car park.
Mike Collins, Community Patrol said to the youth, “I’m not going to do anything else today, if I come across you again, or the staff have a problem with you again, I’ll be knocking on your door and I’ll be knocking on the school’s door so I’ll speak to the headteacher as well if anything happens with you. Go on and tell your mates to do the same.”
Well today, myself and my election agent delivered my nomination papers to the Town Hall for the election of a councillor for the Bidston & St. James ward, with polling day held on 3rd May 2012. They were checked and found to be OK and my agent should get official notification through the post.
I’ll find out who the other candidates are at the end of the nomination period (I am assuming this election will be contested as it would be highly unlikely for it not to be), but I’m expecting there will be at least Labour candidate, a Conservative candidate and a Lib Dem candidate.
So thank you to the ten people who proposed, nominated and assented to my nomination. Oh and thanks to my election agent Leonora Brace too, who also proposed my nomination (which I accepted).
Certainly it was easier filling out the nomination papers this year as I didn’t have to get a Designated Nominating Officer’s signature or decide on emblem/description and local people seemed to be somewhat disillusioned with one (or more) of the mainstream political parties.
As it was a short meeting I’ve already uploaded it to Youtube. It’s in two parts, part 1 (the first twelve minutes) and part 2 (the last eight minutes), which are also below.
The agenda and reports can be found on Wirral Council’s website except at the time of writing this, the AOB item entitled “Proposed Change to Senior Management Position”. It’s four pages which I’ve scanned in, Page 1, Page 2, Page 3 and Page 4.
The result of these changes will be that:-
(a) David Armstrong is appointed Acting Deputy Chief Executive,
(b) Surjit Tour becomes Deputy Monitoring Officer and stops being Scrutiny Officer (Head of Legal and Member Services) and
(c) Shirley Hudspeth, Democratic Services Manager stops being Democratic Services Manager and becomes Scrutiny Officer (Head of Legal and Member Services).
The Committee agreed to recommend (a) and (c) to Council and noted (b).
Items 5 (Chief Executives Office) and 7 (Department of Regeneration, Housing and Planning: Senior Management Structure) were deferred to a future meeting.
As the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rt Hon George Osborne MP announced the 2012 Budget today, I thought I’d better write a blog post with the potted highlights, although obviously for more detail you can watch his long speech, check out what’s published on the Treasury’s website (and is the main source for what is below) or have a read through the extensive media coverage.
I’ll start with pensions.
Pensions
(a) as average lifespan increases the State Pension Age will go up and
(b) the State Pension will be reformed into a single tier pension for those not currently in receipt of a State Pension but not until the next Parliament (at least 2015).
The latter means such changes don’t affect those currently in receipt of a pension, or those receiving one before the changes come into effect.
Age Related Allowances change affecting those of pensionable age
These allowances affect income tax calculations for pensioners. This will be £10,500 and £10,600 for 2012-2013, with changes in future years from 2013 onwards.
A Pension Infrastructure Platform will be set up to allow pension funds to invest in UK infrastructure.
The Royal Mail Pension Plan is being transferred to the public sector, assuming the government gets approval.
There will be reform of public sector pensions and the age at which you can retire will be increased to bring it in line with increases in State Retirement Age. This and other reforms will have to be agreed with the public sector unions.
The deficit in the Royal Mail pension scheme will be addressed if the government gets State Aid approval. The government will (if they get approval) sell off the non-gilt assets of the pension scheme and take on board the liabilities.
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In the interests of transparency the author makes the following conflicts of interest clear:-
(a) his aunt is in receipt of a Royal Mail Pension Plan pension,
(b) both his parents are in receipt of a state pension,
(c) his parents both receive public sector pensions (from different pension schemes)
(d) both his aunt and uncle are in receipt of a state pension
(e) his uncle is in receipt of a public sector pension
and
(f) I’m related to another unspecified person in receipt of a state pension.
Well on the 19th March 2012, I attended the well-attended Licensing, Health & Safety & General Purposes Committee in Committee Room 1. There were the usual people there such as taxi drivers and union reps and a few new faces from Merseytravel, as well as the committee of councillors and officers.
The committee composed of the following councillors (Cllr Ian Lewis (Conservative) was absent):-
Labour (5)
Cllr Bill Davies (Chair)
Cllr Patricia Glasman
Cllr Chris Jones
Cllr Steve Niblock
Cllr Irene Williams
Conservative (3)
Cllr Sue Taylor (Conservative spokesperson)
Cllr Kate Wood
Cllr Tom Anderson
Liberal Democrats (1)
Cllr Bob Wilkins (Lib Dem spokesperson)
The following Wirral Council officers were there to support the committee:-
Committee clerk: Anne Beauchamp
Legal adviser: Mr. Ken Abraham
Others: Margaret O’Donnell, Mr. Robert Beresford + others I don’t know the name of
The meeting started late with the Chair apologising for the wait as they were waiting for their legal team in regards to item 3 (Proposed election fees 2012/2013). He apologised again for the wait and said they would skip item 3 until Surjit Tour arrived.
He started the meeting with item 1 and asked for any declarations of interest.
Cllr Sue Taylor (Conservative spokesperson) apologised for Cllr Ian Lewis who was not present.
No declarations of interest were made, so they moved to item 2, which was the minutes of the last meeting.
Cllr Steve Niblock objected to the list of people attending the last meeting as he had not been at the last meeting due to being at the Economy and Regeneration Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting which was also held on the 8th March.
He said he couldn’t be in two places at the same time, so he had sent Cllr Salter in his place as deputy. Therefore he asked for the minutes to be changed and his name replaced with Cllr Salter. The Chair said they would make sure it was changed. With the amendment to the minutes, the minutes (item 2) were agreed and the Committee skipped item 3 to item 4 (Hackney Carriage Vehicle Licences).
The Chair explained they would also skip item 4 and deal with it at the end.
At this point a councillor’s mobile phone started ringing and the Committee moved to item 5 sex establishment fees. Margaret O’Donnell introduced this report about the licensing of sex establishments and referred to various pieces of legislation including section 27 of the “Police and Crime Act 2009″, although she actually meant the Policing and Crime Act 2009. She asked the Committee to consider what fees should be charged by Wirral Council for receiving applications. She suggested £1,200 per an application based on an estimate of what costs would be incurred.
At this point 6.15pm Surjit Tour arrived fifteen minutes late and sat down.
Cllr Niblock asked if the £1,200 was just for a new one or the same for a renewal too?
Margaret replied that yes, she suggested £1,200 for both.
Item 5 was agreed that Wirral Council would charge £1,200 for new applications and £1,200 for renewals of sex establishment licences.
The Chair asked Surjit Tour to explain to the meeting his report,item 3 (proposed election fees for 2012/2013).
Surjit Tour asked the Chair if he wanted him to go ahead so they could agree the suggestions? The Chair agreed. Surjit Tour apologised for being late, he had thought the meeting started at 6.15pm, Ed – it was supposed to start at 6.00pm, he apologised again for his late arrival.
He explained that the election fees were proposed fees and were payments made to staff by the Returning Officer. There was no specific guidance or formula used as this was a local issue. The way it had previously been arrived at by the previous Chief Executive/Returning Office Steve Maddox was a yearly increase to take into account inflation. The increase for this year was therefore 3.9%, however it was calculated on the basis of individual wards. Neighbouring authorities fees were included in the report for comparison.
The Merseyside Electoral Administration team also discussed such matters at a meeting. However because of difficulties facing staff he proposed the following changes to those figures in the report.
(a) polling station inspector increased from £190 to £565.
(b) Deputy Returning Officer fee increased from a flat fee of £459.42 (per ward) to 50% of the Returning Officer’s fee (£5,127.98 * 50%) = £2,563.99 (per ward)
The Chair thanked him for the report. The committee agreed the recommendations and changes. He thanked Surjit Tour again.
Reading through a Wirral Council press release about solar energy grants, I noticed a link to the Energy Saving Trust website.
However Wirral Council have got the link wrong, instead of the link being to http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/ they put http://www.energysavingtrust.org (which incidentally is a totally different website owned by someone else).
Does anybody fact-check these press releases before publishing them? When will Wirral Council come into the 21st-century and actually learn about new-fangled things like writing a web address correctly, or even proofreading?
Hopefully I’ll embarrass them into correcting the mistake… mind you with some councillors and some officers similarly puzzled about these new-fangled concepts such as writing which has only been around for about 5,500 years I realise at Wirral Council they class technology as something they rely on their advisers to advise them about.
It reminds me of the time a councillor said they couldn’t print something because they couldn’t follow (or get in touch with) Wirral Council’s tech support?
So why not just ask another councillor, or your leader’s secretary, your research assistant or your office manager to do it then? Or is managing people somehow rocket-science to some councillors just looking for excuses for their own ineptitude or lack of skills?
If you have come to this page looking for details of a planning application for Target Road, Heswall please follow this link.
There have been two planning applications decided recently, and are both listed below. Both were approved.
Application No.: APP/12/00032
Application Type: Full Planning Permission
Decision Level: Delegated
Ward: Bidston and St James
Decision Date: 24/02/2012
Decision: Approve
Case Officer: Mr M Rushton
Applicant: Mr Gareth Walsh
Agent:
Location: 16 Hartnup Way, Prenton, Wirral, CH43 7ND
Proposal: Retrospective application for retention of alterations to the levels of the rear garden, including
dwarf retaining wall.
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Application No.: APP/12/00042 Application Type: Full Planning Permission
Decision Level: Delegated
Ward: Bidston and St James
Decision Date: 06/03/2012 Decision: Approve
Case Officer: Miss S McIlroy
Applicant:
Agent: Aedas Building Consultancy
Location: Our Lady and St Edwards RC Aided Primary School, PRICE STREET, BIRKENHEAD, CH41 8DU
Proposal: Single storey extension to rear of school to create new library, practical, storage and withdrawal
areas.
Well as promised in a previous post here’s a writeup of part of last Thursday’s Cabinet meeting, well at least some highlights.
Item 8 (Chief Executives Office) along with its its appendix have been deferred to a future meeting.
Cllr Jeff Green wanted to waive call-in on item 27 regarding St. Anselms College but was given legal advice by Surjit Tour that he couldn’t because the officers who have to agree to it to waive call-in weren’t present.
The nomination for Mayor and Deputy Mayor for 2012/2013 were as follows:-
Mayor: Cllr Gerry Ellis
Deputy Mayor: Cllr Dave Mitchell
Bill Norman (Director of Law, HR and Asset Management), Ian Coleman (Director of Finance) and Jim Wilkie (Chief Executive) were all absent from the Cabinet meeting.
Err, let’s see, Craig Manning has written about item 16 for the Wirral Globe which can be read online. Certainly Cllr Jeff Green wasn’t happy with the news, but Social Services has a reputation for overspending by £millions each year.
