Expense claim forms for Councillor Stuart Kelly (Wirral Council) 2013 to 2014

Expense claim forms for Councillor Stuart Kelly (Wirral Council) 2013 to 2014

Expense claim forms for Councillor Stuart Kelly (Wirral Council) 2013 to 2014

                                                       

Councillor Stuart Kelly is a Liberal Democrat councillor for Oxton ward. He is also their spokesperson on the Audit and Risk Management Committee (which at the time of writing) will be meeting tomorrow evening to sign off on Wirral Council’s accounts for 2013-14 (which include his own expenses claims) totalling hundreds of millions of pounds.

So, having received specialised audit training and being the spokesperson for audit on Wirral Council for his party do all his expense claims add up? No he claimed too much by £0.40p for travelling to a meeting in Birkenhead as 3 * 40p does not equal £1.60. How embarrassing for Councillor Stuart Kelly (but thankfully this risk of overpayments was noticed before it was paid)? However we all make mistakes.

On the plus side he is one of the few councillors that type their expenses claims, which as some councillors have handwriting that is very difficult to decipher helps a lot with comprehension. Councillor Stuart Kelly’s claim forms are below.

Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 1
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 1
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 2
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 2
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 3
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 3
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 4
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 4
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 5
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 5
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 6
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 6
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 7
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 7
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 8
Cllr Stuart Kelly expenses claim 2013 2014 page 8

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Have improvements to make Wirral Council’s decision making better got bogged down in bureaucracy?

Have improvements to make Wirral Council’s decision making better got bogged down in bureaucracy?

Have improvements to make Wirral Council’s decision making better got bogged down in bureaucracy?

                                     

The New Year is a time of looking back to the previous year and forward to the new one. So please cast your minds back to November 2013 and a meeting of the Improvement Board held in public.

Prior to this there had been a short ten-day consultation on the Improvement Board Review report.

As the Improvement Board Review report is sixty-three pages long I will quote the sections I am referring to here about changes to the Audit and Risk Management Committee (the committee referred to in the quote from section 95 is Wirral Council’s Audit and Risk Management Committee):

20. Action Taken


20.4 It is proposed to strengthen the independent nature of the Audit and Risk Management Committee through the appointment of a majority of external members.” (page 15)

“PRIORITY 2: CORPORATE AND DECISION MAKING

95. It is proposed to strengthen the independent nature of the Committee through the appointment of a majority of external members.” (page 34)

“Next Steps

112. Compliance with the constitution will be through more rigorous challenge from Audit and Risk Management Committee. It is proposed that would be enhanced, by (subject to Council agreement) appointing a majority of independent members of the committee.” (page 37)

“SUMMARY OF NEXT STEPS FOR WIRRAL

167. A key challenge is to ensure compliance to the revised procedures. Compliance with the constitution will be through more rigorous challenge from Audit and Risk Management Committee. It is proposed that would be enhanced by (subject to Council agreement) appointing a majority of independent members of the committee. The Leader of the Council has indicated that he will develop a proposal for consideration by Councillors alongside the review of the Constitution.” (page 49)

Prior to the Improvement Board public meeting on the 15th November there were special meetings of both the Coordinating Committee and the Audit and Risk Management Committee to discuss the Improvement Board Review report.

The Coordinating Committee agreed this:

That this Committee welcomes the Report. It clearly states that the Authority is moving in the right direction.

This Committee pledges to play its full part in continuing that direction of travel.

All Members will be encouraged to engage in the next steps identified within the report.

We must not be complacent as we still need to improve in many areas identified in the report and embed positive changes.

We thank all members of the Improvement Board for their help.

We thank all employees and Members for their efforts in this journey of improvement.

We would recommend the approach adopted by the Local Government Association, in piloting sector led improvement, and would recommend it to others who find themselves in difficulties.

and the Audit and Risk Management Committee (by eight votes to one agreed):

(1) That this Committee welcomes the report of the Improvement Board, which draws attention to the significant progress Wirral has made in the last 20 months.

It recognises that there are still issues which need to be addressed but believes it is clear that Wirral is now an outward looking Authority – open to constructive criticism and willing to address problems when they occur.

We would recommend the sector-led approach to change and development to other authorities who find themselves in difficulty.

(2) That the thanks of the Committee be accorded to the Improvement Board, all staff and Members who have participated in the change process. It now remains for Members to continue to participate in their own development and not become complacent but ensure that change becomes embedded for the future.

(3) That the recommendations contained within the Review report be endorsed and that, subject to clarification as to the ownership of the steps required to support continued improvement, all Members be encouraged to engage in the work required in those areas.

Here is a transcript of the answer given to my question on this issue at the Improvement Board meeting of the 15th November 2013 on the issue of changes to the Audit and Risk Management Committee:

In the review report it states “it is proposed to strengthen the independent nature of the Audit and Risk Management Committee through the appointment of a majority of external members”. How many independent members of the Audit and Risk Management Committee will be appointed, who will they be appointed by and will the Audit and Risk Management Committee be chaired in future by one of these independent members?

You can watch Graham Burgess’s and Cllr Phil Davies’ reply to this question by following this link to footage of the Improvement Board meeting.

Graham Burgess replied, “In terms of the request to strengthen the independent nature of the Audit & Risk Management Committee. First of all I think it’s going to be proposed by the Leader of the Council that for the new municipal year, after the elections in May, that there should be a majority of independent people on the Audit and Risk Management Committee.

There’s only one other Council in the country that’s adopted this approach and the Leader may wish to speak for himself on this matter but I think it is, it’s got to be recognised I hope, the willingness of this Council to open itself up to external scrutiny by I don’t know the numbers yet because that’s going to be discussed, it will be and Phil’s agreed that it should be referred to the Council’s scrutiny committee to discuss the best way to do it, the best way to recruit them, the exact numbers, but certainly I think it’s really brave of him, the fact that this Council and the other one Council to open themselves up in this way.

And the sort of people who might be ?????, and again there’ll be discussions with scrutiny and looking at elsewhere and taking advice from audit. I suspect there’ll be a number of people with a financial background to challenge that.

There’ll be a number of people who can represent key community organisations and can represent individual voices on the Wirral. So there’ll be a mixture I suspect of professional and lay people who can judge whether this Council is actually operating well in terms of its audit responsibilities.

I think that’s another demonstration of the openness that Phil and all parties I suspect want going forward and to be challenged. So in theory and in practice in fact, the councillors can be out voted by the independent members on that panel.

Might I also say that the Council does intend, again this is not finalised to retain the Chair of that panel as a councillor. The majority will be non councillors and that’s because it’s still a Council committee and in terms of organising things we need the availability of a councillor to do that, but I don’t want to be drawn about that.”

Cllr Phil Davies: “Just a sentence to say I think it will enable kind of an ongoing challenge to be built into monitoring, reviewing how we go forward in terms of all of the issues that have been looked at by the Improvement Board over the last eighteen months.

So I think it’s just another kind of check going forward that we’ve got an external voice or external voices, not part of the Council to really scrutinise what we’re doing on our performance going forward and I welcome that.”

So just to go back to a quote from the Improvement Board review report “The Leader of the Council has indicated that he will develop a proposal for consideration by Councillors alongside the review of the Constitution.” Well on Monday 6th January 2014 at a special meeting of the Standards and Constitutional Oversight Committee councillors (and the independent members of the Standards and Constitutional Oversight Committee) will discuss a review of Wirral Council’s constitution and a survey of councillors. The survey itself states “This feedback will inform a full review of the Constitution that will be undertaken in January 2014” asking for councillors to return the survey by the 7th January 2014 (the 7th January 2014 is stated on the survey, but the recommendation in the accompanying report states 24th January 2014).

Yet nowhere in the thirty-six proposed amendments to Wirral Council’s constitution is there even one that refers to appointing a majority of the Audit and Risk Committee as independent members. The Standards and Constitutional Oversight Committee is the Council committee that proposes and scrutinises changes to Wirral Council’s constitution. So why haven’t changes to Wirral Council’s Audit and Risk Management Committee appeared on the Standards and Constitutional Oversight Committee agenda for the meeting on the 6th January?

The Improvement Board will be returning in March 2014 to see the progress Wirral Council has made, so why the delay on this matter. Does it require the matter to be referred to the fifteen councillors on the Council’s Coordinating Committee to agree things like “the exact numbers” of independent members on the Audit and Risk Management Committee? If the intention is a majority of independent members that can outvote the councillors you merely have one more independent member than councillors and remove the casting vote of the Chair?

Where is the Leader’s “proposal for consideration by Councillors alongside the review of the Constitution” and why isn’t it included in the agenda of the Standards and Constitutional Oversight Committee’s meeting of the 6th January? Why delay implementation of this until after the elections in May? Surely if it’s a “demonstration of openness” this could (as was indicated in the Improvement Board review report) be included in part of the January constitutional review and these changes to the constitution agreed at the Council meeting in either February or March?

At least then when the Improvement Board returned to check on progress in March (although the independent members wouldn’t have been recruited yet) the constitutional change to the Audit and Risk Management Committee could be pointed to as evidence that Wirral Council has actually implemented one of the Improvement Board’s recommendations?

If a simple recommendation to have a majority of the Audit and Risk Management Committee made up of independent people has to go to a meeting of the Coordinating Committee to be agreed in principle (November 2013), the Audit and Risk Management Committee to agree its recommendations (November 2013), then the Coordinating Committee (again to agree the details), then the Standards and Constitutional Oversight Committee (to recommend the constitutional changes to Council), then full Council (to agree the constitutional changes), is it any wonder that the Anna Klonowski Associates report referred to the “bureaucratic machinations” of Wirral Council (which seem to still be alive and kicking) and that the Wirral public (as expressed at the public meeting of the Improvement Board in November) are sceptical that there is a political will to change Wirral Council in the direction of more openness in what most people would consider a reasonable timescale?

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Cllr Simon Mountney “There are major issues happening in this Council that are still being covered up”

Cllr Simon Mountney “There are major issues happening in this Council that are still being covered up”

Cllr Simon Mountney “There are major issues happening in this Council that are still being covered up”

                                   

Last Thursday as part of the consultation into the future of the Improvement Board, Wirral Council’s Audit and Risk Management Committee met. Whereas all councillors voted in favour of the motion on the report on Wirral Council’s response to critical reports 2010/2013, Cllr Simon Mountney voted against the earlier motion about the Improvement Board Review, this motion contained the phrase “it is clear that Wirral is now an outward looking Authority – open to constructive criticism and willing to address problems when they occur”.

I thought (for those who weren’t at the meeting) it would be interesting to report Cllr Simon Mountney’s comments here as from his comments it’s clear that not all Wirral councillors agree on the way forward. His comments start at 8:56 in the video below.

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Cllr Simon Mountney said, “OK, politically are we ready, perhaps we are today Chair, are we ready post the elections should things change this year or the year after, I’m not sure and I don’t think we’re politically savvy or grown up enough yet to ensure that if that and when that change comes that we are politically grown up enough to make sure that that is the case.

I think there are elements of the Council that perhaps don’t want that to change and whether we are politically grown up enough or savvy enough to make sure that that happens, I’ll reflect on the answer to that.

Strategically are we grown up enough? No, I don’t think we are. This report is historic but clearly it’s about things that have happened, all true. The first point here that says it was the Council that was perceived as having a silo culture and a lack of corporate and strategic thinking.

You know when the Chief Exec sits in front of us and says the last two budgets have been fire fighting budgets because we’ve got other things to think about that demonstrates to me that we haven’t been planning operations strategically, we’ve had too many other things to think about and all we’ve been doing is fire fighting.

So, yes moving forward, we might develop and grow, but historically this document doesn’t reflect what’s happened and I’ll pick one area, FOI requests.

The number of FOI requests that this Council receive, I believe gives a really good indication of how open and transparent and therefore you could use the argument, I would, as to whether good means a Council we are.

There are still major issues that I know of and I’m working very hard to get the evidence and as soon as I do I’ll bring it to you. There are major issues happening in this Council that are still being covered up and you know it’s wrong and I don’t understand why as a Council we persist with that type of attitude and ethos.

This Council is only ashamed of the ethos changes and the culture changes that as yet I see no evidence that that has changed. I’m aware of three or four incidents that should appear in this final second report but don’t and they don’t as yet, because they will, they don’t as yet because they’ve been covered up, they’ve been kept from me!

Now why that is I don’t know, but I will find out and I’ll let people know but based on that alone, this report doesn’t reflect the Council that I currently see.

Yes we are some way down the road, yes we are improving, yes there is improvement and yes there are policies in place and politicians in place that are making a difference but there is some and there is the ethos and culture that persists from where we came from and until that changes I’m afraid this report doesn’t quite reflect the Council that I see.”

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Never believe anything until it’s officially denied

Never believe anything until it’s officially denied

Never believe anything until it’s officially denied

                          

There is a phrase “Never believe anything until it’s officially denied” which seems to apply to the Wirral Council/LGA Improvement Board too although they seem to have rewritten it to “Never believe anything until you’re told you can’t even speak about it”.

I’m a member of the NUJ and subject to a Code of Conduct which includes in rule one an obligation on me (rule 1) that “At all times upholds and defends the principle of media freedom, the right of freedom of expression and the right of the public to be informed.”

So when I got a response like this (the email is copied below) in response to a question I submitted to the Improvement Board’s public question and answer session I wonder why someone doesn’t want the public to be informed on this matter and why? If there was nothing going on, surely the Wirral Council/LGA Improvement Board would welcome an opportunity to set the record straight? Have Wirral Council not heard of the Streisand effect?

An opposition councillor at last night’s Audit and Risk Management Committee was complaining that officers won’t answer his questions. If councillors can’t get answers and a question from the public is effectively censored from even being asked is it any wonder that some of the public don’t think things at Wirral Council have changed much along their much trumpeted journey to openness and transparency (accompanied by the phrase “move on” as “sweep it under the carpet” seems to have gone out of fashion)?

Below is the email and below that the question. It feels pointless to ask it at the meeting as I doubt I’ll get an answer, but it shows that the “bureaucratic machinations” referred to by Klonowski seem to still be alive and kicking.

from: CorpServ-Improvement
to: john.brace@gmail.com
date: 14 November 2013 17:16
subject: RE: questions for Wirral/LGA Improvement Board question and answer session on the 15th November 2013
mailed-by: wirral.gov.uk

Dear Mr. Brace

Thank you for your questions which I have shared with the Chair of the Improvement Board. I have been asked to advise you that Q8 refers to a member of staff and it would therefore be inappropriate for this to be discussed in a public forum.

The Chair kindly requests you do not refer to this question at the meeting.

Best Regards
Improvement Team

Q8 is The Strategic Director for Regeneration and the Environment Kevin Adderley has been mysteriously absent of late from recent public meetings at Wirral Council. Can a reason be given for this to quash (or confirm) the rumours circulating as to the reasons why?

P.S. I am reminded of an answer given by the Improvement Board to a question in July “The LGA Wirral Improvement Board meetings are not meetings of the Council at which public functions are being exercised.” Quite how you manage to have a public forum and a public meeting (or is to use a phrase trotted out by Wirral councillors when they are heckled not a public meeting but a meeting held in public?) without exercising a public function is probably one of those difficult questions there isn’t a good answer to.

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