Why did Labour’s Cllr Foulkes gag Green Party Cllr Cleary in devolution debate and what’s happening at the next Merseytravel Committee meeting?

Why did Labour’s Cllr Foulkes gag Green Party Cllr Cleary in devolution debate and what’s happening at the next Merseytravel Committee meeting?

Why did Labour’s Cllr Foulkes gag Green Party Cllr Cleary in devolution debate and what’s happening at the next Merseytravel Committee meeting?

                                                     

Councillor Steve Foulkes (Labour) (right) speaking at a recent meeting of the Birkenhead Constituency Committee (28th July 2016) while Councillor Pat Cleary (Green) (left) listens
Councillor Steve Foulkes (Labour) (right) speaking at a recent meeting of the Birkenhead Constituency Committee (28th July 2016) while Councillor Pat Cleary (Green) (left) listens

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Council (Wirral Council) 6th December 2016 Liverpool City Region Combined Authority Part 1 of 2

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Council (Wirral Council) 6th December 2016 Liverpool City Region Combined Authority Part 2 of 2

In a debate of Wirral Council councillors held yesterday evening to agree changes to the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, Labour’s Cllr Steve Foulkes used a procedural motion to gag the Green Party councillor Cllr Pat Cleary from speaking.

Despite an intervention by Cllr Stuart Kelly, pointing out that in Cllr Kelly’s opinion no such power exists in Wirral Council’s constitution, the gag remained.

Asked after the meeting for his views on what happened, Cllr Pat Cleary stated, “Thank you Labour for gagging me and sparking unprecedented interest in my views on devolution.” and he has blogged about what he would’ve said had he not been gagged here.

In other Liverpool City Region Combined Authority news, an Extraordinary meeting of LCRCA’s Merseytravel Committee is scheduled for the morning of the 16th December, followed by a meeting of the Combined Authority later that day. Cllr Steve Foulkes is one of Wirral’s four representatives on the Merseytravel Committee. The purposes of the next Merseytravel Committee meeting is to agree a contract for new rolling stock.

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Cllr Phil Davies stands down as Chair of the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority

Cllr Phil Davies stands down as Chair of the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority

                                                           

Councillor Phil Davies chairing a meeting of the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority earlier this year
Councillor Phil Davies chairing a meeting of the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority earlier this year

This morning the dramatic news that Cllr Phil Davies is stepping down as Chair of the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority was made public. In a statement Cllr Phil Davies said, "I felt now was the right moment to rebalance my time in favour of my duties as Wirral Council Leader."

Councillor Phil Davies (Leader of Wirral Council pictured above) has been Chair since the Combined Authority’s since the first meeting of the Combined Authority on April Fool’s Day in 2014. Those with long memories will remember that Mayor Joe Anderson (pictured below) expected to be elected Chair at that meeting and was unhappy at how Cllr Phil Davies was elected.

Mayor Anderson was elected Mayor of Liverpool in 2012 and is expected to be the Labour candidate in an election for a second term of office as Liverpool’s Mayor in 2016. As a result of the devolution deal announced last month, there will be a public election for the Mayor of Merseyside in May 2017. Mayor Anderson has announced his intention to seek the Labour nomination for Mayor of Merseyside and if he is elected Chair of the Combined Authority at Friday’s meeting this will help his chances.

Mayor Joe Anderson speaking at a meeting of Liverpool City Council (8th April 2015)
Mayor Joe Anderson speaking at a meeting of Liverpool City Council (8th April 2015)

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Is the whole price/prize point about Merseyside’s Mayor actually a load of rubbish?

Is the whole price/prize point about Merseyside’s Mayor actually a load of rubbish?

Is the whole price/prize point about Merseyside’s Mayor actually a load of rubbish?

                                                  

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Liverpool City Region Combined Authority Scrutiny Panel 28th October 2015 Part 1 of 2

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Liverpool City Region Combined Authority Scrutiny Panel 28th October 2015 Part 2 of 2

Ged Fitzgerald (Chief Executive, Liverpool City Council) tries to explain devolution to a meeting of the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority Scrutiny Panel 28th October 2015
Ged Fitzgerald (Chief Executive, Liverpool City Council) tries to explain devolution to a meeting of the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority Scrutiny Panel 28th October 2015

You can view what was said at a public meeting earlier this week on the subject of devolution for Merseyside above. It’s openly admitted however that the communications/engagement/public relations side of this has been pretty poor.

I will disagree with something that’s been said throughout this process since it doesn’t make sense (although from press reports Cllr Phil Davies has done a U-turn in favour of a Merseyside Mayor).

It’s been stated (in the video above by Ged Fitzgerald, Liverpool City Council Chief Executive and Mayor Joe Anderson before) and again and again that the price of devolution is a Merseyside Mayor. This whole process based on the Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill which is wending its way through parliament.

I realise legislation does get amended, but as it’s on its 8th parliamentary stage out of ten it’s going to be eventually (especially as it’s a government bill) mainly in the form it’s now in.

Here’s the section on an elected Mayor.

It modifies the Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009 to state:

107A 15 Power to provide for election of mayor

(1) The Secretary of State may by order provide for there to be a mayor for the area of a combined authority.
(2) An order under subsection (1) shall not be used as a condition for agreeing to the transfer of local authority or public authority functions.”

In other words what is repeatedly repeated (and perhaps why they’re so bad at communications) doesn’t make sense. The government can’t say we’ll give you this if you have an elected Mayor and the price/prize thing is a load of rubbish. The government can’t do that as the legislation that will underpin this (which has to come into force to trigger the next stage which would result in devolution) makes that unlawful.

With me so far?

The government knows this is going on and I’m sure that it doesn’t make them look favourably on Liverpool when these sorts of political shenanigans to make them look bad, are being played out amongst Merseyside’s more ambitious Labour politicians.

So why would this have got started?

My best educated guess (as trying to make sense about what’s going on with the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority with its poor public relations is like wading through treacle) is a certain Labour politician wants (again) to blame something unpopular in some quarters on a Tory government (even if it isn’t entirely true).

Add to this the ambition in some quarters to actually be Merseyside’s Mayor (because once it’s a done deal all they’ll need is the Labour nomination) gives a motive.

So that’s my opinion. The whole price/prize thing is a politician’s way of deflecting the blame knowing that generally the media won’t inquire too deeply and I think readers of this blog can make a jolly good guess as to who wants to be Merseyside’s Mayor.

Once again Labour are blaming something they want (a Merseyside Mayor) on the government, stating an untruth (that it’s a condition of the devolution deal which it’s not because the legislation would make that unlawful) and hoping everyone will believe it?

Well who do you believe? I’ve outlined above the consistent line that they’re trying to spoon feed the Merseyside public and the press whilst deflecting any attempt at scrutiny by politicians by openly refusing to state how the negotiations are going?

There will be an extraordinary public meeting of all Wirral Council councillors (as well as public meetings of councillors in the other areas of Merseyside and Halton) to discuss the devolution deal. Wirral’s will be held on the 19th November starting at 6.00pm in the Council Chamber at Wallasey Town Hall.

Isn’t it about time the public were told the truth?

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VIDEO: A round-up of local Wirral and Merseyside politics by John Brace (part 2)

VIDEO: A round-up of local Wirral and Merseyside politics by John Brace (part 2)

VIDEO: A round-up of local Wirral and Merseyside politics by John Brace (part 2)

 

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John Brace on local Wirral and Merseyside politics (part 2)

Part 2 of this video series is shorter than part 1.

As before, this transcript of the video will include relevant links. After I recorded the video I found another bundle of papers that make up the BAM Nuttall contract on the scanner. There are also pages Wirral Council didn’t give me because of commercial confidentiality reasons. However I think you get the point that it’s a long contract!


still from a Youtube video about politics part 2 thumbnail
still from a Youtube video about politics part 2 thumbnail

Hello, I’m John Brace and this is the second part of my videos about local politics on Merseyside and on the Wirral.

One thing I’ll be talking about today is the Bam Nuttall contract. You may not have heard of Bam Nuttall, but they replaced Colas. If I went into the whole Colas saga and the senior officers that were suspended and paid oodles of money because Wirral Council didn’t quite get it right, well I’d probably use up all the tape on this camera.

But anyway going back to Bam Nuttall, in must have been 2014, Wirral Council signed up to a contract with them and the contract called, let’s see the Highway Services Contract. So for instance stuff to do with road works. Anything I think over a certain amount to do with traffic lights is someone else’s responsibility but I’ve scanned in the first bit of the contract which is here, see that’s the bit I’ve scanned in, but it’s an absolutely massive contract.

This is the next bit, bit not the rest of it! Then there’s this. That makes up the contract.

I have asked Wirral Council not to give me things on paper and to save the planet, not cut down so many trees and give them to me on a CD, but Wirral Council always seem to prefer paper.

Anyway the other thing I’ll be writing about in the near future is, this is some of the invoices I got during the audit for various things. For instance, this one is an invoice for £7,389.50 for the Moscow Ballet doing Giselle at the Floral Pavilion.

Moscow Ballet invoice Wirral Council Floral Pavilion 2014 £7389 50 thumbnail
Moscow Ballet invoice Wirral Council Floral Pavilion 2014 £7389 50 thumbnail

Now you may well say well what’s the point in getting an invoice for that? Well, the taxpayer actually subsidises the Floral Pavilion to a large amount of money.

So whereas for example Wirral Council sees closing down Lyndale School as a priority because they say they don’t have the money, they do have the money to be subsidising the tickets of rich people going to see the ballet at the Floral Pavilion. OK, I could look up the amount later.

The other thing I was going to talk about is Liverpool City Region Combined Authority. Now of course this was only set up in the recent past and has mired itself in all kinds of controversy over the devolution deal, price, prize, all that and elected Member stuff.

Anyway, what I did notice and this came as news to me, even though I report on the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority is that Knowsley Council has set up a website for the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority and they’re currently running a consultation on the things that make up the devolution deal.

Now, firstly before the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority was set up politicians quite categorically said, I’m not going to name the politician here but I’m sure people can find this out, I’ll probably find this out when I write this up on my blog.

They said the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority won’t cost any more money than the existing arrangements. Now registering a website, having a website hosted, dealing with all the stuff to do with a website does cost money! OK, the politicians will probably turn round and say, well this is from existing budgets or something, but it costs money that can’t be spent on something else.

So anyway, when I write this up on the blog, in the transcript I’ll include a link because to be honest it was news to me, it hasn’t been in a report that was submitted to the Combined Authority and as far as I’m concerned the only mention online about it is from Knowsley, whereas the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority is all the councils on Merseyside plus I think Halton and really speaking you shouldn’t just consult with the people of Knowsley, you should be consulting everybody.

So that’s a few things that I’ll be doing, let’s see today’s weather is cold, hence the jumper. When I was looking into market research as to what people want from a blog, one of the things that came up was weather forecasts. Now you’ll be glad to know that unless there’s a big demand I’m not going to start up with a map behind me and little symbols of clouds and sunshine, wind and all that because I really don’t fancy being a weather forecaster probably because people would love turning round and saying, “Well you said it would be sunny today John and now it’s raining!”.

But anyway if you really do want weather forecasts, there’s the Met Office website for that.

So that’s a summary of where I’m up to, this week there are hardly any public meetings because of the half term holidays and of course there’s Halloween at the weekend. One of the things that’s coming up of course is Bonfire Night and the Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service, ok I’m sure people are probably sick of me talking about Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service.

Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service are running, in I think conjunction with Wirral Council, trying to clear up the, say for instance the bits of wood and stuff like that people put together for bonfires because Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service probably really don’t want to be going round putting out a lot of small fires on Bonfire Night.

I mean they’re not being killjoys or anything, there are Council organised fireworks displays and things like that so people can go along. I’m sure there’ll be one in Birkenhead Park this year, people can make the usual jokes about taxpayer’s money going up in smoke, that kind of thing.

But anyway, that’s what I’ll be doing today, I’ve decided to keep it short because typing up these transcripts takes a while, but if there’s anything you want to leave a comment on or you think I should write about then please get in touch.

OK, thanks for listening.

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What did Cllr Phil Davies’ PR adviser have to say about the LCRCA devolution campaign?

What did Cllr Phil Davies’ PR adviser have to say about the LCRCA devolution campaign?

What did Cllr Phil Davies’ PR adviser have to say about the LCRCA devolution campaign?

                                                              

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Liverpool City Region Combined Authority meeting of the 21st September 2015 Part 1 of 2 (devolution and Transport for the North)

Ben O'Brien of Kenyon Fraser Ltd (a PR company) speaking at the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority meeting on the 21st September 2015
Ben O’Brien of Kenyon Fraser Ltd (a PR company) speaking at the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority meeting on the 21st September 2015

Declaration of Interest – the author wishes to declare an interest in that Google (named in the piece below) has an existing contract with the author for advertising revenue from Youtube videos.

Unusually a Chief Executive of a local PR company called Kenyon Fraser Limited spoke at the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority meeting on its agenda item on devolution. Below is the exchange between Cllr Phil Davies and Ben O’Brien of Kenyon Fraser, then I go into more detail about the existing contracts that this PR company Kenyon Fraser has with Merseytravel/Liverpool City Region Combined Authority.

The Chair Cllr Phil Davies said at the end of a presentation by Ged Fitzgerald (Chief Executive, Liverpool City Council) on devolution, "With the Combined Authority being advised by Kenyon Fraser [Ltd] on this. Ben O’Brien from Kenyon Fraser has come here today, so just with your permission, I’d just like to give Ben a couple of minutes to talk about plans around public engagement, stakeholder involvement etc so Ben, do you want to just say a few words about that please? Thank you."

Ben O’Brien from PR company Kenyon Fraser said, "Chair, very briefly, as has been outlined in the presentation I think things are developing quickly and our role is to take that forward Chair.

I’m Chief Executive of Kenyon Fraser, my name’s Ben O’Brien, we’re a Liverpool based communications consultancy.

We’re very pleased to have been appointed to support taking the work forward and we’re linking in with colleagues in Knowsley in the Secretariat role in order to facilitate that.

And really given the timescales and the tasks in hand to provide additional resources to be able to do that work to a high standard in the timescales that are required of us.

So in short our role is to produce communications resources to support that better engagement with the public, with key stakeholder groups including the business community and other stakeholder groups relevant to the key policy proposal areas that are being taken forward at this time and in advance of the CSR [Comprehensive Spending Review] in the first instance.

So we’re here to provide additional resources, we’re pulling together our plans to support doing that at a city region level and at a borough level, as we’ll be required by the work that officers are undertaking at this stage and we want to take that work forward from here on in as it takes shape.

So thank you for inviting us along to introduce ourselves in the first instance."

Kenyon Fraser have a number of contracts with Merseytravel.

The first called the "Agreement for Consultancy Services relating to High Speed Rail for Liverpool Campaign development and delivery" is a contract dated 16th September 2014 for £99,500 for the work detailed below (prices have been blacked out by Merseytravel as apparently they are "commercially sensitive") .

Merseytravel Kenyon Fraser Limited contract Agreement for Consultancy Services relating to High Speed Rail for Liverpool Campaign development and delivery schedule of rates thumbnail
Merseytravel Kenyon Fraser Limited contract Agreement for Consultancy Services relating to High Speed Rail for Liverpool Campaign development and delivery schedule of rates thumbnail

For those wondering what the taxpayer got for £99,500 (or find it hard to read the image above) that was the work of the Chief Executive, a named Account Director (name was removed by Merseytravel), Account Managers/Designers/Web Designers/PRs and similar & engagement staff. The services of these people are charged on an undisclosed daily rate.

The Cost Summary Schedule detailed work in the following areas:

  • Campaign Strategy and planning, political engagement up to launch
  • Design and build website inc one year hosting
  • PR & Media Relations inc pre launch activity, copy, video, photography, staff attendance
  • Branding and core materials – design and production
  • Public launch, engagement activity to 12th August
  • Ongoing PR and media relations activity including Liverpool Echo partnership, copy, photography, social media
  • Political engagement activity including copy, packs, events, liaison
  • Events programme – business, opinion former and stakeholder engagement, all supporting activity
  • Public engagement activity across all Local Authority areas post launch period, petition support, public events

Total £99,500 of public money spent on a campaign, which hasn’t resulted in persuading the government to extend HS2 to Liverpool.

There is also an “Agreement for Communication Support” that Kenyon Fraser Limited have (or had) with the Merseyside Passenger Transport Executive dated 12th December 2013. The brief for that one is simple and is:

  • To provide media support as and when required pending recruitment to the vacant posts within the Corporate Communications Team
  • To roll out support for the Stakeholder Engagement Plan
  • To provide specialist development and training support

Oh but there’s more than that! This company also has the "Framework Agreement for Consultancy Services for the Design of Travel Marketing Literature Commencing 1 January 2014 until 31 December 2015". This one is for bus posters, Google PPC advertising, Facebook advertising, other online activities, as well as quarter pages ads in the Liverpool Daily Post (although as this paper ceased publication in December 2013 I’m curious about why it’s in the contract), Southport & Formby Champion, Bootle, Crosby & Maghull Champion and Wirral Globe, advertising on the back of buses, bus stop advertising, employee engagement and PR activity such as "Mersey Summer Time", web page work, leaflets, in-car air fresheners, Meal for 2 incentives, engagement and PR activity.

It looks like this contract was extended in 2014 to 2017 and renamed "Consultancy Services Agreement for the Provision of Design Services for Travel Marketing Literature October 2013 to September 2017".

However there’s more, Kenyon Fraser Limited have a 35 page contract dated 20th May this year called the "Merseytravel Consultancy Services Framework Agreement 2015-2019 For Consultancy Services (Various Lots)" which is for PR, campaign & engagement.

I could start publishing Kenyon Fraser invoices to Merseytravel, but this is already starting to sound more like an advert for them than a serious piece of journalism. You can find one of the Kenyon Fraser invoices for £29,160 in this earlier story headlined Why did Merseytravel spend £2,775 on a “Parliamentary Reception”?

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