37 Labour councillors agree Wirral Council’s budget for next year & reject amendment to keep Lyndale School open
37 Labour councillors agree Wirral Council’s budget for next year & reject amendment to keep Lyndale School open
Councillor Phil Davies "I’m pleased that for a second successive year this Administration will freeze Wirral’s council tax" Budget Council 24th February 2015
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There was plenty of blame to go round at last night’s Council meeting, called to agree Wirral Council’s budget for 2015/16.
Labour’s Cllr Phil Davies blamed both the Conservatives and the Lib Dems. The Tory Leader Cllr Jeff Green chose instead to blame the Labour Administration on Wirral Council. The Lib Dems said that both Tories (on using money for welfare assistance for other purposes) and Labour (on streetlights not being fixed) were wrong, but did agree with Cllr Green’s plea for a U-turn on the closure of Lyndale School.
The sole Green Party councillor Cllr Pat Cleary blamed first the Conservatives referring to “untold misery” caused by housing benefit reforms and then the Labour Administration for accepting the Council Tax Freeze Grant which he called “simply a bribe”.
It then went on and on and on a lot more with backbench councillors trying to score political points. In the end Labour wouldn’t back down on closing Lyndale School and the votes were as follows:
Lib Dem Budget
Votes: 5 for, 56 against, 1 abstention LOST
Conservative amendment to Schools Budget to reverse Lyndale School closure decision
Votes: 24 for, 37 against, 1 abstention LOST
Conservative Budget
Votes: 18 votes for, 43 against, 1 abstention LOST
Labour budget
Votes: 37 votes for, 24 against, 1 abstention WON
The councillors went on to agree to Eric Robinson as Chief Executive, unusually by a card vote with 57 votes for, 4 against and 1 abstention.
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Wirral Council’s Cabinet agree to continue council tax freeze for 2015/16
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The budget item starts at 1m33s in the video above of the Cabinet meeting on the Budget on the 10th February 2015
Councillor Phil Davies (right) introduces Labour’s 2015/16 Budget for Wirral Council at the Cabinet meeting on 10th February 2015
Wirral Council’s Cabinet agree to continue council tax freeze for 2015/16
Last night’s Cabinet meeting included Labour’s fifteen page budget recommendation to Council on the 24th February so the items below are just some highlights. Although the Wirral Council element of Council Tax is being frozen at 2014/15 levels, the Council Tax for Wirral residents may still go up because of a rise in the amount for Merseyside Police.
Who decides what your Council Tax bill will be (on Wirral) for 2015/16?
Who decides what your Council Tax bill will be (on Wirral) for 2015/16?
As I write this blog, the Merseyside Police and Crime Panel is meeting in the Council Chamber in Huyton to decide on the police precept for council tax payers on Merseyside for 2015/16. The Police and Crime Commissioner for Merseyside Jane Kennedy has asked for a 1.95% increase (compared to the 2014/15 figure) for the police precept on Council Tax. This extra 1.95% raises just over £1 million more than last year. Continue reading “Who decides what your Council Tax bill will be (on Wirral) for 2015/16?”
Wirral Council’s Cabinet disagree with Lib Dem concerns over how the Lyndale School closure decision was made
Wirral Council’s Cabinet disagree with Lib Dem concerns over how the Lyndale School closure decision was made
Cllr Phil Gilchrist explains his concern about the Lyndale School closure decision at a public meeting of Wirral Council’s Cabinet 15th January 2015
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Cabinet – item 7 – Notice of Motion – The Corporate Plan’s Ideals in Practice
The mundanely titled motion The Corporate Plan’s Ideals in Practice was put forward for debate by two Lib Dem councillors at the Council meeting of the 8th December 2014. However no debate had happened then and it had instead been referred to Cabinet. The notice of motion was mostly about the closure of Lyndale School and how the decision had been made.
Cllr Gilchrist’s criticisms of how the decision had been made ranged from questions the parents had submitted in March 2014 which had not been answered, the way the consultation meetings had been chaired, how what was said at the consultation meetings had then been reported back to Cabinet, the imbalance between the financial resources of the Council compared to the financial resources of the parents to challenge the decision and the consultant’s report on the SEN Improvement Test (amongst other points he made).
Cllr Phil Davies responded that he had read that there might be a legal challenge so he asked Mr. Tour for advice. Surjit Tour said that they hadn’t received notification of a claim or a claim itself, but that a decision had been taken by Cabinet about the Lyndale School. He advised that councillors not to speculate in response to the specific points about the potential claim, bearing in mind that they were on notice that there may be a potential claim. Mr Tour asked them to stick to the Corporate Plan issues and engagement issues.
The Cabinet Member, Cllr Tony Smith thanked Mr Tour for his advice. He outlined the history of the decisions on Lyndale School, the consultation meetings and the visits councillors had made. The “significant amount of correspondence” on many issues about Lyndale School was also referred to by Cllr Smith, so was the consultant’s report and the equality impact assessment.
Cllr Phil Davies responded by saying “I do believe that we were faithful to our principles in listening to people. Phil can I just remind you that listening to what people say doesn’t always mean you have to agree with them?” He said he had read the report of the parents, visited Lyndale School, met with the parents and he repeated that he believed the Cabinet had listened but that they “came to a different conclusion than you did Phil but that doesn’t mean to say we didn’t listen.”
He said the decision was based on “sound evidence and thorough analysis” and that “we did understand what the community was saying to us”. Cllr Davies believed that they had been faithful to the principles in the Corporate Plan and that that was the Cabinet’s response.
Not unsurprisingly Cllr Gilchrist disagreed with whether the analysis had been thorough, he also pointed out that there had been issues about the creation of the funding formula and its application across various schools, but as the issue was “parked” he’d see what the outcome would be.
Cllr Phil Davies felt that they’d met the requirements, and whatever happened in the legal case they’d need to respond to that “in due course”. He thanked Cllr Phil Gilchrist for his attendance.
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Looking back to 2014 on this blog at the 3 most popular stories for each month
Looking back to 2014 on this blog at the 3 most popular stories for each month
Cabinet 17th December 2014 vote on Lyndale School L to R Shirley Hudsepth Surjit Tour Cllr Phil Davies Graham Burgess
The lists below are of the top three most viewed stories in each month in 2014. To be selected each story also had to be published in that particular month.
The year started with a look at why Martin Morton had called on Cllr Pat Williams, Cllr Moira McLaughlin and Cllr Denise Roberts to resign. I also published the accounts for Birkenhead Market Limited (who lease Birkenhead Market from Wirral Council) and a letter gagging Councillor Gilchrist.
After the Merseytram matter hit the buffers, Merseytravel was left with property that it didn’t want or need. The first story is about what happened when they tried to sell it off. The second story is the first about Lyndale School and how when the first Cabinet decision got called in, the call in committee had to ask Council to add extra people to it who’d been left off in a “constitutional oversight”. The third story was about the court battle between Wirral Council and Upton Park Pony Association. Upton Park Pony Association were given a year to leave Fernbank Farm (which is owned by Wirral Council).
Mark Latham from Wirral Street Pastors told councillors on Wirral Council’s Licensing Act 2003 Committee about his experiences of Birkenhead’s night life and alcohol (19th March 2014)
It may seem strange now, but in March the government were consulting on changes to the filming public meetings law. Some changes were made to the draft regulations and a right to live commentary during meetings was removed. Some new criminal offences were also added to the same legislation (but not to the section about filming). The “open and transparent” story was about the Chief Executive, in a 4 page letter, upholding an earlier decision at internal review to refuse a Freedom of Information Act request for the minutes of the Standards Working Group of the 17th December 2013. The last story was about the Wirral Street Pastors organisation and what Mark Latham had to say at a public meeting about Birkenhead’s night life.
113 candidates stood in the Wirral Council elections and only 23 of these were later elected. However if you’re interested who they were then there’s a list of names. The Liverpool City Region Combined Authority met for the first time on April 1st and chose Cllr Phil Davies as Chair. The third story is my rebuttal of a (mainly) false complaint made about me by a Lib Dem.
May had two elections in it. The first was where one councillor to Wirral Council was elected for each ward (except one that elected two due to a recent resignation in Greasby, Frankby and Irby). The second election was for 8 Members of the European Parliament for the North West region. The Lib Dems lost their only MEP in the region Chris Davies and ended up with no Members of the European Parliament in North-West England. Brian Kenny (Labour) lost his council seat in Birkenhead and Tranmere to Pat Cleary (Green Party). Ian Lewis (Conservative) lost his council seat to Treena Johnson (Labour) in Leasowe and Moreton East. Labour also gained in Pensby and Thingwall (the seat was held by an independent formerly a Lib Dem who wasn’t standing).
So the net result was that Labour increased its number of councillors from 37 to 38 (a majority of seats on Wirral Council is one party having 34 or more councillors). The Conservatives decreased their number of councillors from 22 to 21. The Lib Dems stayed on six and the Greens increased from no councillors to one.
In June I started publishing some of the court papers to do with the Fernbank Farm case including Wirral Council’s particulars of claim. During filming a public meeting of the Licensing Act 2003 Committee Cllr Steve Niblock insisted on me stopping so I moaned to Surjit Tour about it. The last story was warning about the effects on the health of the children at Lyndale School if the Lyndale School were to be closed.
July was all about golf because of the Open Golf Championship. First the email of Graham Burgess was claimed to be “fraudulent” by Surjit Tour (who referred to it as the “Open Gold Championship”). Then five minutes later Surjit Tour tried to recall the email. Then BBC Radio Merseyside had a caller asking about the story. Wirral Council’s press office then managed to tell BBC Radio Merseyside two contradictory versions of events over a short period of time. However don’t worry Cllr Walter Smith came on the radio and told everybody how in his day job as a tailor he had enjoyed “lavish hospitality” at the golf!
Treasury Building (Wirral Council), Hamilton Square, Birkenhead, 19th August 2014 (you can click on the photo for a more high-resolution version)
Phil Ward came in for criticism for the way he’d chaired the Lyndale School consultation meetings. As part of the 2013/14 audit I made public the £1,872 Wirral Council had spent on Robin Hopkins of 11KBW to make sure that they didn’t have to give out information to a Freedom of Information Act requester in response to ICO decision notice FS50474741.
Councillor Tony Smith (Cabinet Member for Children and Family Services) at the Special Cabinet Meeting of 4th September 2014 to discuss Lyndale School L to R Cllr Stuart Whittingham, Cllr Tony Smith (Cabinet Member for Children and Family Services), Cllr Bernie Mooney and Lyndzay Roberts
The mileage claim forms for councillors threw up some interesting visits, including one by Cllr Tony Smith to Lyndale School back in February 2013. Once again the Cabinet decided to go ahead to the next stage of consultation on closure of Lyndale School, Surjit Tour got sent another of my letters pointing out the flaws in the decision-making process. The decision was called in.
Marvin the Martian returned to discuss Lyndale and cuts to the SEN budget. The special Audit and Risk Management Committee meeting (twice adjourned from July 2014) finally met on 8th October 2014 to discuss the BIG/ISUS issues and hear from Nigel Hobro. Graham Burgess also gave in his three-month notice and announced his retirement from 31st December 2014.
Dan Stephens Chief Fire Officer, Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service at Greasby Methodist Church Hall, Greasby Road, Greasby on 10th November 2014 for consultation meeting on closure of Upton and West Kirby fire stations and merger at Greasby
A Merseytravel public meeting to discuss whistleblowing led to an interesting turn of phrase. The trade unions marched on Wallasey Town Hall, to have to first sit through a Cabinet meeting discussing how wonderful the Open Golf Championship had been. A consultation on a possible new fire station in Greasby village led to a packed public meeting in Greasby, with Dan Stephens (Chief Fire Officer) doing his best to answer questions from the public about Wirral Council’s involvement.
December’s stories start with the sad news that just before Christmas the Cabinet decided to close Lyndale School (from 31st August 2016). A member of the Wirral Schools Forum expressed concern at the scale of cuts to special educational needs and Wirral Council councillors decided on a long list for a Head of Specialist Services (the outgoing Head of Specialist Services leaves on 31st December 2014).
Cabinet 17th December 2014 vote on Lyndale School L to R Shirley Hudsepth Surjit Tour Cllr Phil Davies Graham Burgess
So that’s it for the 2014 round-up! See you in 2015!
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