What’s happening in the week ahead in local government (30/11/15 to 4/12/15)? (Wirral Council, Merseytravel, Merseyside Police and Crime Panel, House of Commons and House of Lords)

What’s happening in the week ahead in local government (30/11/15 to 4/12/15)? (Wirral Council, Merseytravel, Merseyside Police and Crime Panel, House of Commons and House of Lords) I thought it would be a good idea to restart a regular feature I used to do on this blog which was looking to the week ahead … Continue reading “What’s happening in the week ahead in local government (30/11/15 to 4/12/15)? (Wirral Council, Merseytravel, Merseyside Police and Crime Panel, House of Commons and House of Lords)”

What’s happening in the week ahead in local government (30/11/15 to 4/12/15)? (Wirral Council, Merseytravel, Merseyside Police and Crime Panel, House of Commons and House of Lords)

Cllr Chris Blakeley addressing Wirral Council Regeneration and Environment committee about a new fire station in Saughall Massie September 2015. A decision in September 2015 was deferred by councillors but will be decided this week.

I thought it would be a good idea to restart a regular feature I used to do on this blog which was looking to the week ahead with a brief summary of what’s happening.

Wirral Council’s Families and Wellbeing Committee meets tomorrow (Tuesday 1st December) at 6.00pm at Wallasey Town Hall. There are no motions on the agenda but councillors will discuss the all age disability strategy and the day services local authority company called Wirral Evolutions.

Wednesday evening sees the high-profile issue of a fire station at Saughall Massie return for a debate by the Regeneration and Environment Committee. Also to be debated is a motion on Wirral’s nuclear industries. The changes to how Wirral Council will deal with objections to traffic regulation orders (already agreed by the Standards and Constitutional Oversight Committee will also be discussed. This public meeting also starts at 6.00p.m.

On Thursday you are literally spoilt for choice for public meetings and if I wished I could probably spend all day filming them!

The Merseyside Police and Crime Panel meets starting at 10.00am in the Council Chamber in Huyton. On the agenda are updates on serious and organised crime, the appropriate adult scheme, sustaining excellence, a home office pilot for mental health nurses to be colocated in custody suites, a night-time levy consultation (the consultation has already finished but just applies to Liverpool and 70% of the levy on licenced premises will go the police for policing Liverpool’s night-time economy), proposals for future Chief Constable recruitment and other routine items.

The Merseytravel Committee of the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority meets starting at 2.00pm in the Authority Chamber, 1st floor, No. 1 Mann Island, Liverpool, L3 1BP.

Other than minutes and the co-option of Cllr Joan Lilly (who replaces the late Cllr Sharp), councillors will hear an update on smart ticketing, discuss the Merseytravel Fees and Charges Review for 2016/17 and a report on delivering an improved bus "offer".

Then in the evening at Wallasey Town Hall starting at 6.00pm Wirral Council’s Transformation and Resources Policy and Performance Committee meets. Councillors will debate a motion on freedom of information requests proposed by the Lib Dems (I should declare an interest here as it relates in part to Information Commissioner’s Office decision notices that relate to my requests), security of access to Council issued devices and a report on the Council’s social media policy and its appendix.

On that last report I should also declare an interest as their current social media policy by my initial reading of the policy/report to councillors seemed to state that Wirral Council employees (unless they can prove some business need such as the press office) were prevented from accessing this blog, the associated Facebook Group, Twitter account and as mentioned in the report itself also video of public meetings of Wirral Council on Youtube. However a reader has left a helpful comment stating that this blog isn’t blocked which is useful information I am interested to know.

I’d better declare a financial interest as Youtube pays me a very small amount in royalties from videos I’ve filmed (and by small I mean £1.10p for October 2015). In fact Wirral Council blocks employees from watching its own Youtube channel.

If the new policy goes ahead, Wirral Council employees will be allowed to read this blog (after writing this a reader left a comment to say they already can despite this blog falling into the social media category) and the above sites that fall into the social media category in their breaks.

However ~~Big Brother~~, sorry Wirral Council will be watching what they get up to, so who knows what red flags you’ll raise if you read this blog or Wirral Leaks or well something really subversive like Wirral Council’s Youtube channel!

So that’s the round up for the week, I used to also provide a quick overview of what’s happening this week local government wise in two more open and transparent public bodies the House of Commons/House of Lords which you can watch online.

This afternoon starting at 4.00pm the Communities and Local Government Select Committee will discuss the Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill. The Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill has implications for Merseyside over an elected Mayor in 2017 and the devolution changes that have already received a lot of press coverage. As I’ve seen at least one local government officer here in Merseyside refuse to answer politicians’ questions about the government’s side of what’s happening, this looks like an interesting opportunity to hear about what’s happening from another perspective.

Tomorrow starting at 9.25am, the Public Bill Committee will discuss the Housing and Planning Bill. At the same time (starting at 9.30am) the Education Select Committee will discuss Holocaust Education and in the afternoon starting at 3.00pm the Treasury Select Committee will ask questions of the Chancellor on the Comprehensive Spending Review (which is only partly related to local government). In the House of Lords a Select Committee will be discussing the built environment starting at 10 am.

On Wednesday morning starting at 8.55am the Second Delegated Legislation Committee will discuss the Draft Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (Codes of Practice) (Revision of Code E) Order 2015. For those not familiar with police procedure Code E relates to the audio recording of interviews with suspects. Starting at 9.30am the Work and Pensions Select Committee will discuss the local welfare safety net, also at 9.30am the Education Select Committee will discuss regional school commissioners, the Treasury Select Committee will continue debating the Comprehensive Spending Review starting at 2.15pm and the Public Accounts Committee will discuss reform of the rail franchising programme.

Thursday sees more discussion of the Housing and Planning Bill by the Public Bill Committee in two sessions starting at 11.30am and 2.00pm. The House of Lords Select Committee will continue to discuss the built environment and hear from a former Chief Executive of the Planning Inspectorate.

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Why did Wirral Council pay £700.43 for a private company to check when a fire alarm went off at Irby Library?

Wirral Council invoice Dante Irby Library £700.43 thumbnail

Wirral Council invoice Dante Wallasey Town Hall £671.33 thumbnail

Above are a couple of invoices from Dante Group to Wirral Council. Of course on the Dante theme, Wirral Council has its own version of the nine circles of hell in Dante’s Inferno.

Limbo is the circle that whistleblowers are sent to, lust has already been covered by the more tabloid leaning Wirral Leaks, gluttony (some politicians have fallen into this trap and it’s a shame unlike the House of Commons they don’t have to get up and stretch their legs when voting), greed is too massive a topic to go into in detail, anger (again too many examples of politicians losing their temper), heresy seems to be the circle of hell politicians fall into when somebody disagrees with them, thankfully Wirral Council is not in control of the Armed Forces so violence is rare, but allegations of fraud (which whistleblowers repeat until they’re blue in the face) still ring in the ears of those who have given up listening and of course the ninth circle of hell is one that’s wrapped up in the tapestry of Wirral’s politics treachery.

However back to the invoices (the thumbnails above link to more readable versions), the first is for one of the two most sensitive issues in Wirral’s politics that begin with l which is libraries (the other being Lyndale).

I explained to a colleague (not hard to work out who) that this invoice was for being called out to Irby Library because a fire alarm was beeping and asked her to guess how much is was for. As readers of this blog may already know Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service since 2012 don’t attend non domestic premises when an Automatic Fire Alarm goes off.

So on the 28th July 2014, Wirral Council asked Dante Group to attend Irby Library. According to something scribbled on the invoice it states "mess left (something undecipherable) by library staff Sat 26".

The public are being told that public sector bodies have no choice but to outsource to the private sector because it’s cheaper. Wirral has what used to be called the Community Patrol (before enforcement of littering got outsourced to Kingdom Security earlier this year and I think what’s left is now called the Corporate and Community Safety Team). Part of the role of the Community Patrol was to keep an eye on Wirral Council’s buildings and land.

If it was still dealt with in-house and if the Community Patrol took the long way round to Irby library, spent the whole day there and sent a team of three to investigate (along with meal expenses) I’m sure the costs wouldn’t never be as high as £700.43.

However that’s what Dante charged Wirral Council for the call out.

The other invoice for £671.33 is for fitting 1 x 8W emergency lighting tube and 4 emergency light fittings at Wallasey Town Hall and 4 12 volt batteries. Surprisingly (despite the parts) the invoice comes to £671.33 (less than the call out to Irby Library).

So if Wirral Council are paying out £700.43 each time the fire alarm goes off in a library, can they really honestly say the reason they have reduced library hours (which no doubt has led to more expensive invoices as it’s increased the hours each week libraries are closed) is because of lack of money?

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Does Wirral Council believe that the will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government?

Wirral Council Cabinet meeting at Birkenhead Town Hall Thursday 12th March 2015 Left to right Surjit Tour, Cllr Phil Davies and Joe Blott — Wirral Council Cabinet meeting at Birkenhead Town Hall Thursday 12th March 2015 Left to right Surjit Tour (Monitoring Officer), Cllr Phil Davies (Leader of the Council) and Joe Blott (Strategic Director (Transformation and Resources))

I was planning on writing today about the implications of the Comprehensive Spending Review (however that’s something that would really benefit from a very in-depth piece), but Wirral Council have published an interesting document about Cabinet meeting report protocol.

That probably sounds rather boring, but it shows the informal arrangements that everyone knew existed behind the scenes before reports were published are being put on a more formal footing.

Although much of it is probably the rather dry nuts and bolts and let’s face it there will still be people submitting reports late and chairs not following procedures with regards to late reports, it does seem an attempt at least to make what the press and public end up reading at least not full of obvious errors (and I’m not talking about spelling mistakes).

The report does state what I knew already, that the SLT (Senior Leadership Team or senior managers at Wirral Council) see reports before they’re published and have a chance to suggest edits.

Even before each public Cabinet meeting happens, Cllr Phil Davies has a meeting of his Cabinet (called a briefing) which the officers are expected to attend (usually in what’s called the Cabinet Briefing Room behind locked doors at Wallasey Town Hall) where he goes through the entire agenda and matters are discussed in private.

Interestingly, this report shows that the Cabinet briefing is used as a filter and the Cabinet briefing can be used to change the reports that are later published. I presume this practice of writing reports by committee leads to some bits being watered down.

There are also four compulsory steps a report has to go through before the press or public see it. It seems reports have to be run by legal (which makes me laugh considering some of the legal howlers I’ve pointed out on this blog over the years), human resources (which is understandable as many of the decisions are going to have HR implications), finance (again understandable) and the Head of Service (which has been standard practice for years anyway). As there are vacant heads of service posts, in that situation the relevant strategic director signs it off.

However there is one very important group of people this all leaves out, the public. Anyone involved with politics will of course comment and say that the last group of people involved in political decisions are the public.

This is what Wirral Council’s constitution states about decision-making:

13.2 Principles of decision-making
All decisions of the Council will be made in accordance with the following principles:

(i) proportionality (i.e. the action must be proportionate to the desired outcome);
(ii) due consultation and the consideration of professional advice from officers;
(iii) respect for human rights;
(iv) a presumption in favour of openness;
(v) clarity of aims and desired outcomes; and
(vi) Wednesbury* reasonableness (i.e. the decision must not be so unreasonable that no reasonable Council could have reached it, having taken into account all relevant considerations, and having ignored irrelevant considerations).

*This piece is too short to provide an in-depth description of the legal definition but it refers to the case law definition of "unreasonable" which is a reference to a Court of Appeal case from 1947, [1947] 2 All ER 680, [1947] EWCA Civ 1, [1948] 1 KB 223, [1948] KB 223.

Every policy disaster (whether the library closure fiasco which resulted in a public inquiry or half a dozen others I could mention here) has resulted because the public weren’t involved (or were involved/consulted but politely ignored by politicians and officers who had the arrogance to think they knew better) and/or the above principles weren’t followed.

Let’s take the Fort Perch Rock car park charging U-turn as an example. Principle (ii) above states the "consideration of professional advice from officers" yet officers didn’t tell them that if they started charging at Fort Perch Rock car park then the lease the Council had for the Marine Point development would lead to charges at hundreds of spaces at the other currently free car parks.

No, it fell to a local blogger to publish the pages of the lease, a large petition against it of thousands of people and a campaign against the charges from a former Conservative councillor in the marginal seat of New Brighton. This was despite Labour’s backbench councillors warning the Cabinet at at least one public meeting not to go ahead with plans for charging.

Next week, the Transformation and Resources Committee will discuss the high-profile issue of a fire station in Saughall Massie. At the Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority meeting earlier this year where the decision was made, the petition organiser was given five minutes to speak and a delegation from the Saughall Massie Conservation Society was also given the opportunity to speak for up to five minutes.

Yes, you are probably going to say, this ties in with (iii) above, respect for human rights as article 21, which Wirral Council signed up to when Cllr Adrian Jones was Mayor quite clearly states

(1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives.
(2) Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in his country.
(3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.

Notice the importance of that word directly or through freely chosen representatives (that is politicians).

The other public bodies I report on either have mechanisms written into their constitution (for example Liverpool City Council has a regular public question time slot at many of its meetings and I’ve mentioned the mechanisms that Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority has), so people can exercise their rights at public meetings and have their say before the decision is made.

At Wirral Council the public at public meetings get frustrated and heckle instead (then get told to shut up by the Chair or clear off which does show some politicians’ attitude towards the public outside of elections).

The Chair at last night’s meeting (despite his wish to get home in time to watch Coronation Street) tried to let many taxi drivers have their say (some more than once) before the decision to consult on increasing hackney carriage fares was made (if a decision is made following the consultation it’ll mean fares go up in time for Christmas).

Yet if there’s one point I am trying to make from this maybe boring piece about Wirral’s politics, it’s that the public should be more involved and you don’t encourage the public to turn up by expecting them to sit through meetings in silence and not have any influence over decisions that are going to affect their lives.

At the moment taxi drivers have more influence over decisions as there is a Joint Consultative Committee that meets regularly behind closed doors than I do over say Wirral Council’s filming of public meetings policy.

Yes, this probably sounds like as to why it’s a good idea to have politicians, or for the kind of public interest journalism I spend a lot of time doing but the point I’m trying to get at is one that Wirral’s political system doesn’t seem to have quite grasped which is "the will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government".

At Wirral Council this seems to have morphed in the past to "the will of the officers shall be the basis of the authority of government" (and we expect politicians to rubber stamp decisions we refer to them).

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EXCLUSIVE: Leaked minutes of Merseyside Pension Fund’s Investment Monitoring Working Party

Pensions Committee (Merseyside Pension Fund) 16th November 2015 L to R Peter Wallach, Cllr Paul Doughty (Chair)

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The public meeting of Wirral Council’s Pensions Committee held on the 16th November 2015

I will start this piece by declaring that I have a close family relative paid a pension by the Merseyside Pension Fund.

Monday night’s public meeting of Wirral Council’s Pensions Committee (you can view the video above) chucked out the public for two agenda items (issues about the tender exercise for CB Richard Ellis Capital Advisers Ltd (CBRE) and the minutes of the Investment Monitoring Working Party meeting of the 17th September 2015 and the 8th October 2015.

Originally one of the governance policies agreed by councillors that run the Merseyside Pension Fund stated that minutes of the Investment Monitoring Working Party and Governance Working Party should be published. I did query a while back why they weren’t, which led to the situation now where the minutes are split on the agenda and the public gets to see which councillors turned up, who sent their apologies and what the declarations of interest are.

However the rest of the minutes of those meetings (despite it being councillors that sit on these committees), councillors decide to keep the rest of the minutes a secret (on the advice of Wirral Council officers).

As it states on Wirral Council’s website the law states “Information is exempt to the extent that, in all the circumstances of the case, the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information” and the reason given on Monday evening was “Information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information)”.

Strictly speaking politicians are supposed to carry out their own public interest test based on the above and I suppose I should kick up more of a fuss at this point of the meeting if they’re about to chuck us out for no reason.

The Merseyside Pension Fund is a large pension fund with billions of pounds invested. Of course as a member of the press I’m going to take a view that it’s wrong for the public sector to be engaging in these inappropriate levels of secrecy when the total number of people in the fund comes to over 100,000.

Actually persuading politicians to actually go against an officer recommendation on this though is probably beyond my powers of persuasion. So here is a leak instead of the Investment Monitoring Working Party minutes of 8th October 2015. Think of all the money I’ve saved Wirral Council by not making a FOI request for this (although no doubt they will now carry out another leak investigation!)

I’ve corrected Cllr Ann McLachlan’s name in section 1 which was misspelt as McLachalan.

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
By virtue of paragraph(s) 3 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A
of the Local Government Act 1972.

EXEMPT APPENDIX 2

Minutes of the Investment Monitoring Working Party,

8 October 2015

In attendance:

Councillor Ann McLachlan (WBC) (Vice Chair)	Peter Wallach (Head of MPF)
Councillor Geoffrey Watt (WBC)	Joe Blott (Strategic Director Transformation and Resources
Councillor Treena Johnson (WBC)	Noel Mills (Independent Adviser)
	Rohan Worrall (Independent Adviser)
Councillor Paulette Lapin (SC)	Louise-Paul Hill (Aon Hewitt)
	Emma Jones (PA to Head of Pension Fund)

Apologies were received from:

Councillor Paul Doughty (WBC)	Councillor Brian Kenny (WBC)
Councillor Cherry Povall (WBC)	Councillor George Davies (WBC)
Councillor John Fulham (SHC)	Councillor Adrian Jones (WBC)

Declarations of Interest

Councillor Geoffrey Watt declared an interest due to a relation being a beneficiary of the Merseyside Pension Fund.

1. Introduction

Cllr Ann McLachlan (AM) chaired the meeting on behalf of Cllr Paul Doughty.

Action Points

None

2. External Manager Presentation

2.1 M&G Investments

Matthew Vaight (MV), Fund Manager and Orla Haughey (OH), Client Director, presented their global Emerging Markets Mandate to IMWP. Their agenda covered their mandate, market overview, a re-cap on their process, performance and finally their funding positioning.

Merseyside Pension Fund current holdings are valued at £112.8m. They briefed members on their bottom-up stock picking style and currently hold 50-70 stocks on behalf of the Fund.

A discussion ensued with regard to the risk in developed markets compared to emerging markets but MV argued that although a portfolio could remain cautious there are improving fundamentals in countries such as Taiwan for example which still offer opportunities as markets on cheaper valuations.

Specific risks of stocks and value was examined and how specific risks can be stock specific rather than country specific. However the sharp currency devaluations in some markets such as Brazil and Russia over the past 12 months had hit the fund’s performance where stock fundamentals had been overridden by the market’s performance. Oil prices were discussed and how this affected the markets. To further mitigate risks M&G said they have also developed a framework to look at currency which will further aid stock selection.

Questions were raised with regard to governance and M&G clarified how they work with particular companies and examine management within the organisation closely.

Ethical investments were discussed and M&G clarified they have no exposure in tobacco products or defence. M&G explained their view is that good corporate governance is an indication of quality management and is a good indicator of how a company is run. It combined to make an attractive investment and is integral to their analysis of a company.

Action points

None.

3. External Manager Presentation part 2

3.1 Maple-Brown Abbott

Geoff Bazzan (GB), Head of Asia Pacific Equities, and Susan Douse (SD), European Marketing and Client Services, presented at IMWP an overview of their organisation. They spoke about their value style and investment process and philosophy. They looked at their total performance up to 31 August 2015 and the major contributors and detractors during that period.

A discussion ensued with regard to their cyclical turn down and the classic value trap over the long term. The Chinese economy was discussed and the fact that GB believes there is still opportunities in China but be wary of companies exposed to too much US debt.

Maple-Brown Abbott’s asset allocation and in particular their specific stock selection was debated and how this has impacted on performance. GB asserted that there has been a slight improvement in performance and hopes to see this improving in the future. GB expressed the view that exposure of Chinese stocks will improve.

Maple-Brown Abbott were asked about their ethical investments and it was asserted that restrictions are imposed on companies but in the broader portfolio they do not screen out but look at the sustainability over the long term and subsequently ethical questions come into play.

Action points

None.

External Manager Presentation part 3

4.1 Amundi

Mickaël Tricot (MT), Head of Emerging Markets Equities and Peter Brackets (PB) presented the Amundi Actions Emergent Team, Process and Portfolio Review to the IMWP. MT gave Merseyside’s portfolio’s investment summary and talked about the team structure and its resources. MT explained that they combined a top-down and bottom-up featured approach which supported a high quality stock selection process which was well suited for emerging markets with higher volatility.

Ethical investments were discussed and MT asserted this was very subjective but they coupled this with knowing the companies and looking carefully at aspects of the organisation thoroughly. MT explained that although aspects of ethical investments were not mandatory, companies were coming under pressure from the stock exchange to comply with guidelines. This was becoming very important and companies are finding it beneficial to conform.

The question of how the stock exchange can apply pressure was discussed and it was stressed that there was a common current exchange of disclosure and reporting which raises issues when concerns are expressed. It was also argued that collaboration and initiatives within global firms have a consistent framework which can put pressure on managers to comply. There are also the UN PRI principles which encourage disclosure.

Amundi’s exposure in Brazil and currencies was discussed and value versus growth was debated further. Amundi noted they were always looking at changing their approach to look at more complex valuations by using supplementary tools and databases to help with analysis.

Action points

None.

5.1 Noting items

None

5.2 Action Points

None

5.3 Summary of Recommendations

None

5.4 Discussion Points (including any other business)

None

Date of Next Meeting

Thursday 10 December 2015 at 10.00 am, 6th floor, Cunard Building.

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KPMG (external auditors) advise councillors that report nearly finished on objection to Merseytravel’s 2014/15 accounts

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Liverpool City Region Combined Authority Audit Committee 3rd November 2015

Risk management was a subject John Fogarty tried very hard to be interesting about by making topical references to Thomas Cook, TalkTalk and Volkswagen, however he was completely unaware that he was being upstaged by a couple in the background flirting while waiting for the lift (as pictured above).

That is the most interesting introduction I can make to a write-up of yesterday’s Audit Committee meeting. You can read the reports for the public meeting on Merseytravel’s website.

The one Wirral Council councillor on the Audit Committee (Cllr Mike Sullivan) wasn’t present and didn’t send his apologies. The other five councillors on the Committee were there (the Chair Cllr Anthony Carr (Sefton Council), Deputy Chair Cllr Nina Killen (Sefton Council), Cllr Andy Moorhead (Knowsley Council), Cllr Rob Polhill (Halton Borough Council) and Cllr Pam Thomas (Liverpool City Council)).

On the agenda were three main items a presentation by John Fogarty (Treasurer to the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority) on risk management, a quarterly update on internal audit work and the final item was a report from the Treasurer on the final accounts for 2014/15 (which had two appendices the draft report to those charged with governance from the external auditors KPMG and the Annual Audit Letter 2014/15.

Although one of those reports only mentions one formal objection (I referred to the objection I made here), there is still another formal objection to the accounts.

As Merseytravel and the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority are audited separately (although this Audit Committee covers both bodies), I would guess that this relates to the matter discussed at Merseytravel’s meeting on the 1st October 2015 and minuted in this way (Members means councillors) “Finally the Director advised of an objection raised by a member of the public in relation to a historical item from the accounts relating to the internal transfer of funds between two Merseytravel services. The outcome of this matter could be reported to Members once resolved. Councillor Abbey asked that it be placed on record that such complaints did result in a cost to council taxpayers as they required investigation by external auditors.”

The external auditors (KPMG) confirmed at yesterday’s meeting that they are in the process of writing a report on that matter and hope to report back soon, however did confirm that the matter the objection related to doesn’t pass the threshold of materiality.

Due to the unresolved objection, the accounts haven’t been closed by the statutory deadline of the 30th September 2015.

There is not much else interesting I could write about the Audit Committee meeting (although video of the meeting can be watched below).

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Liverpool City Region Combined Authority Audit Committee 3rd November 2015

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What’s happening in the week ahead in local government (30/11/15 to 4/12/15)? (Wirral Council, Merseytravel, Merseyside Police and Crime Panel, House of Commons and House of Lords)

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Why did Wirral Council pay £700.43 for a private company to check when a fire alarm went off at Irby Library?

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Does Wirral Council believe that the will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government?

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EXCLUSIVE: Leaked minutes of Merseyside Pension Fund’s Investment Monitoring Working Party

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KPMG (external auditors) advise councillors that report nearly finished on objection to Merseytravel’s 2014/15 accounts

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