Who are the 20 Pledge Champions and how has Wirral Council’s Cabinet changed?
Who are the 20 Pledge Champions and how has Wirral Council’s Cabinet changed?
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Wirral Council’s Cabinet meeting held on the 5th November 2015
Cabinet (Wirral Council) 5th November 2015 Councillor Phil Davies asks Surjit Tour to introduce the report on Cabinet portfolios and Pledge Champions
Yesterday’s Cabinet meeting agreed changes to which area each councillor on the Cabinet covers and some minor changes to how each Cabinet portfolio’s description.
Instead of two Deputy Leaders at Wirral Council (Cllr George Davies and Cllr Ann McLachlan) there will now be only one Deputy Leader (Cllr Ann McLachlan).
I thought it would be useful to explicitly state each Cabinet’s former title and its new title (along with the councillor that now holds that role). Old titles are in italics. New titles are in bold. None of the councillors on the Cabinet have changed.
Councillor Phil DaviesLeader of the CouncilFinance Leader of the CouncilStrategic and Policy Oversight
Councillor Ann McLachlanJoint Deputy Leader of the CouncilGovernance, Commissioning and Improvement Deputy Leader of the CouncilTransformation and Improvement
Councillor George DaviesJoint Deputy Leader of the CouncilNeighbourhoods, Housing and Engagement Housing and Communities
Councillor Adrian JonesSupport Services Resources: Finance, Assets and Technology
Councillor Christine JonesAdult Social Care and Public Health Adult Care and Public Health
Councillor Tony SmithChildren and Family Services Children and Families
Councillor Pat HackettEconomy Business and Tourism
Councillor Bernie MooneyEnvironment and Sustainability Environmental Protection
Councillor Chris MeadenLeisure, Sport and Culture Leisure and Culture
Councillor Stuart WhittinghamHighways and Transport Transport, Technology Strategy and Infrastructure
In addition to those changes, Cabinet will now meet on Monday mornings at 10.00am starting in 2016.
Also decided were a number of Pledge Champions. The role of each Pledge Champion will be to make sure there is action on a specific pledge in the Wirral Council Plan: a 2020 Vision (formerly called the Corporate Plan).
Twenty councillors (all from the ruling Labour Group) were appointed as Pledge Champions (a role that Cllr Phil Davies pointed out at the Cabinet meeting doesn’t mean these councillors receive increased allowances). A list of who the Pledge Champions are (along with which pledge they are the champion for) was handed out at the Cabinet meeting and is below (but without the bullet points next to each pledge which was on the original). The pledges are in three broad themes of people, business and the environment.
20 PLEDGES
PEOPLE
CHAMPION
Older People Live Well
Irene Williams
Children are ready for school
Walter Smith
Young people are ready for work and adulthood
Phillip Brightmore
Vulnerable children reach their full potential
Treena Johnson
Reduce child and family poverty
Angela Davies
People with disabilities live independently
Rob Gregson
Zero tolerance to domestic violence
Janette Williamson
BUSINESS
Greater job opportunities in Wirral
Joe Walsh
Workforce skills match business needs
Jean Stapleton
Increase inward investment
Matthew Patrick
Thriving small businesses
Denise Realey
Vibrant Tourism economy
Matt Daniel
Transport & Technology infrastructure fit for the future
Ron Abbey
Assets and buildings are fit for purpose for Wirral’s businesses
Denise Roberts
ENVIRONMENT
Leisure and cultural opportunities for all
Christine Spriggs
Wirral residents live healthier lives
Steve Foulkes
Community services are joined up and accessible
Christina Muspratt
Good quality housing that meets the needs of residents
Steve Niblock
Wirral’s Neighbourhood are safe
Brian Kenny
Attractive local environment for Wirral residents
John Salter
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Councillor Paul Hayes “The aspiration should not be for imitation for the Lyndale School, we have the real thing”
Councillor Paul Hayes “The aspiration should not be for imitation for the Lyndale School, we have the real thing”
On the day that Wirral Council fires the starting gun in the local elections with the publication of the notice of election giving candidates until 4pm on Thursday 9th April to submit their nomination papers, I thought it would be good to look back at an issue that has divided the political parties on Wirral Council which was the decision to close Lyndale School.
When Wirral Council met last month to decide its budget for 2015/16 the Conservatives submitted an amendment to Labour’s schools budget. As the amendment was short I will repeat it here:
The Lyndale School
Council recognises the unique and caring environment provided by The Lyndale School to children with profound and multiple learning difficulties. Council acknowledges the value of this facility and affirms its belief that such provision should remain at The Lyndale School.
Council, having regard to the overwhelming support given to the campaign to keep The Lyndale School open by the public of Wirral recognises that The Lyndale School should remain open and wishes to bring to an end the anguish and uncertainty that has been heaped on pupils and their parents and carers throughout this whole sorry saga.
Accordingly, Council requests Cabinet to issue a Revocation Notice to consult on proposals to stop all current and planned action being taken to close The Lyndale School immediately. Should this be approved, Cabinet is further requested to instruct officers to commence negotiations with the Schools Forum and other relevant stakeholders in relation to the High Needs Funding Formula so as to identify and secure adequate funding to enable The Lyndale School to remain open from 1 April 2016. The revised High Needs Funding Formula shall be expressly detailed in the Schools Budget for 2016/17.
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Councillor Paul Hayes speaks about Lyndale School 24th February 2015
Here’s what Councillor Paul Hayes had to say on the Conservative amendment to the Schools Budget:
Mr Mayor, tonight we will expect the usual debates on the principles of budgetary principles for the Council and how we prioritise taxpayers’ money to deliver services, but the fact is Mr Mayor this issue, the Lyndale School is not about money. So much has already been confirmed throughout this entire process both by the Cabinet Member and by council officers.
Mr Mayor, this is about, this isn’t about cuts from above, it’s about choices on the ground, choices in this Town Hall and in this Chamber this evening. It’s about how you choose to care and educate for some of the most vulnerable children in our community, children with some of the most profound and multiple learning difficulties and Mr Mayor surely there can be no doubt that the excellent caring and learning environment provided to the children of Lyndale School for so long should continue to be done so at the Lyndale School in Eastham.
The aspiration should not be for imitation for the Lyndale School, we have the real thing, right here in Wirral. Surely Members will join me in the fight to keep it?
Mr Mayor, the Council needs to listen to the real experts in this issue, the parents, the staff and the carers of the pupils of Lyndale. These families who have stood steadfast in defence of this excellent school. We shouldn’t be blindly accepting the views of an expert consultant who charged us £10,000 for the benefit of her advice and as I’ve learned today an extra £500 when called to give evidence at the call in.
Mr Mayor, the Lyndale campaign was of course and as we’ve heard tonight from other Members been recently boosted by Dawn Hughes and her daughter Ellie, I know that Dawn is in the public gallery this evening. She secured backing of a tribunal in her battle to keep Ellie at the School which gives her so much security and comfort.
Mr Mayor, if a learned and I’m sure very distinguished tribunal judge and its two lay panel members recognise the uniqueness of Lyndale School and the real harm moving children from this environment would cause then why can’t Wirral Council?
Mr Mayor, I know some of the Labour Members are very uncomfortable with the decision to close Lyndale School. I appeal to them to make their votes count tonight. This amendment, this second amendment does not put the Labour Budget at risk, it corrects an appalling decision which should never have been made and it halts the anguish which has been caused upon some of the most vulnerable families in our society. I know that it’s difficult to vote a different way to friends and colleagues in the same group and I should know as I’m probably going to do that at item 7a.
However Mr Mayor, this is too much of an important issue to be decided on imposed party whip or as Councillor Sullivan alluded to the block vote. I note that neither the Leader of the Council nor Councillor Tony Smith (the Cabinet Member) have mentioned the Lyndale School in their contributions earlier. I hope Members will not forget Lyndale amongst the political wrangling of tonight and vote to keep this crucial and vital school community.
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Labour councillors on Wirral Council’s Cabinet agree to consultation on master plan for Birkenhead
Labour councillors on Wirral Council’s Cabinet agree to consultation on master plan for Birkenhead
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You can watch what happened at the Cabinet meeting on the 12th March 2015 above.
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’s Cabinet met at a different venue to usual (Birkenhead Town Hall). At the start, Councillor Phil Davies wanted to show people the trophy that Wirral Council had received for being “Most Improved Council”. You can see a photo of when they received the award on the Local Government Chronicle website, but below is a photo of Cllr Phil Davies showing people the award at the Cabinet meeting.
Councillor Phil Davies shows off the Local Government Chronicle award Wirral Council received for being most improved council 12th March 2015
Cllr Pat Hackett talks at a Cabinet meeting about the master plan for Birkenhead Town Centre
Councillor Pat Hackett spoke to the report recommending a consultation on the masterplan for Birkenhead Town Centre. He referred to an “improved market” and the stage one lockout agreement that the Council had entered into with Neptune Developments Limited. The detail of the proposals were covered in an earlier blog post. Cabinet agreed that Neptune Development Limited were to consult with the public (as well as staff who work at Europa Pools) on the masterplan.
Kevin Adderley pointed out that the Mars Pension Fund had recently advertised the Grange and Pyramids shopping centre in Birkenhead as being for sale. The recommendation to have a consultation was agreed by Cabinet.
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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