A blog about Wirral Council, Wirral Council's councillors & officers
A blog about Wirral Council's public meetings, Wirral Council's councillors, Bidston & St. James ward and other public bodies on Merseyside
I was barred from filming Wirral Council’s Planning Committee tonight, usual excuses health and safety, data protection both are bogus reasons
was barred from filming Wirral Council's Planning Committee tonight, usual excuses health and safety, data protection both are bogus reasons
— John Brace (@level80) June 27, 2013
An account of the special meeting of Wirral Council’s Coordinating Committee of the 24th June 2013 to discuss the call in of the decision by Conservative councillors to send five councillors and two officers to the LGA Conference as an approved duty
Please accept YouTube cookies to play this video. By accepting you will be accessing content from YouTube, a service provided by an external third party.
If you accept this notice, your choice will be saved and the page will refresh.
The first part of Monday’s meeting is above, if you want to watch the entire meeting, here is a link to a Youtube playlist covering it.
Coordinating Committee (previously called Scrutiny Programme Board)
Cllr Stuart Wittingham (Chair)
Cllr Steve Foulkes (Vice-Chair)
Cllr Andrew Hodson (spokesperson)
Cllr Alan Brighouse (spokesperson)
Cllr Ron Abbey
Cllr Leah Fraser
Cllr Paul Doughty
Cllr Jean Stapleton
Cllr Moira McLaughlin
Cllr John Salter deputy for Cllr Patricia Glasman
Cllr Denise Roberts
Cllr Adam Sykes
Cllr Steve Williams
Cllr Bernie Mooney
Cllr David Elderton
The Chair started by stating that it was a special meeting of the committee to consider the call in by eleven Conservative councillors of the decision by the Cabinet Member for Corporate Services, Cllr Adrian Jones to make attendance by five councillors and two officers at the LGA conference an approved duty (meaning Wirral Council pays for their costs).
He asked for any apologies for absence. Cllr John Salter sent Cllr Pat Glasman’s apologies and said he was deputising for her. There were no declarations of interest or party whip made.
Cllr Moira McLaughlin started by asking that as the Conservative spokesperson on the committee Cllr Andrew Hodson was a signatory to the call in whether this amounted to predetermination?
Ed – news flash for Cllr McLaughlin, there’s no such thing as predetermination any more, it got abolished on the 15th January 2012 by the implementation of s.25 of the Localism Act 2011.
Surjit Tour answered that being a signatory to the call in doesn’t amount to predetermination. Cllr Hodson, Conservative spokesperson said that despite the fact that some on this side of the table (referring to himself and Cllr Leah Fraser) were signatories to the call-in, that they hadn’t made up their minds and that they would make an unbiased decision.
He went on to say that he felt the way that officers had dealt with the call-in was “in an unprofessional manner” and accused officers of making rules up as they went along. Cllr Hodson said that they’d been asked by Surjit Tour to disregard an email from Cllr Phil Gilchrist (who had an interest in the matter). He said, “We know he was told what to say by Shirley Hudspeth.” and that at a later time Surjit Tour told them to carry on. Cllr Hodson said he wanted to stick to the fact that they were only dealing with transport and attendance.
Surjit Tour said that Cllr Gilchrist had said he wanted to make written submissions to the members of the committee, but that there had been “no authorisation for that information to be circulated”. He’d therefore asked members of the committee who’d received Cllr Gilchrist’s email to disregard it. Instead Surjit Tour only wanted Cllr Gilchrist’s written submissions to be circulated to the committee if the Chair agreed to it. He said that that was why he’d sent out the email telling councillors to disregard Cllr Gilchrist’s email.
Cllr Hodson pointed out that Cllr Gilchrist wasn’t present, Surjit Tour responded to his points. Cllr Adrian Jones, Cabinet Member for Corporate Services interjected from the audience and asked the Chair to ask people to speak louder as it was difficult to hear what people were saying.
The Chair, Cllr Stuart Wittingham asked people to speak up and moved onto agenda item 3, Surjit Tour said that it was a reminder of the committee’s terms of reference, the terms of reference were noted by the committee, the Chair moved the meeting onto agenda item 4 (Procedure for considering a decision that has been Called-in). Surjit Tour said that members of the committee would’ve received in their packs the proposed call in procedure regarding the call-in. He said that paragraph two set out the process and went through the various stages. The Chair asked for agreement, the committee agreed to the procedure and the meeting progressed to item 5 (the call-in).
Cabinet (Wirral Council) 13th June 2013: Closure of Moreton Day Centre
Present:
Cllr Phil Davies
Cllr Pat Hackett
Cllr Brian Kenny
Cllr Adrian Jones
Cllr Tony Smith
Cllr Chris Meaden
Cllr Chris Jones
Cllr Ann McLachlan
Cllr George Davies
Once Cabinet had approved the minutes of the last meeting and declarations of interest were out-of-the-way, the Chair turned went to the item that most of the people were there for, the report recommending the closure of Moreton Day Centre.
Please accept YouTube cookies to play this video. By accepting you will be accessing content from YouTube, a service provided by an external third party.
If you accept this notice, your choice will be saved and the page will refresh.
Cllr Phil Davies said that the central government cuts led to “difficult decisions to take on the budget”, he referred to the three-month consultation on the specific option to close Moreton Day Centre and thanked everybody who had taken part in it. He hoped people had had the opportunity to read the report on Wirral Council’s website.
Mr John Daulby addressed the meeting on behalf of the carers and thanked the Council for giving them the opportunity to offer their proposals for changing day services whilst at the same time making the required savings. He said that the savings in their social enterprise model exceeded those proposed by the Department of Adult Social Services. They disagreed that the £400,000 for central functions should continue as in their view it would remove accountability to the day centre management.
With reference to Moreton Day Centre he said that the “fear and distress experienced by the customers, their families and carers is well documented” and that “uncertainty for Moreton customers still exists”. Mr. Daulby said that the carers wanted involvement in any change and that they wanted to direct any changes, as opposed to having changes imposed upon them.
Mr. Daulby said that their proposal “minimised the angst generated” and would involve changing the day centres to resource centres. They wanted the new service to be a “role model for day service provision across the country” and “transform them not close them”. They would seek alternative income streams but would need “the help and support of Wirral Borough Council” and “hoped it was not too late to abandon the DASS [Department of Adult Social Services] proposals”.
He said, “We know it’s not too late though to fix the location of Moreton and its size as a matter of urgency, find a more effective way of interacting with day service customers, carers and parents, commit the transformation team to work with us to establish a social enterprise and commit DASS to work with us in terms of transforming day service provision.”
A report about Merseytravel’s Scrutiny Committee meeting of the 3rd June 2013: Fares Review Cllr Steve Foulkes “where you can go on a bus and you hear people say, “What’s the cheapest deal today?” you know and that shouldn’t be the case”
Unfortunately Standing Order 61 of Merseytravel’s rules in a section marked “Confidentiality” states “No record of the proceedings (or part of the proceedings) of a meeting may be taken to enable persons not present to see or hear any such proceedings without express permission” so sadly there won’t be any accompanying photos or video footage to this report. Perhaps Merseytravel didn’t get the letter from Bob O’Neill about this issue.
Attending the meeting were the Chair, Cllr Malcolm Sharp (Labour, Knowsley), Cllr Steve Foulkes (Labour, Wirral), Cllr Liam Robinson (ex-officio, Labour, Liverpool), Cllr Anthony Carr (Labour, Sefton), Cllr Joanne Calvert (Labour, Liverpool), Cllr Hayley Todd (Labour, Liverpool), Cllr John Dodd (Merseytravel Alliance Signals Good Governance (which is what the Lib Dem/Conservative coalition calls itself on Merseytravel although Cllr John Dodd is a Liberal Democrat), Sefton as well as various Merseytravel officers.
The Chair started by welcoming their new Chief Executive, David Brown to the meeting. David Brown replaces their former Chief Executive Neil Scales after a brief stint by their current Deputy Chief Executive Frank Rogers as Interim Chief Executive. Mr. Brown gets a salary of £149,000. As he [David Brown] was attending his first meeting, the Chair (of the Scrutiny Committee surely who’s very raison d’être would be to scrutinise Merseytravel officers’ decisions?) said that Mr. Brown, the new Chief Executive was there purely as an “observer” and not to ask him “any questions” or “put him on the spot”.
The meeting started with the Chair asking for any apologies for absence. Apologies were given for Cllr Pauline Walton (Labour, Liverpool). The Chair asked for any declarations of interest. Nobody gave any. He then asked if the minutes of the meeting held on the 27th April 2013 were agreed as a true record of the last meeting? They were agreed.
An officer referred to by the Chair as Liz introduced item 4 Fares Review which also had an enclosure. She referred to a decision at an earlier Scrutiny Committee meeting on their priorities for the coming year and that the first workshop had been held in May. Liz said it had been well attended by councillors, not just those on the Scrutiny Committee and the workshop had brought up two potential topics to be considered. After it had been discussed with the Chair [of the Scrutiny Committee] the first two items for scrutiny had been decided as a Fares Review and an Operator Interface Review. These would report back in September, the appendix detailed the aims of the Fares Review and the expert witnesses. She said that at 9b (of the report) it asked for councillors to be nominated to be involved in the Fares Review, instead of deciding now this would be done after the Annual Meeting of Merseytravel on the 27th June. The Chair asked for any comments.
Cllr Steve Foulkes said, “Thanks Chair, I have no problem with the Terms of Reference, particularly whilst it talks about excluding us from the work that’s been going on around young people because I know that’s underway. There’s been a great deal of work on that. It would be very helpful to Scrutiny Committee for that report when that’s ready to come back to us as well as part of our overall look at fares and I think it’s an issue really that if we are in tune with the public, I think it’s something the public want us to do and I think a well documented and well thought out piece of work on scrutiny would not only be used within this organisation but be used further afield to make people recognise indeed some of the discrepancies that there are.
Certainly for the public it’s a very confusing picture outside, out there now for fares and that. I think about my own sort of various grievances I have, where you can go on a bus and you hear people say, “What’s the cheapest deal today?” you know and that shouldn’t be the case. If you’ve got an offer or there’s something that can save people money, it should be known automatically before people plan their journey. So I think we can be part of the bigger picture, I think it’s about going to areas to work on that are something that look, hopefully encourage Scrutiny [Committee] to do more pieces of work and I was thinking it’s a healthy start to our Executive/Scrutiny split so that’s what I wanted to say and thank you.”
Planning Committee 30th May 2013 (Wirral Council): Vote on new play area in Leasowe splits Planning Committee 7:6f
If there was ever a part of a meeting that sums up both the Kafkaesque bureaucracy of Wirral Council, item 12 (and its appendix) would serve very well.
It all started as usual with an officer saying it would’ve been decided by officers under their delegated powers if Cllr Lewis hadn’t asked for it to be decided by the Planning Committee (however with a qualifying petition against it and nine letters of objection it would’ve been decided by the Planning Committee anyway). The officer continued by stating that the planning application was for a children’s play area comprising five items and dated back to a 1997 agreement with a developer building a new housing estate. The area proposed for the play area was part of an area of open space established for the residents, residents had concerns, but environmental health had no objections to the proposal despite the area being a flood risk.
A representative of the petitioners, Steven Lindsay of 5 Aintree Close thanked the Planning Committee for attending the site visit on the day before the meeting. He pointed out it had been sixteen years since the original agreement for the play area had been signed and that since then many families had grown up, he referred to a survey conducted eighteen months ago of one hundred and forty-seven properties. Ninety percent had been against the play area, six and half percent for and three and a half percent hadn’t expressed a preference. Mr. Lindsay referred to another brand-new play area nearby which was well used by children and a further play area that had been built as the result of a section 106 agreement with a developer.
The concerns of the petitioners were of vandalism, theft of the play area equipment, antisocial behaviour and people gathering there who were not from the area. Another concern was that the site of the proposed play area was too close to adjoining properties and that a nearby play area had had equipment stolen. Two other play areas at a distance of 200m and 300m were nearby as well as Leasowe Common.
Miss Jackie Smallwood, of Wirral Council’s Parks and Countryside Service addressed the committee on behalf of Wirral Council. She said that when the section 106 application had been granted that the policy had been twenty metres from property boundaries, however the policy had since changed to ten metres to property boundaries and twenty metres from the facade of buildings.
Cllr Ian Lewis agreed with the petitioner Mr. Lindsay and said it was unusual to have a planning application for a play area. He pointed out it had been sixteen years since the section 106 agreement and that since then they’d spent £75,000 on a play area as part of the Playbuilder scheme whose catchment area included this estate. He pointed out that in a further change that 23,000m² of the public open space had been sold, leaving 5,000m² and that the appendix pointed out that as a condition of the planning permission that the developer was to provide 60m² of open space per a property. He asked why the land left was well below the recommended limit of 60m²? In a survey of every home in the development by Taylor Wimpey, ninety percent of residents had been against it. As Wirral Council was the applicant, he said that they had nothing to lose and that they had to recognise the cost of maintaining a particularly small play area which was not wanted as Wirral Council would be taking on a further liability. He asked the Planning Committee to refuse the application. He passed around details of the sale of some of the public open space.
Cllr Elderton said that the petitioner and ward councillor had shown that times had changed, that the site visit had shown it was in an established residential area and the evidence of the petitioner showed that the residents would prefer not to have it developed as a play area. He suggested that they refuse the application on the grounds that it was no longer necessary. Cllr Elderton also pointed out the fact that as the Council was the applicant that it couldn’t sue itself and that they should go along with what residents want.
Matthew Davies said that the original permission (OUT/1994/6791/D) had been granted sixteen years ago and that the Planning Committee in August 2011 had revisited the issue. He said that the developer had paid money for the installation of a play area, which had been approved in 1997 and 2011, therefore the play area could be erected under permitted development, however the developer had wanted the details to be considered as a standalone item. If they refused the planning permission, they would have to reimburse £50,000 plus interest which would come to £75,000. Officers had assessed the existing play areas and felt that they were not acceptable or accessible as they were separated from the development by busy roads.
Cllr Steve Foulkes said that the training that councillors on the Planning Committee had received meant that they should consider each planning application on its merits, without any consideration as to the applicant. He said he hadn’t been a member of the Planning Committee back in 2011 and that whilst a survey had taken place that they had to be ultra careful if they were turning it down for this reason. Cllr Foulkes pointed out that the nature of the estate might change, that it was a “viable planning application” and that the play area “might well be seen as an asset”. He said he understood there were fears and pessimism, but if they went down that route then there wouldn’t be any play areas. Cllr Foulkes said that it was a bit of a cop-out that the Council wouldn’t appeal its own decision, that he had seen the site and location and that areas that were well looked at and overseen didn’t tend to attract antisocial behaviour. Cllr Foulkes asked “Is it a good thing?” and then answered his own question with the answer being “probably yes”.
Cllr Simon Mountney said it was reminding him of the George Orwell novel 1984 and that [Cllr Foulkes] was sounding like the Politburo. He pointed out that the residents wanted them to spend the money elsewhere and enforcing a play area on them was not right. Cllr Mountney referred to the “massive consultation”, the result had told them “please don’t give us” [a play area] with the public telling us [the Planning Committee] “thanks but no thanks”. Cllr Mountney said that they couldn’t make an assumption over the nature of the estate over twenty years. He received applause for his points.
Cllr Wendy Clements said that at 4.9 in the report, that before development progressed Wirral Council would have to consult the local community, therefore public opposition to the scheme was a material consideration in determining the planning application.
Cllr Elderton said he agreed with Cllr Wendy Clements, that times had changed and they had to make sure it was appropriate. He pointed out that things had moved on from sixteen years ago and that he’d been on the Planning Committee in 2011. Cllr Elderton said they should consider the current position rather than bury their heads in the sand. He said that he didn’t like to see councillors overturn the will of the local community to merely support something from sixteen years ago and that wasn’t the reason why he’d become a councillor. Cllr Elderton said they should support the aspirations of all local communities.
Matthew Davies said that the appendix had come as a report to the Planning Committee in 2011 and that they’d heard the comments from petitioners and Cllr Ian Lewis then, which was more recent than sixteen years ago. He cautioned them against refusing permission and that the permission granted sixteen years ago could take twenty, thirty or forty years before it was built. Mr. Davies said that as it had been approved it could be built without further consent which they needed to be aware of.
Cllr Mountney said they were there to support residents. The Chair, Cllr Bernie Mooney said they were there to uphold planning policy and that the policy was still the same.
Cllr Mountney asked who was going to build the playground? Matthew Davies said that as the developer had made the contribution that the Council would put the play equipment in place. Cllr Mountney expressed concern that they were “riding roughshod over the public”. The Chair, Cllr Bernie Mooney said it had to be agreed and that the only reason it was back here was to approve the type, amount and the age group.
Cllr Foulkes asked if it was refused, would the old planning permission take precedence leaving it as a decision for the Executive [Cabinet]?
Cllr Hayes referred to the 60m² of open space per a resident and asked a question about commuted sums and the section 106 agreement. Matthew Davies answered that it was something to consider when drafting the section 106 agreement whether or not to accept commuted sums, which could be used to upgrade existing facilities, however when it was drafted in 1997 they decided not to go for a commuted sum. He said the fact the land was sold had no bearing as the green space and play area were separate issues.
Cllr Muspratt said it was quite compact and had concerns about the guidelines on different age groups mixing. Matthew Davies said there were guidelines but they were outside the planning remit. He said that colleagues in parks and leisure tended to put an upper age limit of twelve on play areas as this was when people tended to stop using them.
Cllr Brightmore said that the residents were asking them to refuse the application. Matthew Davies said they could refuse this application as it was a standalone application, therefore they could refuse this specific play area. Cllr Wittingham referred to the petition of twenty-nine households but said he would be uncomfortable to refuse the application as it would mean children would have to cross Reeds Lane.
Cllr Stuart Wittingham moved accepting the planning permission and Cllr Joe Walsh seconded it. Cllr Foulkes said he didn’t enjoy councillors trying to make a fool of him. He said that he didn’t like being set up or being pilloried.
The Chair asked for a vote of those in favour of the planning permission. Cllr Stuart Kelly, Cllr Bernie Mooney, Cllr Brightmore, Cllr Christina Muspratt, Cllr Joe Walsh, Cllr Stuart Wittingham and Cllr Irene Williams vote for (7).
The other councillors (6) voted against, so the planning application was approved by 7 votes to 6.