Category: Standards Committee

Standards Committee 29/9/2011 Part 2

Cllr Chris Blakeley said the summary tells its own story and the “deploring way” in which there’d been delays, costs which he said “absolutely appalls me”. He said they don’t know the date of a complaint. A second complaint had taken twelve months, another had taken ten months, a third had taken sixteen months. He … Continue reading “Standards Committee 29/9/2011 Part 2”

Cllr Chris Blakeley said the summary tells its own story and the “deploring way” in which there’d been delays, costs which he said “absolutely appalls me”. He said they don’t know the date of a complaint. A second complaint had taken twelve months, another had taken ten months, a third had taken sixteen months. He said a complaint submitted on the 4th November had been dealt with at an Initial Assessment Panel on the 25th January, which was 11 weeks! He asked why. Another had taken 12 months with a £6000 cost. He said another complaint made on the 30th March had gone to an IAP on the 29th July taking 4 months, with no final hearing date which he considered “unbelievable”.

He referred to another complaint with an Initial Assessment Panel of the 8th October. Cllr Blakeley said from the date of complaint this was 10 months, followed by another Initial Assessment Panel 12 months later. He said there was an Initial Assessment Panel on the 25th August and that there had been a “litany of failure”, an “absolute litany of failure” by the “Head of Law” [Bill Norman].

The Chair, Brian Cummings said that the figures speak for themselves and the cost and timetable was alarming.

Cllr Gerry Ellis said he was going to say the same thing, it was “staggering”. He wanted an explanation and asked “why”?

The Chair, Brian Cummings pointed out at 3.2 there was a recommendation for proper timescales and a monitoring regime.

Cllr Chris Blakeley said the “time for explanations and excuses was over”.

Standards Committee 29/9/2011 Part 1

Present on the Standards Committee:

Independent Members
Brian Cummings (Chair),
Ken Harrison (Vice-Chair),
Stella Elliott

Conservative councillors

Cllr Chris Blakeley

Deputy Mayor Cllr Gerry Ellis

Cllr Les Rowlands
Labour councillors

Cllr John Salter

Cllr Denise Roberts

Cllr Bill Davies
Liberal Democrat councillors

Cllr Bob Wilkins

Cllr Mrs Pat Williams

Cllr Dave Mitchell deputising for Cllr Ann Bridson

Officers present

Mr. Bill Norman (Monitoring Officer)

Mr. Surjit Tour (Deputy Monitoring Officer, Head of Legal and Member Services)

Mr. Malcolm Flanagan (Head of Revenues, Benefits and Customer Services)

Mrs. Shirley Hudspeth (committee clerk)

The Chair welcomed people to the meeting and thanked them for their attendance. He asked for any declaraions of interest (item 1 on the agenda). None were declared.

He asked those present if they accepted the minutes of the last meeting held on the 4th July 2011. These were accepted.

Surjit Tour, Deputy Monitoring Officer introduced item 3 on the agenda entitled summary of complaints made under Member’s Code of Conduct. He said the code had been in effect since 2008, information had been redacted over confidentiality reasons. There had been problems over delay. In June further details had been requested as to how complaints were progressed. A summary was provided in Appendix 1. The required information had been updated and a draft protocol had been written for approval (Appendix 2).

Standards Committee 4th July 2011 – Item 6 – Exempt Information – Exclusion of Members of the Public, Item 7 Review of a Standards Complaint

Cllr Chris Blakeley said there was a piece of work being undertaken by the Scrutiny Programme Board to look at the work processes and how flows and blockages were happening.

Ken Harrison said he would like it minuted if ok, asking if they had the manpower with sufficient staff or was it the case that existing staff were not capable? He had listened to this “time after time”.

Bill Norman said it was “part capacity and part priorities”, however it would have “a higher priority than hitherto”. Cllr Chris Blakeley asked about enlisting the help of other authorities to speed it up?

Brian Cummings said it shouldn’t be taking two to three years to deal with the public. There was no other business raised by committee members so the meeting ended.

Since the meeting the agenda on Wirral Council’s website has been reordered to remove item 6. Therefore agenda item 7 has become agenda item 6. The report for this item can be read here with the appendices here.

Please note this blog post uses the original numbering of agenda items, not the changed agenda that Wirral Council changed a day after the meeting on their website to remove item 6.

The original agenda distributed at the meeting had the following added as agenda item 6:

EXEMPT INFORMATION: EXCLUSION OF MEMBERS OF THE PUBLIC

The public may be excluded from the meeting during consideration of the following item of business on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information.

The grounds given were paragraph 7c of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972, however as you can see here by reading the legislation there isn’t a paragraph 7c.

Standards Committee 4th July 2011 – Item 6 – Exempt Information – Exclusion of Members of the Public, Item 7 Review of a Standards Complaint

Bill Norman said the content of the complaint was considered exempt which was mandatory, however it was already in the public domain so they could expect phone calls from journalists.

Cllr Bill Davies said he was conscious that Cllr Roberts was outside the room. Cllr Chris Blakeley said they should agree to note the report, however it was incumbent for him to put “on record his discomfort and distress at the time taken to resolve standards complaints”. He said this was unfair for complainants, those complained about and he would be seeking every opportunity to express to the Head of Law the extent of his unhappiness. Another complaint had been taking 19 months, a further case that was referred quickly took 15 weeks to appoint an investigating officer. He thought a bog standard complaint should take at most three to four months. He didn’t expect them to take so much time and he wanted to put on record his feeling to the Director of Law.

Brian Cummings said in reference to cases, some had taken two or three years. There were some problems and it was unfair to some complainants and some must just give up. Cllr Les Rowlands mentioned the cost. Brian Cummings said the cost was important.

Bill Norman acknowledged the criticism as valid, fairly made, related to numerous occasions and that they were not satisfied with the position. To vary how they proceed would need resources, complaints were “taking too long” and they needed to do better in the “dying days of the current regime”.

Since the meeting the agenda on Wirral Council’s website has been reordered to remove item 6. Therefore agenda item 7 has become agenda item 6. The report for this item can be read here with the appendices here.

Please note this blog post uses the original numbering of agenda items, not the changed agenda that Wirral Council changed a day after the meeting on their website to remove item 6.

The original agenda distributed at the meeting had the following added as agenda item 6:

EXEMPT INFORMATION: EXCLUSION OF MEMBERS OF THE PUBLIC

The public may be excluded from the meeting during consideration of the following item of business on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information.

The grounds given were paragraph 7c of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972, however as you can see here by reading the legislation there isn’t a paragraph 7c.

Standards Committee 4th July 2011 – Item 6 – Exempt Information – Exclusion of Members of the Public, Item 7 Review of a Standards Complaint

Cllr Bill Davies said on the report they were awaiting he had “nothing to say”. Cllr Les Rowlands said he noted the history, but “what has happened in the department”? He said a mistake had been made twice and asked how they could proceed to avoid it happening again and what improvements would be made?

Bill Norman said that future reports would be cleared by Bill Norman or the Head of Service in future before the reports go out.

Cllr Mitchell said there had been a similar situation in planning about mobile phone masts. There had been an independent review which had led to things being dealt with in stringent chronological order. This meant they stopped to check the item was dealt with and treated before moving on and he hoped a similar process regarding the workings would be made to avoid “horrendous mistakes”. These were the kind of mistakes he “wouldn’t expect from a first year apprentice”, hopefully they could “move to the right process” where things were “done in a given order” and the “boxes ticked up”.

Cllr Blakeley accepted this and referred to 2003 in Greasby where it had been revoked. Cllr Mitchell said there needed to be an independent review by an outside body so that things would be “tightened up”. Cllr Gilchrist said he was “happy this was in public” and “not exempt”. However what would Wirral Council do what it was asked to see the information for this agenda item? He hadn’t read the documents, but just skimmed through the two hundred pages written by Smith. He had deciphered it and proceeded over how people had been treated. The inquiry would ask what was this about? Where they prepared against any public action?

Privacy Preference Center

Consent Management

privacy-policy

Required
You have read and agreed to our Privacy Policy.

Necessary

Advertising

Analytics

Other