These don’t include taxi journeys where councillors have paid for the taxi themselves and then claimed back the cost.
Sadly, due to a lot of missing pages (curiously always the ones with councillors’ names on them), plus a number of pages scanned at such low quality making them very difficult to read, I’ve requested an internal review.
There was an £85 taxi journey listed on page 5. By the price list published on my blog here it comes to a taxi journey of around 67 and a half miles.
Sadly the second page of the invoice that invoice from May 2015 that would state who undertook this unusually long journey is not supplied. The invoice itself is of such low quality it’s hard to read how far this journey was. However if you’re going on a journey that far why not take the train instead?
In fact if the journey was by a councillor then Wirral Council’s constitution states (members means councillors):
“8. Travel and Subsistence
Travel Costs
8.1 Travel costs incurred by members in performing “approved duties” as specified in Schedule 2 to this Scheme shall be reimbursed at the prevailing public transport rates, provided that the use of taxis or members’ private motor vehicles may be permitted where public transport is either not available, or the journey by public transport would be likely to result in unreasonable delay.”
Sadly as Wirral Council didn’t respond properly to this FOI request it’s impossible to tell whether a councillor took this journey or not!
However over the 6 months of invoices where names were supplied, here are how many taxi journeys were undertaken by each councillor at the taxpayers’ expense. For shared journeys I’ve counted it as one journey for each councillor sharing the taxi:
Cllr Moira McLaughlin (38) Cllr Steve Niblock (23) Cllr Bill Davies (13) Cllr Irene Williams (5) Cllr Pat Williams (2) Cllr Kathy Hodson (1) Cllr Denise Roberts (1) Cllr Phil Davies (1)
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Bernard Halley (left) talking about Girtrell Court at the Wirral West Constituency Committee 11th February 2016 L to R (foreground) Bernard Halley, David L to R (background) Graham Hodkinson, Cllr Matthew Patrick
Next Monday evening, starting at 6.00pm in the Council Chamber at Wallasey Town Hall there is a public meeting of all Wirral Council councillors.
One of the items to be debated at that meeting is a notice of motion on Girtrell Court (the text of the notice of motion is below). The notice of motion calls for any decision on closure of Girtrell Court to be made in public, rather than behind closed doors by the Cabinet Member Cllr Chris Jones and the Director of Adult Social Services Graham Hodkinson.
3. GIRTRELL COURT (to be debated)
Proposed by Cllr Chris Blakeley Seconded by Cllr Bruce Berry
Council notes that the Leader of the Council has previously stated that he wants his Administration to be open, transparent and fair with the people of Wirral. Council welcomes this approach.
Council therefore believes that the future of Girtrell Court must be decided in public and not under delegation to the portfolio holder, in conjunction with the Director of Adult Social Services.
Council further believes that the families of those using Girtrell Court, the staff, trade unions and residents and users must be given every opportunity to influence the future of Girtrell Court through a clear and transparent decision making process.
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Why is Liverpool City Council not complying with ICO decision notice FS50591795?
ICO Information Commissioner’s Office logo
A long time ago I made a FOI request to Liverpool City Council that resulted in ICO decision notice FS50591795 dated the 1st February 2016.
As it states in paragraphs 3 and 4 of that decision notice:
“3. The Commissioner requires the council to take the following steps to ensure compliance with the legislation.
Issue a fresh response under the terms of the FOIA to the part of the complainant’s request that seeks copies of relevant invoices.
4. The council must take these steps within 35 calendar days of the date of this decision notice. Failure to comply may result in the Commissioner making written certification of this fact to the High Court pursuant to section 54 of the Act and may be dealt with as a contempt of court.”
However 35 calendar days after the decision notice was yesterday and no “fresh response” has been issued.
So below is my response to Liverpool City Council’s Monitoring Officer about the lack of compliance with this decision notice.
To: "McLoughlin, Janette" <Jeanette.McLoughlin@liverpool.gov.uk>
Dear Janette McLoughlin,
I write to you in your capacity as Monitoring Officer for Liverpool City Council.
A copy of ICO decision notice FS50591795 issued on the 1st February 2016 is attached to this email for reference. Please note that this is an enforcement notice, see s.52 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
The enforcement notice states in paragraphs 3 and 4,
“3. The Commissioner requires the council to take the following steps to ensure compliance with the legislation.
Issue a fresh response under the terms of the FOIA to the part of the complainant’s request that seeks copies of relevant invoices.
4. The council must take these steps within 35 calendar days of the date of this decision notice. Failure to comply may result in the Commissioner making written certification of this fact to the High Court pursuant to section 54 of the Act and may be dealt with as a contempt of court.”
No fresh response has been issued within 35 calendar days of the decision notice.
Please could this matter be rectified as soon as possible.
As you are Liverpool City Council’s Monitoring Officer, I am also requesting that you write a report to the executive of Liverpool City Council (see s.5A of the Local Government and Housing Act 1989) as Liverpool City Council’s lack of response would appear to constitute a breach of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
A report would be useful so that lessons were learnt and there isn’t a repeat of this in the future.
I will also be contacting the regulator (the Information Commissioner’s Office) today about this matter.
Yours sincerely,
—
John Brace
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What was Mayor Anderson and Cllr Roz Gladden’s response to a campaign to save the Liveability service?
Protest before Liverpool City Council meeting about Liveability
Above are three women protesting in the rain before the Liverpool City Council budget meeting last week.
As the slogans are hard to read on the resized photos they are (from left to right), “LIVEABILITY for old, lame, sick, obese, lonely, confused. Don’t cut us off”, “It’s false economy to cut Liveability” and “LIVEABILITY helps us to help ourselves and saves money”.
Before the meeting I’d not heard of Liveability, but according to Liverpool City Council’s website it’s “a nurse led service that promotes the health and independence of people aged 50 and over”.
There were plenty of people apart from the three in the photo above that turned up to express their support for it.
Liverpool City Council meetings have a public question time/petitions/statements slot which was used by a campaigner against closure of the Liveability service. Second to speak during this slot was a Sue Carmichael. You can watch what Sue said below.
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Liverpool City Council Budget meeting 2nd March 2016 (public question time/statement/petition item)
Sue Carmichael (pictured below on the right) said, “Lord Mayor, Mayor Anderson, elected members, thank you for the opportunity to speak on behalf of the newly formed Liveability Action Group.
Sue Carmichael addresses a meeting of Liverpool City Council about the Liveability service
We have a petition with over 550 signatures which I’ll hand over now.
We very much welcome the great achievements for a city under your leadership and we also understand the impact of nationally imposed cutbacks on the city’s finances.
Our action group was formed last Thursday and over two hundred attended. We are all deeply shocked by the summary destruction of this award-winning NHS-led, nurse-led service and there’s no consultation about options. It was all done completely by stealth from our point of view.
We believe it’s an ill-considered decision halfway through Liverpool’s decade of health and wellbeing.
The Liveability service is fifteen years old and it’s for the physical and mental health and well-being of people over fifty, but most are in their sixties to nineties. Only about ten per cent are in their fifties.
The 1,500 registered members, there are 500 users each week with 24 brilliant volunteers who help. There are about twenty different sessions including a chair based one and ones for those with dementia and their carers. Plans were already in place to roll the scheme out elsewhere because we know how important it is.
Most users have acute or chronic conditions or mobility issues, or like myself have had major surgery of chemotherapy and Liveability has been part of our recovery.
Many live alone or are housebound carers. The twenty-four volunteers are critical to the service’s success. They are welcoming, they support the staff, they make drinks in the cafe and arrange social events and trips. There is a 50+ charity which also fund raises alongside.
Liveability is much more than exercise. It’s an informal village hub, where we meet different people on different days thereby extending our social contact as well as getting physically healthy. The social aspect is crucial.
It’s won many awards deservedly, been on national TV and even been visited by the Department of Health.
The proposed annihilation will be a cruel blow. Many say Liveability is a lifeline for them.
We’ve just heard earlier on today, there is a surprise announcement that there will be a new 50+ exercise program being city-wide, that is most welcome.
But this instant replacement cannot reinvent Liveability, the nurse led service, mainly for those in their sixties to nineties. It’s a unique city health and well-being asset. We must save it!
The fifteen years worth of staff, volunteer and user experience is available to build on. Liveability certainly ain’t broke so don’t fix it by killing it off.
Mayor Anderson, please abandon this hasty and cruel decision done in such a surprisingly underhand way without consultation. Liveability’s experience and success is there to use. Let’s jointly find an intelligent way to do this.
Keep Liveability and roll it out across the city, it’s really magic. Thank you.”
In response to what Sue Carmichael said there was applause.
A heckler shouted, “Shame on you!”
The Lord Mayor of Liverpool Cllr Concepcion said, “Mayor Anderson, would you like to respond?”
Mayor Anderson responds to concerns about the Liveability service Liverpool City Council 2nd March 2016
Mayor Anderson replied, “Lord Mayor, I just want to make one comment and then if it’s ok for you, I’ll just hand over to the Cabinet Member who can explain what we’re doing and why the decision has been made but we’re more than happy, I’ve been to the Liveability scheme and I’m more than happy to meet with people that are using the scheme to explain why we’re doing and what we’re doing. We’ve lost a huge amount of funding and this … fit for purpose and ready to replace the existing one, but as I said, I’ll let Cllr Gladden explain a little bit more.”
Councillor Roz Gladden (Cabinet Member for Adult and Children’s Social Care and Health) responds to concerns about the Liveability service at the Liverpool City Council meeting on the 2nd March 2016
Cllr Roz Gladden (Cabinet Member for Adult & Children’s Social Care & Health) responded by saying, “Can I first of all thank you for the amazing campaign that you’ve brought together in such a small amount of time?
You know one of the sadnesses of being the Cabinet Member for Social Care is watching over a six-year period cuts happen to the service and very few people have actually complained about it, so I honour the fact that you care so much about your service that you’ve come out to campaign for it. So thank you for doing that.
Lot’s of people think that public health do nice wooly things like making sure you eat salad, not put sugar in and don’t eat cake and things like that but I think these cuts have proved, cuts to public health have proved that actually they do really important services such as the Liveability services, such as looking after people who are homeless, the rough sleepers and those with drug addiction problems and naturally as an Authority we have to take care of those who are most vulnerable. That’s not to say that you aren’t of course, but we’ve had £2.9 million of council cuts within this financial year and next year we’ve got a further cut of £7 million just to the public health budget. They are government cuts, they are not imposed by us, they are cuts directly to the public health service.
And what we’ve decided to do, what we have done is we’ve been looking for some time now as a physical activity strategy that will be announced later this year, but we are running this, three centres across the city.
I don’t know where you’ve been looking to roll this out across the city. I visited Liveability three years ago. I’ve been trying to negotiate, my officers have to try and get the Liveability model because we value it rolled out across the city. That’s not happened and I can’t, I don’t want a service that just operates in Austin Rawlinson, I want to see it where people in the north of the city and the centre of the city can benefit from it too because I think it’s really important.
So that’s what we’re going to do and we’re going to ask you how you think we can do that for the rest of the city? This won’t be excluding you, we will include your knowledge and your experience in how this services works really expertly in how we can do it. So I welcome you, I welcome on board this. We will come along to you, I will meet with you next week and we’ll carry on from there. So thank you so much for coming along tonight, I really do appreciate it, thank you.”
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Protest outside Wallasey Town Hall about Girtrell Court 3rd March 2016 thumbnail
It is hard to know where to begin when writing about last night’s Council meeting of Wirral Council at Wallasey Town Hall to decide on the budget. Above is a photo of the demonstration outside the main entrance to Wallasey Town Hall protesting about Girtrell Court being closed.
Realising that councillors were bypassing this entrance and using the door by Committee Room 3, there was another protest outside that way in too.
The meeting started and within the first few minutes the petition item was reached. The Mayor asked Bernard Halley (pictured below with his son David) to present his petitions opposing the closure of Girtrell Court. His e-petition had 1,200 signatures (of those nearly a thousand were Wirral residents). There was also a linked paper petition with over six hundred signatories opposed too.
Bernard Halley said, “Both petitions begged this Council to keep Girtrell Court running until proper alternatives are established, costed, evaluated, consulted upon and proven to be adequate.”
Bernard Halley and his son David present a petition opposing the closure of Girtrell Court to a budget meeting of Wirral Council 3rd March 2016
He gave a similar speech to the one he had made at the Cabinet meeting. Mr Cleary felt closing Girtrell Court was contrary to one of the 2020 pledges to protect the vulnerable and his opinion was that the proposed saving through closure would not save Wirral Council money but cost more money. Reference was also made by him to a proposal in 2011 proposed by Cllr Steve Foulkes and seconded by Cllr Phil Davies to stop the closure of Council-run care homes.
He expressed concern about the quality of care in the private sector and added, “At a time when users, their families, the public and staff see press stories of the frivolous use of taxpayers’ money, we implore you to look in the mirror, look into the eyes of those people in the balcony upstairs and tell them hand on heart how there is better provision out there.
We know you can’t do that and as such we urge you to fully drop this proposal. Thank you for your time.”
Although petitions of over 3,000 signatures can be debated for fifteen minutes, a decision was made to debate Girtrell Court during the budget debate instead.
Each of the political parties on Wirral Council with more than one councillor had a slightly different policy in their budget about Girtrell Court.
The Labour budget proposed closing it, subject to a later decision of the Cabinet Member Cllr Chris Jones and Director of Adult Social Services Graham Hodkinson.
The Conservative budget removed the need to close Girtrell Court by finding savings elsewhere instead. Three of the proposed areas for savings (amongst others) the Conservatives proposed were removing the free taxi service for councillors to and from the Town Hall, deleting the Executive Support Officer post held by Martin Liptrot and reducing the Council’s press, marketing and destination management team from fourteen posts to eleven and a half.
The Lib Dem budget stated this on Girtrell Court, “Council believes that the closure of the Lyndale School and the anguished debate about the re-provision of services at Girtrell Court underline the need to work closely with service users and their families. Council has a duty of care to ensure their concerns are fully addressed.
In the case of Girtrell Court, Council requests that the Director of Adult Social Services and the Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Public Health produce regular reports to Members. These must set out how a range of sufficient quality alternative services is to be achieved. Members would be failing in their duty if they were not to seek assurance about the quality, availability and capacity of the
alternatives.”
Around three hours after the meeting had started, despite many heartfelt pleas about reversing their proposed closure of Girtrell Court, there was a vote on Labour’s budget and the amendments proposed by the Conservatives and Lib Dems.
The amendments proposed by the Conservatives and Lib Dems were lost (due to Labour councillors voting against them). The Labour budget was agreed (due to the majority of Labour councillors on Wirral Council).
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