So who’s putting up your council tax in Wirral, Liverpool, St Helens, Knowsley and Sefton and what happened when the Race Equality Task Force reported?
By John Brace (Editor) and Leonora Brace (Co-Editor)
First publication date: 7th February 2021, 15:37 (GMT)
This last week has been an interesting one, as politicians decided (despite concerns about affordability) to put up local taxes such as council tax for the people of Merseyside.
Thursday saw a public meeting of the Merseyside Police and Crime Panel meet (who are ten councillors appointed by the district councils on Merseyside (Wirral, Liverpool, St Helens, Knowsley and Sefton) plus two independent members.
You can watch the discussion below (although Knowsley Council in the interests of openness and transparency made their video of the meeting unavailable to view afterwards).
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Merseyside Police and Crime Panel 4th February 2021
The other item of note discussed at that meeting was the recruitment of a new Chief Constable for Merseyside Police following the resignation of Andy Cooke (who resigns to take up a role in HMICFRS (Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services). He referred during the public meeting to efforts made by Merseyside Police to recruit police officers from ethnic minorities.
Although the report about that on Knowsley Council’s website states at 4.2, “Any prospective appointee must have been a Constable in any part of the United Kingdom”, as usual with local government this is part of the making it up as we go along approach.
The Appointment of Chief Officers of Police (Overseas Police Forces) Regulations 2014 opens up such Chief Constable appointments also to those who have been police (of a specified rank) in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and United States of America. But as regular readers of this blog will know, it’s deemed “unreasonable” of me to expect those involved in law and order to have an understanding of the law and make such decisions in accordance with the legal framework rather than just make it up as they go along.
This takes me quite neatly to the next topic for this piece which is Liverpool City Council’s Race Equality Taskforce chaired by Tracey Gore. A public meeting of Liverpool City Council’s Education & Children’s Services Select Committee had a Race Equality Task Force Update (starts at 49:06 in the video below),
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Liverpool City Council’s Education & Children’s Services Select Committee 28th January 2021
Councillors heard from those involved at Belvedere Academy as to what had happened there (but were instructed by the Chair that they would not be allowed to ask questions). Later in the meeting there was also a bad tempered exchange of views (although not quite descending to the level of the infamous Handforth Parish Council public meeting).
Those at the Liverpool City Council meeting heard that the final report of the Race Equality Taskforce looks like it will now be delayed until after the May Mayor of Liverpool elections and the the Taskforce and its continued work depends on whoever is elected as Mayor of Liverpool in May.
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They don’t give value for money as it is, and have the cheek to raise it, they only have one interest and that’s lining their own pockets?
Thanks for your comment.
Yes council tax (at least the police element of it on Merseyside) is going up from April 2021.
As to whether there’s value for money, well there’s the value for money assessment done by the auditors then there’s the public view on whether what is paid in council tax is value for money or not.