Tag: Cllr Denise Roberts

Standards Committee 29/9/2011 Part 14 Urgent Business – Correspondence Received by the Chair

Continued from Standards Committee 29/9/2011 Part 13 Cllr Chris Blakeley said it “needs more than five minutes to understand the ramifications” and asked when the next meeting was. The answer given by Mrs. Shirley Hudspeth was the 30th November [2011]. Cllr Les Rowlands said there were no time issues. Cllr Chris Blakeley said this needed … Continue reading “Standards Committee 29/9/2011 Part 14 Urgent Business – Correspondence Received by the Chair”

Continued from Standards Committee 29/9/2011 Part 13

Cllr Chris Blakeley said it “needs more than five minutes to understand the ramifications” and asked when the next meeting was.
The answer given by Mrs. Shirley Hudspeth was the 30th November [2011].

Cllr Les Rowlands said there were no time issues.
Cllr Chris Blakeley said this needed to be conveyed to Mr. Morton.
Cllr Dave Mitchell said it was not fair on councillors.

Surjit Tour said the process was explained in the middle of August. However the letter had been delivered on the eve of the committee. The process had been communicated to individuals in the middle of August. There had been delay, Standards for England had decided in the middle of August (17th August).

Cllr Chris Blakeley said he was happy to consider it if he had the time to read it and digest it and give him justice.

The Chair Brian Cummings asked if everyone wanted a copy?

Surjit Tour said they should consider whether to make it exempt or not.

RESOLVED:  That Mr Morton’s correspondence be considered at the next meeting of the Committee scheduled for 30 November 2011 and he be informed of this decision.

The meeting finished.

Standards Committee 29/9/2011 Part 13

The Chair, Brian Cummings said he wanted to consider an urgent request in respect of whistleblowing from Mr. Martin Morton.

Cllr Pat Williams declared a prejudicial interest in this matter as Mr. Martin Morton had made a complaint about her.
Cllr Denise Roberts declared a prejudicial interest in this matter as Mr. Martin Morton had made a complaint about her.
Cllr John Salter declared a prejudicial interest by virtue of being on the Initial Assessment Panel.

Cllr Gerry Ellis asked Surjit Tour a question which was answered.

Cllr Pat Williams, Cllr Denise Roberts and Cllr John Salter having declared a prejudicial interest in this matter left the room.

Cllr Dave Mitchell asked for clarification as he had been involved in a call-in.

Surjit Tour said there were no further conflicts of interest.

The Chair, Brian Cummings said something about it being “before his time”.

Surjit Tour said the letter regarding the standards matter and whether it should be urgent business had only been sent to the Chair [Brian Cummings]. There were issues involved. He suggested they consider representations this evening and make a decision. Surjit Tour said the complaint had been addressed and gone through due process. The level of detail, would require sufficient time for representations however there was not time limitation and would be more appropriate by the next meeting when the full range of issues could be discussed.

Deputy Mayor Cllr Gerry Ellis asked if it was the same letter from a West Kirby resident?
Cllr Les Rowlands said in his opinion it should be on the next committee’s agenda, it was not right to digest it all and make decisions.

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

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?

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

Bill Norman continued saying that the detail was not analysed, but the level of fairness in the delay in the referral and delays organising the IAP meeting (which made its recommendation in March) as well as the earlier report being “topped and tailed” meant the wrong report had been sent when it was referred to the Standards Board for England so that it only referred to three instead of four councillors.

They had “checked the files” and only the original complaint against three councillors had been used which led to no further action by Standards Board for England. When it emerged that Martin Morton asked what the result was of the complaint about Cllr Bridson that had been referred to the Standards Board for England, the thing “unravelled”. They had “appended the wrong complaint”. The wrong one had been sent to the Standards Board for England by Wirral Council. There was then a discussion on how to go ahead.

The recommendation was that there should be the same Initial Assessment Panel. This met on the 8th June and considered the second complaint and decided to refer it to the Standards Board for England. They were awaiting a decision about the full complaint. The timescale was five working days, however Standards Board for England were not compliant with this as they were “hemorrhaging staff” and were having a problem with timescales.

Bill Norman apologised for the Initial Assessment Panel receiving the wrong paperwork and was “happy to repeat it shouldn’t have happened”.

Cllr Blakeley said he accepted the apology but it had shown Wirral Council “in a bad light”.