What were the top 10 most popular stories on this blog last month in June 2016?

What were the top 10 most popular stories on this blog last month in June 2016?

What were the top 10 most popular stories on this blog last month in June 2016?

                              

Below are links to the ten most popular stories read on this blog last month (June 2016). Eight involve Wirral Council, one Liverpool City Council and the other Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service/Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority. All except one (the one about the regeneration of Birkenhead Town Centre) were published in June 2016. Two are on the topic of the recent First-tier Tribunal (Information Rights) public hearing involving myself and Wirral Council.

I’m surprised the EU Referendum stories didn’t feature higher up in the list, but as the EU Referendum was held in the last week of June, those stories have had less time to be read than articles published nearer the start of June.

Councillor Steve Foulkes (left) at a Merseytravel Committee meeting (7th January 2016)
Councillor Steve Foulkes (left) at a Merseytravel Committee meeting (7th January 2016)

1. Why has Wirral Council sunk deeper into the quagmire of poor corporate governance surrounding a complaint about Cllr Steve Foulkes? (published 29th June 2016)

2. Secrets about Wirral Council’s Birkenhead Town Centre Regeneration revealed (published 27th December 2013)

3. Labour councillors reject Green Party proposal to reduce Mayor of Liverpool’s Allowance by £89,000 over a 4 year period (published 1st June 2016)

4. Surjit Tour asks Wirral councillors to agree to changes to how complaints about councillors are dealt with (published 3rd June 2016)

5. £206,000 extra for Wirral’s potholes, £170,000 for selling “ornamental pleasure gardens” and a land swap to a body that doesn’t exist! (published 13th June 2016)

6. What did Surjit Tour answer to questions about a Freedom of Information request to Wirral Council at the First-tier Tribunal (Information Rights) hearing (EA/2016/0033) (continued)? (published 22nd June 2016)

7. Disclosure of 46 pages of PFI contractor’s banking details by Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service described as “oversight” (published 14th June 2016)

8. What was in the 11 A4 page witness statement of Surjit Tour (Wirral Council) about a Freedom of Information request for the minutes of a meeting of the Headteachers’ and Teachers’ Joint Consultative Committee (EA/2016/0033)? (published 17th June 2016)

9. Where is your polling station (for Wirral voters) for the 2016 EU Referendum vote? (published 23rd June 2016)

10. Liberal Democrat Leader Cllr Phil Gilchrist calls for cross-party unity on Wirral Council on issue of EU funding withdrawal (published 27th June 2016)

If you click on any of the buttons below, you’ll be doing me a favour by sharing this article with other people.

£206,000 extra for Wirral’s potholes, £170,000 for selling “ornamental pleasure gardens” and a land swap to a body that doesn’t exist!

£206,000 extra for Wirral’s potholes, £170,000 for selling “ornamental pleasure gardens” and a land swap to a body that doesn’t exist!

£206,000 extra for Wirral’s potholes, £170,000 for selling “ornamental pleasure gardens” and a land swap to a body that doesn’t exist!

                                        

Jane Kennedy (left), the current Police and Crime Commissioner for Merseyside and Labour Party candidate in the 2016 elections for a Police and Crime Commissioner for Merseyside at a public meeting of the Police and Fire Collaboration Committee (2015)
Jane Kennedy (left), the current Police and Crime Commissioner for Merseyside | Right Sir Jon Murphy QPM (Chief Constable)

Wirral Council has accepted an extra £206,000 from the government’s Pothole Action Fund to be spent on (no prizes for guessing) fixing potholes on Wirral’s roads.

The details are in a report, but they expect to repair around 3,887 potholes and Wirral Council will be publishing a report on how they spend the money.

Of the £206,000 allocation, £116,000 is planned to be spent on surface dressing, £20,000 on “micro-asphalt” and £70,000 on patching.

The surface dressing work will be carried out in August and the micro-asphalt work is planned to start in July.

In other news, Cllr George Davies has managed to agree a land swap with a public body that was abolished in 2012. Yes, I couldn’t make this up if I tried!

The Merseyside Police Authority (abolished in November 2012) is now the “owner” of a piece of land (according to his decision). Maybe Wirral Council needs to move with the times and realise it’s the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner for Merseyside (after all only last month we had the second election for who would be Merseyside’s Police and Crime Commissioner)!

Finally, onto a phrase you don’t hear very often on this blog “ornamental pleasure garden”. Wirral Council has decided to sell land next to Gibson House to a developer for £170,000 despite covenants restricting its use to an “ornamental pleasure garden”.

Wirral Council selling off green space is of course a worry elsewhere on the Wirral with its flagship Hoylake Golf Resort project causing such concerns a local Hoylake councillor Cllr Gerry Ellis recently called for the project to be scrapped.

If you click on any of the buttons below, you’ll be doing me a favour by sharing this article with other people.

How did councillors think Wirral Council should spend £75,000 in Wallasey on road safety, cycling and walking?

How did councillors think Wirral Council should spend £75,000 in Wallasey on road safety, cycling and walking?

How did councillors think Wirral Council should spend £75,000 in Wallasey on road safety, cycling and walking?

                        

Following on from yesterday’s story about a legal change meaning Wirral Council can’t prevent filming at its public meetings any more, the first meeting affected by this was a Working Group of the Wallasey Constituency Committee.

You can watch this entire meeting from beginning to end if you wish, but let’s start at the beginning.

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.

YouTube privacy policy

If you accept this notice, your choice will be saved and the page will refresh.

First here’s a list of who from the Working Group was present:

Conservative councillors
Councillor Bruce Berry
Councillor Chris Blakeley
Councillor Paul Hayes
Councillor Leah Fraser

Community representatives
Ken Harrison
Tony Jones
Brian Higgins

Labour councillors
Councillor Rob Gregson
Councillor Chris Jones
Councillor Adrian Jones
Councillor Matt Daniel
Councillor Anita Leech
Councillor Bernie Mooney
Councillor Janette Williamson

The first item was appointing a Chair (just for this meeting). Unusually nobody from Wirral Council’s legal services was present to advise the Committee, so the committee services officer Andrew Mossop asked for nominations for Chair.

Cllr Janette Williamson proposed Cllr Rob Gregson. Cllr Williamson’s proposal was seconded by Cllr Chris Jones.

Six out of seven Labour councillors voted for Cllr Rob Gregson as Chair.
Four out of four Conservative councillors voted against Cllr Rob Gregson being Chair.

So Cllr Rob Gregson was elected Chair by a vote of 6:4. Who was the Labour “rebel” who didn’t vote for Cllr Rob Gregson as Chair? Well the answer to that was he didn’t vote for himself.

Cllr Rob Gregson said “thank you very much” and wandered over to where the Chair sits and continued his list of thanks which was thankfully shorter than most Oscar acceptance speeches.

He thanked people for attending, he thanked myself and my wife, the councillors & community representatives. Having thanked literally everyone in the room, he then went on to apologies.

Andrew Mossop read out a list of apologies. It was a long list of councillors that couldn’t make it Cllr Pat Hackett (Labour), Cllr Treena Johnson (Labour), Cllr Lesley Rennie (Conservative) and Cllr Steve Williams (Conservative).

Councillor Anita Leech apologised for the absence of Cllr Ron Abbey (Labour). Another Labour councillor apologised for the absence of Cllr Chris Spriggs (Labour). The Council’s website also lists apologies from Keith Raybould (one of the community representatives).

The Chair got his glasses out of his shirt pocket to read what was the next item on the agenda. He asked for declarations of interest? Nobody made any declarations of interest.

The first main agenda item was Integrated Transport Block Capital Programme Funding (2014/15). In case that agenda item title means absolutely nothing to you, it was about how the committee would decide to spend £38,875 on “improving road safety” and £38,875 on promoting active travel & health. The jargon “active travel” if you’re unfamiliar with the term it refers to walking and cycling.

The Chair asked Wirral Council’s road safety manager David Rees to introduce his report. He explained that his report and how officers decided on road safety schemes based on casualty figures. Mr Rees referred to what the money could be spent on, such as vehicle activated signs which had previously been funded by the Area Forums. Another way the money could be spent was on dropped crossings which assisted pedestrians with mobility issues, blind people, those in wheelchairs and mums with prams. The list of schemes already approved by Cabinet under central funding was referred to. He asked for areas that the Committee wished officers to look into and they would find out how much it was likely to cost.

Councillor Leah Fraser spoke first and asked a question and asked what on the list had been dealt with already which was replied to by David Rees. The next councillor to be heard was the mellifluous tones of Councillor Adrian Jones. After a short answer to his question Cllr Adrian Jones explained that he was in a position to understand his own ward (which is Seacombe) but that they had to decide what was best for Wallasey. He explained that each councillor would make a bundle of requests for their own ward which would go to officers, who’d then make recommendations. He said he assumed that David Rees must be frustrated by the process.

David Rees in his answer referred to Department for Transport regulations. Mr Rees said that even with suggestions where there weren’t recorded accidents, there may be broader benefits that officers could see for particular schemes.

Councillor Chris Jones asked about potholes and asked whether some could be done using the extra pothole funding that Wirral Council had received? David Rees explained that he had limited knowledge of the highway maintenance side and that they were keen to sort out the potholes while the weather was good. He said he could ask Caroline Laing to circulate a list to the Committee as to which ones they were looking at sorting out.

Councillor Chris Blakeley said, “OK thanks Chairman, .. I’m aware we’re being filmed tonight” and glanced in the direction of the camera. He said “we all know our own wards” and “at the risk of sounding like a stuck needle” that in the days of the Area Forums, where there were two wards involved that they used to split the money down the middle. He suggested that the money should be split six ways (as there are six wards in Wallasey), so that each ward would get just under £13,000.

The Chair replied to Councillor Chris Blakeley and admitted he was a little confused, but he said the danger was that the more articulate councillors being able to able to describe a minor dint in the road as apocalyptic which would mean such things would be favoured over areas that needed to be looked at.

If you click on any of the buttons below, you’ll be doing me a favour by sharing this article with other people.