Catch the Rabbit

[fred c]

If you look at the Present Register of Interest...... it would appear some councillors have no visible means of support.

A list on HTH of councillors who earn a salary / expenses etc etc etc, from any of the following occupations would be useful.

Health Service

Local Authority

Unions

Voluntary Sector

Care in the Community

Supply of Services to HBC or Voluntary / Charitable Organisations.

What I can`t fathom out is, "Why" any councillor wouldn`t be in favour of a Comprehensive Register of Interest, that is Open, Transparent & Accountable to the rate payers of Hartlepool.

[tankerville]

Can anyone tell me as an outsider looking in, just what will be the outcome of all this?

The same people if they held responsible will be re-elected.

They can beat their partner / wife / husband , lie,  steal, and kick the dog yet when election day comes along they get voted back in.

The whole mess will leave a taste in people's mouths that will not go away, those that are blameless will get tarred with the same brush as those that are not.

It's an ill wind that does nobody any good.. But this is a foul stench.

[craig finton]

This is something which the public expect to be in place already just like it is for MPs. It will be the resistance to putting it in place which will catch the public's attention and make them wonder why such resistance exists.
This is a council which is forever boasting of how transparent and open it is and when the Peer Group found that the council's approach to the declaration of interests 'lacked rigour', is it not reasonable for people to expect the council to 'take it on the chin' and put it right?
Instead they seem to be engaged in rubbishing the Peer Group. Put it this way, if the Peer Group had come up with nothing but praise for the council, they would now be quoting it left, right and centre as a way of telling us how wonderful they all were.

[craig finton]

I'm sure that they will put this one off as long as possible and look for 'a good day to bury bad news'.

[testing times]

The planned increases in basic councillor allowances are sitting on a desk somewhere but I would suggest that it's been decided to tag this on to the increases for committee chairman and the council leader so as not to have two 'bad news' days. It's a poor show really. On the one hand, we're looking at a step change upwards in allowances with lots of labour councillors set to be considerably better off what with the increase in basic allowances AND 'special responsibility' allowances; on the other hand, the same people resisting any move to tighten up the declared interest procedures. Doesn't tell a good story, does it?

[fred c]

It  may be useful to reflect that it only took 4 days for the Peer Group to come to the conclusions they did about HBC.

You would have thought that The Chairman of the Council would have been keen to clear up some of the misconceptions the Peer Group may have come to.

And he could have done that quite simply by proposing that HBC adopt a fully accountable & concise "Register of Interest" at the last Council Meeting, & that it should come into effect immediately.

It would have been as simple as that.

[fred c]

What exactly does the LINk do ?? am i correct in thinking it only started in 2009 ?

[steveL]

http://www.hartlepoollink.co.uk/

Interesting page this. There's this bit at the bottom:

HVDA is currently the host for Hartlepool Local Involvement Network (LINk).  This section of the website is currently under reconstruction and will be available shortly.
If you require any information regarding the work of Hartlepool LINk please contact:
Christopher Akers Belcher at c.akersbelcher@hvda.co.uk
Stephen Thomas at s.thomas@hvda.co.uk
Alternatively you can telephone 01429 262641.

Apart from CAB, I think Stephen Thomas is also a labour member who stood for election in Dyke House. At the very bottom, you see that the site is Powered By: Xivvi which is a private business run by Cllr Paul Thompson and Cllr Pamela Hargreaves and which gets much of its business from the local public sector.

I doubt if there's anything dodgy here but it's a good example of how incestuous things can appear to be and why there is such a need for 'declared interests' to be more rigourous and open. Both Thompson and Hargreaves are past and present Cabinet members and would have been involved in grant funding. Further down the live, Xivvi gets the job of the HVDA website.

They could have done it for free; in which case good for them. However, if there was/is a payment involved then it begs the question 'was the chance of the work available to other web writing organisations'  and if not why not? There have been other examples of Xivvi performing work for organisations dependant on grant funding.

Open and Transparent? I think we're a long way from that.

[mk1]

A while back I googled  Pam's businesses and I was surprised how many she had a finger in.

[fred c]

A while back I googled  Pam's businesses and I was surprised how many she had a finger in.

Do Tell........... lol


But if HBC had a fully accountable Register of Interests, there would be no need to Google that sort of information, it would be available on the HBC website ??

[steveL]

I would say that the present system is so slack and has been for so long that its reached the point when councillors can no longer see what others can see all too clearly. You can't be involved in the decision process of awarding grants or funding to organisations and then, further down the line, be seen to be receiving payments or benefiting in some other way from those organisations unless you're totally up front about the connection.
By that I mean that it's not enough to simply put Xivvi down on your declared interests but specifically to make it clear that Xivvi focuses on providing services to organisations in the 3rd sector, a number of which receive funding from HBC and it also provides services directly commissioned by HBC. It's this level of detail that is missing from the present system.

While we're on the subject, if any of you have the time, take a look at the accounts of Families First on the Charity Commission's web site and compare them with the fag-packet accounts of Manor Residents. It'll give you an idea of where the problem really lies.

[steveL]

Can anyone tell me as an outsider looking in, just what will be the outcome of all this?

The same people if they held responsible will be re-elected.

They can beat their partner / wife / husband , lie,  steal, and kick the dog yet when election day comes along they get voted back in.

The whole mess will leave a taste in people's mouths that will not go away, those that are blameless will get tarred with the same brush as those that are not.

It's an ill wind that does nobody any good.. But this is a foul stench.

There's no one untainted by this because even those with nothing to hide (and those are by far the majority) have sat and allowed such complacency to take root which in turn has allowed the few bad apples to spoil the whole barrel. Councillors are the first people we rely on to keep their house in order; it's only because they have collectively ducked the issue that we are where we are.

[fred c]

At the end of the day, The Voters need to be in possesion of all the facts before being able to make an informed decision on "Who" to vote for in any election, & a Register of the financial details of any possible candiate would be a major consideration for the voter.

Members have shown in the last day or so how easy it is to gather information about various people, but the point is, we, the public should not need to go to these lengths, a Register of Interests that lists all of the various details that have been mentioned in these forums would not be a significant problem to HBC.

The problem lies with both Councillors & Officers, surely they can see why urgent action needs to be taken to remedy the problems brought into the public domain by the Peer Group Review.

As mentioned on numerous occcasions, members of HTHC have passed comment on the fact that the
majority of Councillors are doing a good job in difficult times for their wards & the town, but unfortunately any delay in resolving the issue of a Register of Interest, is adding fuel to the fires of conspiracy.

[not4me]

CABs efforts in The Mail suggest the Labour crowd are intent on strangling this one at birth.

"To be quite honest, I was disappointed that the motion came about because I find it to be a slur on the work of our officers in the council. All of the accounts and contracts are managed both internally and also by an external auditor.
The resolution was done off the cuff without any regard on the impact of the cost, terms of reference or timescale, just that it had to be indepenent and by somebody with a leagal background.
That is why the Labour Group Leader put forward an amendment for a further report to come back to full council outling the cost and terms of reference.
Councillor Akers-Belcher fears an inquiry could cost up to £100,000 and said it would be based on people's perceptions and no hard evidence. There is no evidence to suggest that there is any wrong doing. I would rather see that money spent on services or helping to safeguard services under threat. We need to make sure that we are doing right by the finances of the Council."

I would have thought a good start would be for CAB to explain why he tried to blame the Charity Commission for the fiddled accounts of Manor Residents, something which I gather he has so far failed to do.

[fred c]

I guess this is what they mean by 'perception'

Ar**`s are twitching down at the Kremlin, The Mail is their biggest supporter, but with the recent poll result (see above) even The Mail would be hard pressed to be supportive of any action they take that goes against such strong public opinion.

The £100,000 is a frightener, they have no idea of how much its going to cost, but whatever it costs it will be money well spent if it gets to the bottom of this whole unsavoury business.

The motion did not offer any slurs against council officers, however the action by the ruling group places a slur upon every sitting councillor.