Two Faced Enquiry ?

[Stig of the Seaton Dump]

So it is okay to waste massive amounts of money on dubious community groups that employ councillors BUT when it comes to investigating wrong doing we need to penny pinch !!!!

http://www.hartlepoolmail.co.uk/news/local/inquiry-into-councillors-interests-1-5417169

Glad to know that they are looking out for our interests - hahahaha

[fred c]

When you look at the vast amounts of ratepayers money wasted on schemes like the Tall Stories (£150,000 On Corporate Hospitality Alone), £4 Million of the "No Transport Interchange" i find it staggering that CAB can make a statement of limiting the expenditure on an Independent Inquiry to £20,000.

They surely can`t allow the Inquiry to reach this Limit & then abandon it before any conclusive decision is made by the Chairman of the Inquiry................ although on second thoughts..... maybe thats what they are hoping for.

[Inspector Knacker]

I was intrigued by the comment ....' a chance to set the record straight and quash any rumours and perceptions' . Surely that depends on the outcome of the enquiry ......?

[SRMoore]

I was intrigued by the comment ....' a chance to set the record straight and quash any rumours and perceptions' . Surely that depends on the outcome of the enquiry ......?

You presume the outcome hasn't already been reached and hand delivered to the chairman of the enquiry by a representative of the CLP

[tankerville]

Whether your for or against this enquiry is a matter of choice, but to abstain on such an important issue such as this is nothing less than shameful.

Why do we elect council representitives to sit on the fence?

They at least should have the strength of conviction to say. Yes or No.

But as they say you get what you vote for.

Next time around we'll see if this decision was the right one.

[for fawkes sake]

I certainly would agree with that. The integrity of the whole council is being questioned here and for any individual councillor to duck the issue by abstain is absurd. Has Cllr Fisher no view on the matter?  Is he not at all bothered one way or the other?

[tankerville]

The prospective councillor's that breathed fire and brimstone before being elected now seem to have found slippers in front of the fire.

Lion's now Lamb's..

It would seem the only BALLS OF STEEL we are going to see in this town are those on Powlett Road Roundabout.

[mk1]

Forget the detail and look at the big picture.
Despite the best efforts of the fa*tty Belchers and the rest of the Labour nodding dogs the issue has not gone away. They have been forced onto this and the graceless way they have gone about it betrays the hurt they feel.
I am sure they would rather be writing  pointless and rambling 
letter to No 10 rather than facing trouble-making out of town pensioners!  Combine it  with Angie's latest brush with the law and  this is not a good time for the tireless 'charidee' worker and his partner who loots the local authority  purse when someone calls him names at work!

[rabbit]

If the council had paid more attention to "transparency" and "governance" they would not have to be spending up to 20K pounds of our money on this inquiry.

The inquiry will no doubt come up with recommendations which include improving the above, by adopting better or best practices used by other councils,.

[DRiddle]

People who go to full council meetings probably know already, but on December the 6th last year, it was me who asked for this inquiry directly, via one of my supplementary questions. The question was immediately followed by a motion from Councillor Lilley which basically called for the extact same thing, which at the time was pleasing.

As was reported in the 'Catch the rabbit' article on this site, there then followed one of the most interesting debates in council for a long time.

At the time of the intitial question from me, and subsequent motion from Councillor Lilley, there were LOTS of councillors who openly objected to the idea of an inquiry. Some of them very strongly objected. However, now it seems that they ALL support it, from the chief executive downover, they all want it to happen.

However, what concerns me, is that in terms of what i originally wanted, and what we're now likely to get, are two different things entirely.

In my opinion, the inquiry has already been neutered to within an inch of its life.

Councillors have decided on how much it will cost. Councillors are deciding on the level of professional acumen of the person leading the inquiry. Councillors will, between them, hand pick the chairman of the inquiry. Councillors will decide/have decided on the specific focus of the inquiry.

The whole problem I had, and reason I asked the question in the first place, was that the peer review highlighted an issue with councillors being seemingly TOO involved in the awarding of contracts to other councillors, or at least to CIC's which have councillors on their board of directors. (e.g Who Cares North East, a £640,000 contract awarded by councillors to councillors). 

Now, we will see an 'inquiry' into situations such as the awarding of the 'WCNE' contract (and others), in which a huge number of the key decisions as to how, when, where and by whom the inquiry will be led by.... have been taken by the councillors.

Several of whom are the people under the focus of the inquiry.

If this inquiry reveals anything other than a "Well done, everythings fine, crack on as you are" type verdict i'll be very surprised.

[steveL]

HBC has been sloppy over its register of interests for years.

For example, imagine someone being Chairman of the local Health Scrutiny Forum, one of the duties of which is to monitor the performance of the local PCT. If that Chairman had a spouse or partner who was employed in a position entirely funded by the local PCT, then you would expect the Chairman's register of interests to say so, wouldn't you?

Not that it could ever happen here, of course. 

[steveL]

People who go to full council meetings probably know already, but on December the 6th last year, it was me who asked for this inquiry directly, via one of my supplementary questions. The question was immediately followed by a motion from Councillor Lilley which basically called for the extact same thing, which at the time was pleasing.

As was reported in the 'Catch the rabbit' article on this site, there then followed one of the most interesting debates in council for a long time.

At the time of the intitial question from me, and subsequent motion from Councillor Lilley, there were LOTS of councillors who openly objected to the idea of an inquiry. Some of them very strongly objected. However, now it seems that they ALL support it, from the chief executive downover, they all want it to happen.

However, what concerns me, is that in terms of what i originally wanted, and what we're now likely to get, are two different things entirely.

In my opinion, the inquiry has already been neutered to within an inch of its life.

Councillors have decided on how much it will cost. Councillors are deciding on the level of professional acumen of the person leading the inquiry. Councillors will, between them, hand pick the chairman of the inquiry. Councillors will decide/have decided on the specific focus of the inquiry.

The whole problem I had, and reason I asked the question in the first place, was that the peer review highlighted an issue with councillors being seemingly TOO involved in the awarding of contracts to other councillors, or at least to CIC's which have councillors on their board of directors. (e.g Who Cares North East, a £640,000 contract awarded by councillors to councillors). 

Now, we will see an 'inquiry' into situations such as the awarding of the 'WCNE' contract (and others), in which a huge number of the key decisions as to how, when, where and by whom the inquiry will be led by.... have been taken by the councillors.

Several of whom are the people under the focus of the inquiry.

If this inquiry reveals anything other than a "Well done, everythings fine, crack on as you are" type verdict i'll be very surprised.

I'm not too bothered about this. In a way the enquiry has already begun and the selection of the Chairman and the drafting of the terms of reference is its first test.

You're right to be sceptical. The sea-change in attitude towards an enquiry that we both witnessed on Thursday suggests that some within the council think that they already have things well under control - they don't. They may well have a plan - probably that if they select the 'right' Chairman and throttle the terms of reference, then everything will work out fine.

However, no enquiry is worth a fig if it doesn't have the support of the public and its first task is to win that support. Any attempt to try to fix the outcome before it even gets underway will only attract more wrath from the public and confirm their worst suspicions. That's not to say no such attempt will not be made; in fact I'm almost certain that it will. The race across the chamber made by Cllr Wells to Cllr CAB immediately after the meeting finished suggested a joint strategy was at play - only the high-five and a loud 'YES' was missing.

The misjudgement being made, is that there is currently no recognition or acceptance that the operational integrity of HBC is already in freefall and that nothing will now stop a very hard landing. There are already too many cracks for the monolith to remain intact in its present state and, with even more about to appear, the only decison left for individual councillors to make is on which side of the line do they want to be found when the whole rotten edifice comes crumbling down.

There are issues of corporate negligence here and of a lack of probity and due diligence in the way that public money has been spent. Public scrutiny of these issues requires a far bigger and wider process.

The enquiry is only part of this process. It will focus almost entirely on the matter of the register of interests and won't touch the developing Owton Manor scandal to any great extent. That will continue to run as a parallel story and will show any attempt to use the enquiry as a cover-up merely as confirmation that the local authority is indeed rotten to the core.   
 

[whatabouthisthen]

To be fair to Fisher, he explained he couldn't vote for the motion as he didn't agree to the £20k cap. No alternative was offered so he had no alternative but to abstain.

Thompson proposed the cap but also abstained - don't know why. I think the other two abstainees were Drummond and Hall.

[whatabouthisthen]

I agree with driddle. I, too, am not as sanguine as Steve. I don't know how you can have an 'independent' inquiry when the people who are going to be examined choose the Chair and, presumably, any other member, set the terms of reference and set a cap on the cost - £20k isn't going to go far especially if wrong doing is established. The scene was set for a whitewash as soon as the Councillors became enthusiastic  over a suggestion to find someone local who may be so publicly minded as to do it for nothing - you could hear the sighs of relief. For many Councillors it was the first and only time that they became animated.
Surely Peter Devlin should be handling the inquiry and the Chair should set his own terms of reference after public consultation. Councillors should have NO say in the matter, they are the ones under scrutiny.

[whatabouthisthen]

Re my post re Fisher, I meant Cath Hill, certainly not GED.