Council Meeting 25th June (inc. Video)

[admin]

The next meeting of the full council will take place on Thursday, 25th June 2015 at 7pm in the Civic Centre

Agenda

http://www.hartlepool.gov.uk/egov_downloads/25.06.15_-_Council_Agenda.pdf

[steveL]

Read into this proposal as you wish. I smell a rabbit.....

"The Policy Committee system, which this Council has developed, provides a
role for all members. The public are encouraged to attend Policy Committee
meetings and forums to voice their views. Our Policy Committee system has
been recognised as a model of good practice and a number of other Councils
are considering implementing this model of governance.
We propose that action is taken to ensure that Council business is conducted
with dignity and in a way that supports open, transparent and effective
democracy. We therefore resolve that the Chief Executive be instructed to
compile a report, which incorporates proposals for the management and
filming by the Council, of Full Council meetings and for the publication of the
unedited video on the Council website. To this end, a report will be presented
to an early meeting of the Finance and Policy Committee".

Signed: Councillors C Akers-Belcher, Richardson, Cook, Simmons and
James.

[marky]

Read into this proposal as you wish. I smell a rabbit.....

"The Policy Committee system, which this Council has developed, provides a
role for all members. The public are encouraged to attend Policy Committee
meetings and forums to voice their views. Our Policy Committee system has
been recognised as a model of good practice and a number of other Councils
are considering implementing this model of governance.
We propose that action is taken to ensure that Council business is conducted
with dignity and in a way that supports open, transparent and effective
democracy. We therefore resolve that the Chief Executive be instructed to
compile a report, which incorporates proposals for the management and
filming by the Council, of Full Council meetings and for the publication of the
unedited video on the Council website. To this end, a report will be presented
to an early meeting of the Finance and Policy Committee".

Signed: Councillors C Akers-Belcher, Richardson, Cook, Simmons and
James.

Dare I suggest that after years of opposing any filming of council meetings, Labour now want to control it by producing their own videos and, more than likely, to ban anyone else from doing so.

[DRiddle]

Absolute waste of time that proposal. The guidelines already exist and the law favours the public, local press, amateur journalists, bloggers and such like.

Quite rightly too. It favours those types of people for exactly the reason the proposers are trying to do this. You can't just 'change the law' because you don't like it.

They may as well ask the CEO to go away and compile some guidelines on the Highway Code, or on smoking in public places.

Even if this is voted through it can only be a 'guideline', it can't be enforced. People have a right by law to film the meetings. End of.

[steveL]

I don't think it's a waste of time. Everyone needs to be reminded now and then over the direction of travel this council is heading. The video showing Cranney up for what he is has done it this time; without the video, we would have travelled down the 'inconclusive' path and read of how it was 'her word against his'. The video closed off that option.

So the next step is to try and control the videoing of meetings. There will be one 'official' video followed by many instances of the camera 'pointing the wrong way' at critical moments. Only this official video will be admissible as evidence.

It won't work, for all of the reasons Riddle says, but that won't stop them trying.

[fred c]

Public videoing & live streaming has let the cat out of the bag..... all the mob are trying to do is, if there is another contentious meeting to use their video as the evidence to put forward...... but social media youtube & the rest will blow that out of the water.

Just about the best piece of legislation ever brought in by the tories

[Foggy]

I've just had a thought about this and I might be barking up the wrong tree but....

There has obviously got to be something behind this as there usually is where the Labour lot are concerned. The public have been able to film meetings for a while now and they have never been interested in doing any kind of official recording before. So why now? Could they possibly want to use it as an opportunity to film people in the public gallery too?

We all know that the public have been very vocal in some meetings and, rightly so, have expressed their displeasure at how the council (or most of it) operates. I'm just wondering if the Cranney incident, among others, has made them to come up with this little plan.  There was also the incident last month when Chris Simmons threw his toys out of his pram and stormed out because of something a member of the public said to him. I notice he is one of the people who has signed this motion.

My imagination may be running away with me but I just thought I would put it out there. I'm not even sure they are allowed to film the public. Does anyone know?

Edit: I've just found this in the government's guide:

Are there other limits that I should be aware of?
The council or local government body should consider adopting a policy on the filming of members of the public, and ensure that they protect children, the vulnerable and other members of the public who actively object to being filmed, without undermining the broader transparency of the meeting.

It's a little vague and it sounds to me like councils can do what they like with regard to this.

[Foggy]

Seems I wasn't barking up the wrong tree after all. Trisha Lawton has just confirmed my theory. They want to film the public too.

The farce continues.

[Tee_Ess_25er]

I am not sure what was said but just before the meeting started RMW walked over to CAB to have a quick discussion, I saw RMW gesticulating in a definite negative fashion over whatever they talked about and CAB spent the rest of the meeting with a face like a slapped ar5e.  He was not a happy bunny.

[Hartlepudlion]

Yes foggy. Trisha stated that one of the reasons was to protect the officers  from the public - the only time I've seen officers in any sort of danger is when they went to separate two councillors in the Chamber! It is the Councillors who should learn to respect the people not the other way round - they need to earn respect not to demand it.

[Foggy]

I think they are hoping filming the public will put people off turning up to meetings at all as we know they don't like an audience.  They just can't cope with the pressure.

This law is supposed to be about 'open and accountable local government' so the public can see how decisions are made. It's not about monitoring people's behaviour. There should be no need for that.

You can just imagine them all sitting down to watch the video after the meeting, like they would an episode of Big Brother!

I am not sure what was said but just before the meeting started RMW walked over to CAB to have a quick discussion, I saw RMW gesticulating in a definite negative fashion over whatever they talked about and CAB spent the rest of the meeting with a face like a slapped ar5e.  He was not a happy bunny.

I just caught the end of this conversation but unfortunately missed any gesticulation. I would have enjoyed seeing division in the ranks! I thought Ray also had a face on him throughout the meeting but then I put that down to his incredulity at the way the meeting was proceeding. His head was in his hands on several occasions and he gave up on attempting to speak after having his hand up for ages right in front of the Chair.

[steveL]

It's worth publishing again the actual proposal made by Labour last night related to the videoing of meetings. CAB noticeably didn't read it out in full last night, perhaps well aware that he was holding a hot cinder in his hands.

"The Policy Committee system, which this Council has developed, provides a role for all members. The public are encouraged to attend Policy Committee meetings and forums to voice their views. Our Policy Committee system has been recognised as a model of good practice and a number of other Councils are considering implementing this model of governance.

We propose that action is taken to ensure that Council business is conducted with dignity and in a way that supports open, transparent and effective democracy. We therefore resolve that the Chief Executive be instructed to compile a report, which incorporates proposals for the management and filming by the Council, of Full Council meetings and for the publication of the
unedited video on the Council website. To this end, a report will be presented to an early meeting of the Finance and Policy Committee".

As was pointed out last night, it was Trish Lawton who let the cat out of the bag as she seconded the proposal with several references to the public gallery and 'behaviour' she had witnessed when she had attended recent council meetings.

The answer to all of this was summed up recently in just such a meeting: 'when the public find themselves being ignored then they have little option but to shout louder." . . . and the public have been ignored a lot recently. Think of the Hospital; of Manor Residents and Cranney's Who Cares; think of SAB's deceit over his sacking and the lies he told on TV.

So if the Labour Group wants to talk about 'behaviour' then let's not get confused about what the root cause of a more vocal public actually is - a dysfunctional council which itself has thrown any adherence to normal standards of behaviour out of the window. Is it any wonder that the public has reacted?

Labour have for years been used to being able to do exactly what they want without question but the calamitous leadership of Christopher Akers-Belcher has meant that more and more people are now willing to openly question what they are doing. The discomfort this has caused within the coalition ranks has been obvious for months.

On the front page there's an article of how a senior council officer had commented on CAB's inability to think on his feet and during the last council meeting in May, we saw how a labour group asked to make a decision on-the-fly, without being told how they should vote, quickly descended into a rabble of headless chickens.

So the goal now is, not to correct their own behaviour and conform to the normal standards expected of a local authority, but to limit and restrict the public's ability to question or highlight it.

That said, they are getting clumsy and ham-fisted. Nothing that HBC does can circumvent what has been decided by national Government and whatever the outcome of this Chief Executive's report, any member of the public will remain free to video council meetings so long as they conform to the Government guidelines.

Equally, while councillors have no right to object to being filmed, a member of the public does have that right. So any plans to deliberately turn the cameras on the public will be short-lived.

[DRiddle]

I agree with all of that. As I said last night I genuinely do feel this is a waste of the CEOs time when we have so many significant problems in the town to try to tackle.

I had to cut short some of the other things I wanted to say last night due to instruction from the chair. However, one of the things I would have said (given the time) was about the councils who have, in any way, already tried to restrict, control, curtail or internally manage the filming of meetings.

Have a look at the list of councils that have had a poke in the eye from Pickles for doing that. On it, amongst others, is Tower Hamlets. It's not a good list to be on if the guidelines (which already exist from central government) aren't followed to the letter.

My addendum will hopefully help ensure all the CEO has been tasked with doing is a 5 minute cut and paste job from an existing document.

Also, as Steve said, any attempt to film the crowd will create more work for the chief solicitor as he attempts to tip toe through the legal minefield of consent  , data protection, safeguarding, filming of minors, filming of the carers of looked after children etc etc.

It was a completely cack handed motion, ill thought out and badly presented.

If there is a rift in the Labour ranks, that motion won't have helped fix it. It was just amateurish in every respect.

[not4me]

Someone said that it was Cranney being 'caught out' on video which has caused labours action but maybe it was SABs 'adjourned'/'closed' kok up which is also on video. It was so much easier for Labour before videoing started, all they had to do was lie or deny that they had ever said it.

ps the new naughty word censor seems a bit heavy handed. I used to eb able to work out the words from the number of asterisks, now we only get one it's not so easy 

[steveL]

ps the new naughty word censor seems a bit heavy handed. I used to eb able to work out the words from the number of asterisks, now we only get one it's not so easy 

mm...I think you're rather missing the point