Councillor Allowances 31% Pay Rise

[Inspector Knacker]

I was shocked to get a reply from Mike within minutes.

It showed a very human side and the couple of sentences showed more care and empathy than the pages and pages of defensive drivel sent by little Iain.

Early days but a glimmer of hope.

Words are easy, so let's see what actions follow.
Early days, but I expect him to be the loyal Party apparatchik.

[steveL]

Very interesting post from Dave Hunter tonight on Facebook. Is there a glimmer of hope that someone finally will start to do something about the disgrace that is the Labour Group... or will Dave be following Ged Hall? Either way.. respect to Dave for saying the following:

An apology to the people of Hartlepool.

Last night I found myself torn between party and heart, I am historically a proud Labour man and would normally respect the 'Whip' system, as is used in most parties, indeed as I did last night. But I was simply wrong and I should have voted against it instead of abstaining. I have no problem making difficult decisons in my work place, and normally not as a Councillor, but I failed two significant tests over the last 24 hours. Firstly if I can look through a mirror into my eyes, and then look deeper into my soul and know it was the right decision,then it is right! However in this case I cannot. Secondly I often ask myself, how would my late Father have dealt with this one when he was a shop steward? Would he have voted people over process? The answer is a resounding yes to people, and I have let him down  on this as well as myself. Once both tests were failed, nothing was left inside. I am not looking for attention, sympathy or anything else, and I am confident the keyboard piranhas will be delighting in this, as they smell blood, however I have turned off comments. I hope next time I am faced with such an emotive scenario I can pass my own two aforementioned tests. If not then I must oppose, because that is what is - and was - right, regardless of the discipinary actions that may follow such a decison. Before anybody posts that I still took the money, it is a matter of record that I declined any additional income, several hours prior to the meeting, so at least that part of my soul is protected.

Is it really that difficult to understand? I don't think so. Is this not the perfect example of why national politics has no place in local Government? It leads to people voting for things that they don't actually believe in.

It looks to me like Dave Hunter wants it both ways. He wants the freedom to do the wrong thing and the freedom to run straight to the confessional box of Facebook afterwards to be forgiven.

Nope, I'm not buying it. As I see it, he has two choices: he can cross the floor like Brash, Hargreaves and Hall before him or he can challenge the Cabal for the Leadership. I suspect he will do neither but at least then we will be able to offer him the reason why his conscience found itself facing such a dilemma on Thursday night.

While he can, and probably will continue to use Facebook to tell us all of his intellectual agonies, the simple truth is that he's a coward and it's really no more complicated than that.

[steveL]

Back in constituency. Statement on Councillors Allowances will be released tomorrow

Mike Hill tonight on Twitter

Not quite sure why you need to be back in the constituency before you can put 140 characters of English together - unless those 140 characters are going to require some serious thought. If they do, that would suggest he's struggling to find a way out of an awkward situation.

[jeffh]

The word was that it would be a free vote but when the possibility of 3 Labour councillors voting against emerged, the whip was applied just 24 hours before the vote - hence the 3 abstentions. Labour would still have been home and dry even if he 3 had voted against because of the support of the 3 Tories.

Raymond's disproportionate 3 seats on the Planning Committee are far more important to him than any ethical stance on allowances.

I've had a couple of email exchanges with Devlin regarding the non-constitutional makeup of the Planning Committee - he said it was because there were more applicants than places so a vote was taken.  When I asked if the makeup of the applicants could have formed a politically balanced committee he didn't give an explanation saying that the new committees were about to be formed.

These changes were Cooke for the chair with SAB to Vice Chair
Out are Barclay (Labour), Black (PHF) and Robinson (Labour)
In are Sirs (Labour), Fleming (UKIP) and Buchan (UKIP)

This now means that the Committee is constitutionally incorrect in that the 2 PHF/Ind seats are being taken by 2 Conservatives

If we are saying that PHF/Ind aren't available due to daytime meetings, would it not be appropriate to propose that this and other meetings take place on an evening to allow the fair application of the constitution?

I'm sure that new Constitution Committee will be looking at this in the very near future

[steveL]

Can someone help me out here and find the clip of Cranney's interview on BBC Tees?

[Inspector Knacker]

Back in constituency. Statement on Councillors Allowances will be released tomorrow

Mike Hill tonight on Twitter

Not quite sure why you need to be back in the constituency before you can put 140 characters of English together - unless those 140 characters are going to require some serious thought. If they do, that would suggest he's struggling to find a way out of an awkward situation.

Maybe he has to get back to pick up the script?

[steveL]

"councillors should stick to a previous 2013 resolution that they should only receive an increase in their basic allowance in line with any pay increase received by council employees from the Government, as and when that occurred."

Labour Councillor Carl Richardson speaking to the Hartlepool Mail in January 2015.

'Labour's Alan Clark said he was among those who believed the rise showed he "stood shoulder to shoulder with my workers".'

That was Alan Clark speaking to the Hartlepool Mail in February 2015 after voting to accept a 2.2% increase to the basic allowance. Council workers have had to settle for a 1% increase


Two years later, in June 2017, both voted themselves a 31% pay increase.

[Inspector Knacker]

Can someone help me out here and find the clip of Cranney's interview on BBC Tees?

The voice of Hartlepool.  Concise, distinguished, informative and perfect pronunciation just some of the qualities absent from the 'interview'.

[steveL]

https://youtu.be/-ENqbYr2nSs

[DRiddle]

What a plank. He starts off by stating it's not a pay rise then refers to it as "a pay rise" in the interview. Very poor wriggling at the end to about whether he personally is accepting it. "I probably will" he says. Lol.

[jeffh]

Good to see that our Leader took a pay cut to allow him to carry out his council duties  - what exactly did CAB do before he took on this onerous task?

[Foggy]

I can't even bring myself to watch that video to be honest. I can just imagine how bad it is.

If we are saying that PHF/Ind aren't available due to daytime meetings, would it not be appropriate to propose that this and other meetings take place on an evening to allow the fair application of the constitution?

This has been proposed on several occasions and each time the Mob vote against it, or say that due to feedback received at neighbourhood forums, the public prefer meetings during the day (or something like that).

They have no intention of making it possible for normal working people like Paul, James and David (and Jonathan Brash before) to attend meetings. This then makes it impossible for them to go on committees. Then it is used as a stick to beat them with at every available opportunity. It is one of the things that annoys me more than anything... and let's face it there are many things to be annoyed about where certain members of the council are concerned.

It also prevents other decent and competent people with a wealth of skills and experience being able to stand to be a councillor. But then they are more than happy about that too.

On that topic.. does anyone know if Councillor Mike McLaughlin is currently an A&E doctor? I would have thought that would be a difficult career to judge alongside being a councillor, considering he pressure the NHS is under and the hours that doctors have to work. Did he vounteer for any committees I wonder. And if not, I doubt he will be getting the stick and snide remarks others get.

[steveL]

Quite an interesting side to this in that how many hours does Christopher actually put in as Health Watch Manager? If we split it down the middle and say that he does 20 hours for HealthWatch and 20 hours as council leader that would put him on an hourly rate of around £34 per hour as council leader and earning more pro rata than Stuart Drummond ever did.

[steveL]

I can't even bring myself to watch that video to be honest. I can just imagine how bad it is.

If we are saying that PHF/Ind aren't available due to daytime meetings, would it not be appropriate to propose that this and other meetings take place on an evening to allow the fair application of the constitution?

This has been proposed on several occasions and each time the Mob vote against it, or say that due to feedback received at neighbourhood forums, the public prefer meetings during the day (or something like that).

They have no intention of making it possible for normal working people like Paul, James and David (and Jonathan Brash before) to attend meetings. This then makes it impossible for them to go on committees. Then it is used as a stick to beat them with at every available opportunity. It is one of the things that annoys me more than anything... and let's face it there are many things to be annoyed about where certain members of the council are concerned.

It also prevents other decent and competent people with a wealth of skills and experience being able to stand to be a councillor. But then they are more than happy about that too.

On that topic.. does anyone know if Councillor Mike McLaughlin is currently an A&E doctor? I would have thought that would be a difficult career to judge alongside being a councillor, considering he pressure the NHS is under and the hours that doctors have to work. Did he vounteer for any committees I wonder. And if not, I doubt he will be getting the stick and snide remarks others get.

That's not strictly true. The council DID carry out a consultation on this and the result was that most people wanted more meetings to be held on an evening - not quite the result Labour were after and so they have refused to implement it.

[Foggy]

I must have missed that one... or I wasnt listening properly in a meeting. I do tend to switch off a little when certain people are mumbling... or droning on.

The thing that I find interesting is that even if they did change the times of the meetings and a PHF or indy were on the committee they would still have the numbers for the vote to go their way. This tells me that, as usual, they are just terrified of being questioned or challenged.

Anyway.. back on topic. Any word on Mike Hill's statement yet?