by Paul Scully | Nov 28, 2008 | News |
Recently we had the usual back-slapping when the LibDem councillors congratulated themselves having been awarded four stars following a Government inspection. At the recent Scrutiny Overview meeting we considered the detailed report from the Audit Commission who spent a week in Sutton investigating and compiling the
report.
I raised an eyebrow when I read that scrutiny in Sutton was generally effective, despite the fact that they sat in on the worst scrutiny meeting that I have witnessed in the two years that I have been on the Council. I wrote at the time that I could see one of the four stars tiptoeing to the door. However, I obviously didn’t allow for the meeting boring the inspectors into submission.
But I nearly fell off my chair when I saw paragraph 59 which says:
“Decision making is clear and well understood by all those involved and underpinned by
a culture of openness. There are appropriate levels of delegation, with officers able to
refer delegated decisions back to members when appropriate. Decisions are reviewed,
and if necessary, changed to reflect the views of the community. For example, the
Council reverted to weekly waste collections following petitions from residents and opposition councillors following a fortnightly collection trial. This demonstrates that the Council listens to the local community to inform its decision making.” (my highlights)
The picture to the right is the front page of the Guardian when the fabled cock-up was reversed. The date is clearly September 13th 2001. Whereas some of the conclusions made in the report can be described as subjective, this example massively undermines the credibility of the inspection. We have had two elections since the wheelie bin fiasco, a resignation and two further Directors of Environment and Leisure. The book “Maggots: A binman’s woeful tale” which may still be available in the Factual section of Sutton Library didn’t document this as a period in the Council’s history that merits a celebration.
The 2001 Guardian article makes mention of the claims of a 45% recycling record, later exposed to be 23.5% at a time when people were being made to separate their rubbish only for both bins to be emptied into the same truck. It left the Council with a £1.7m overspend and an ongoing bill of almost £1.9m pa following the U-turn. Petitions were treated as complaints at the time, meaning that bundles of paper with some 22,000 signatures were considered as one complaint.
Just remember, next time you complain about the Council; it has four stars so it must be you that is wrong! Maybe it’s just me being unreasonable, but this is exactly why I would take evidence that residents are actually happy with the services of the Council rather than an expensive institutionalised inspection regime.
by Paul Scully | Nov 27, 2008 | News |
Controversial changes to the way children with Special Education Needs (SEN) are taken to and from school was pushed through to the next stage by LibDem councillors at Tuesday’s Scrutiny Overview Committee.
The plan is to collect children from pick up points around the Borough by minibus instead of the door to door service that they receive now. I don’t mind looking into these difficult areas. I don’t mind seeing if we are spending our budget in the best way. However, the policy that was presented was not acceptable.
Following consultation, autistic children were removed from consideration, leaving 85 children whose service is at risk, down from 250 children. This means that the potential savings are £200k pa, down from £360k pa. The 85 children remaining, go to Carew Manor and Muschamp Primary. They have either Moderate Learning Disabilities (MLD) or Speech and Language Disabilities (SLD).
I had a few concerns. Firstly, I did not believe that the policy as presented was detailed enough to show parents exactly who was eligible for what and how they would appeal. Secondly, each child and their route to their pick up point would have to be risk assessed. The Council were trying to get TfL to do this, which immediately set alarm bells ringing. Officers were not sure if private organisations would have to get involved. These uncertainties make me wonder how much saving the Council will acheive in reality. Is it really worth the pain that it will undoubtedly cause for the parents and children for what maybe no change?
It is likely that some of the 85 children will be deemed unable to walk to pick-up points and one parent raised the question of children with several disabilities returning to their doctor to attempt to get rediagnosed as including Autism. These points all add yet more uncertainty. Yet the estimated savings from this policy already forms the cornerstone for this year’s Council budget.
This is a budget that we need to tackle. The Council overspends by £1m pa no matter what it does. However, making cuts on the back of the most vulnerable children in our Borough is not the starting point for such an exercise. Some of the LibDem members of the Scrutiny committee asked some good questions and made some pertinent points. They all then meekly voted the policy through to be considered for a final decision by the Executive next Monday (1st Dec). Fortunately, a review after the first year was added, though this is the usual pressure valve that the Council adds to let off some of the steam when pushing through such decisions.
The Lead Councillor in this area has talked about this policy being about independence and good for the environment. This may turn out to be true in the long term, but should never have been used as a justification for the policy. Scrutiny into this area was started as a cost-cutting exercise, pure and simple. Muddying the waters with these arguments lessens the scope for serious debate about what are difficult issues in themselves.
We will repeat our views to the Executive alongside parents that are presenting petitions and Cllr David Theobald who has worked hard in his own inimitable way to campaign against this proposal. I cannot see how the policy as it is currently framed, can be passed as it is incomplete with no costings.
by Paul Scully | Oct 16, 2008 | News |
Politicians have always tried to influence the behaviour of the electorate, whether by carrot or stick. I rarely like the stick approach and I can appreciate some efforts to attempt to nudge people in a certain direction, for example walking rather than driving, health prevention rather than cure etc. However, the ‘ban’ on smoking near playgrounds seems a typically worthy but pointless exercise that is endemic in local government.
I don’t smoke but I would have voted against the ban on smoking in enclosed areas as I am instinctively against banning things, believing people should be able to exercise choice. I get fed up with politicians treating people like idiots in one breath and then, should they be wanting something from them like a vote, feting them as having the collective wisdom of Solomon. Similarly, local Liberals cannot decide whether they want to do what their party name says on the tin or give in to an authoritarian craving – the second half of their moniker, ‘Democrat’ went by the wayside a long time ago.
The Liberal-dominated Beddington & Wallington Local Committee has agreed to spend £3200 putting up signs politely requesting people not to smoke in playgrounds within their area. There was considerable debate as to what the wording should be as it was felt that the familiar No Smoking sign was inappropriate because the ban had no legal backing. I humbly put forward my own suggested wording in the picture above.
Of course I’m not in favour of people blowing smoke in children’s faces whilst they play on the swings. However, the signs would have to be far bigger and much more wordy if they were to list all inappropriate behaviour by adults in a children’s playground. This smacks of politicians scratching around for something to do. Last year, a pot of ‘Public Realm’ money was introduced in Sutton where local committees could direct some spending in their areas. The total budget was £2m divided between the six areas. I fear that this is an attempt to be seen to be doing something rather than considering whether that £3200 could be better spent elsewhere. Councillors were surprised to hear that each sign would cost £300. They were told that there were four playgrounds and it would be best to put two signs in each. No-one challenged the chairman, who is an accountant by day, when she announced just before voting on the issue that the total spending was £3200. Remember that when you get next year’s council tax bill.
by Paul Scully | Oct 14, 2008 | News |
Sutton’s £5.5m exposure to the Icelandic meltdown was the big topic of discussion at last night’s Executive (Cabinet) meeting. You can see the statement that the Council have issued following UK based Heritable Bank’s slide into administration here.
Tim Crowley, Conservative Finance spokesman has several years of Treasury experience in the City. He addressed the cabinet at the meeting covering the following bullet points:-
- We, as Conservatives, will do all we can to support any Government initiative to retrieve frozen monies – this is the important thing at this time.
- Transparency in Sutton Council on this issue is of paramount importance because we are dealing with taxpayers’ public funds and we need to engender confidence and trust. This must be our next priority.
- This is a reputational issue which could attract attention from other Council services, and potentially overshadow its work elsewhere.
- As the Opposition we are concerned and disappointed with the public pronouncements in the national media of the Liberal Democrat Treasury Spokesman Dr Vince Cable who has described councils who deposited funds into Icelandic Banks and their subsidiaries as “unbelievably silly”.
- We also note the comments of The Lord Oakeshott of Seagrove Bay on the Today programme who attacked Tory-lead Winchester Council which had deposited one million pounds into an Icelandic bank’s subsidiary, Heritable, two weeks before the crash as “blind and deaf.”
- We are disappointed that the national Liberal Democrat leadership has decided to revert to crude political point scoring in a time of crisis, and that by doing so they are undermining laudable efforts by all concerned to get this taxpayers’ money returned.
- We would prefer to concentrate on investigating under what circumstances we lent this money to Heritable Bank, and to ensure that proper procedures were followed.
- To enable this to happen it is imperative that all paperwork relating to these transactions be secured and that an independent investigator be seconded to provide the answers to these questions.
- As the Opposition, we would like hardcopies of all money market transactions that the Council has taken in the last calendar year and the weekly counterparty risk limits to enable informed decisions to be made.
- Only by us having this paperwork will we be able to ensure that scrutiny process is carried out in comprehensive and competent way.
On the party political point, it is interesting to see Vince Cable quoted in the Telegraph as saying “In a crisis like this I don’t think people would warm terribly to my running around saying ‘I told you so'” The LibDem parliamentary finance team certainly did not warm themselves to Sutton’s Lead Finance Councillor who told Lord Oakeshott yesterday afternoon that his comments were less than helpful.
Although the Cable & Oakeshott double act is an interesting diversion, the matter is too pressing to concentrate on partisan politics. Tim is leading our investigation into the matter with considerable vigour. I am pleased that officers recognise the need for a robust and transparent enquiry. In the meantime, we will continue to support moves to get our money back in order to minimise Sutton taxpayers’ exposure to this. It is important to stress that this loss will not have an immediate impact. I know that some council employees have been spooked by reports of losses in other local authorities affecting payroll. This is not the case here in Sutton.
by Paul Scully | Oct 9, 2008 | News |
People have been worrying about meltdown at the North Pole for years. They didn’t suspect it would start with the Icelandic banking system.
Sutton is one of the many local authorities in the UK to suffer in the economic turmoil with £5.5m of loans in Heritable Bank plc, the UK subsidiary of Landsbanki. Heritable was placed in administration following the nationalisation of its parent company leaving Sutton and many other institutions in limbo.
I want to see that every penny-piece of taxpayers’ money is secure. Safeguarding the taxpayer’s well-being, coupled with sound financial management, is the Conservative way. I have given the Chief Executive my support for the call for the Government to step in to help Local Authorities in these exceptional conditions.
In this time of economic hardship it is absolutely essential that the Lib Dem-run Council does whatever it can to protect the council tax payer’s interests – as Conservative councillors my colleagues and I will do whatever we can to ensure this. We have been asking questions of the ruling party and officers to investigate the Council’s investment strategy and risk management whilst recognising the particular backdrop to this unexpected loss.
It was disappointing to see Vince Cable unhelpfully trying to lever some political capital out of the situation whilst others were seeing their monetary capital disappearing. He criticised councils for investing in Icelandic banks explaining that he and his colleague, Lord Oakeshott had concerns as far back as July. It is a shame that he didn’t tell his colleagues at Local Authority level about his fears as it might have saved Sutton £5.5m. Never mind, he got his headline.
