3rd of March 2008

In the early hours of this morning I sent off my reply to The Chief Executives response to my complaint. You can see it here. To understand it you need to also look at a marked up copy of the response, here. I have received a email to confirm receipt and I will wait a few days for a possible reply before I send off my complaint to the Ombudsman for Wales.

29th February 2008

On the 18th of January I received a response to my complaint. It was dated the 7th of January and was headed "Dear Mr Jones". You can read it here. I am not happy with the response. Alison Ward, The Chief Executive, does not dispute that very few councillors knew anything about the clause when they voted for it but since she believes the due processes have been complied with she thinks everything is fine. I do not agree, if a clause like this can get passed without, it appears, even one councillor noticing then something is wrong.

I have emailed The Chief Executive three times since I received this reply, but I have not even received an acknowledgment. I am preparing a full reply to Ms Ward and unless I receive a reply within a few days I shall submit my complaint to The Ombudsman for Wales.

26th of November 2007

I have had lengthy email correspondence with the officers of the council over how and why the new clause 4.16.9 was introduced and, almost by default, I have made a complaint that is being dealt with as official by an officer acting for Alison Ward, The Chief Executive. This will normally be completed within 28days. If the outcome of this is unsatisfactory then I will refer my complaint to the ombudsman for Wales.

My complaint can be seen here, together with the emails before and since (scroll up and down to see these).

I am wondering what the opposition councillors are doing about this new clause, not a lot I think?

There is not much response to the petition yet, it appears that apathy reigns in Torfaen.

18th October 2007

Today I received a reply to my question sent to the council on the 8th of October. It seems the suggestion to add clause 4.16.9 came from a temp employed by the council in early 2006. It was plagiarized from Cardiff CC constitution. The full reply can be seen here. I have asked a few extra questions  and I will await a reply before I comment fully. However this reply says that the clause was discussed at a seminar in November 2006, and approved by members then, but I have yet to get feed back from any councillor who attended that seminar who remembers this full clause being presented to the meeting or discussed in detail.

So now we know, the clause was added at the suggestion of a temporary officer, has been discussed (but no councillors remember the full clause being discussed), and added to the constitution on the 31st of July (but no councillors were aware of what they were agreeing to). Is this the way to run a council? Is this a sensible way to bring about a major change in a constitution?

9th October 2007

I received notice this morning that my question (see below) is to be answered under the Freedom of Information Act within the statutory 20 days. That means I should get an answer before the 29th of October, but it really shouldn't take that long, it is a very simple question to answer. We shall see. The next full council meeting is on Tuesday the 13th of November, 5pm, in the Council Chamber in Pontypool Offices of TCBC.

I note that 15th to 19th of October is Local Democracy Week! See here What a joke! Email your councillor now!

If you want to see when council meetings are held, or read the Agendas or Minutes of Meetings, or the relevant page on TCBC website is here (very difficult to find through the links on the website)

I note that the Constitution has changed once again, latest ammendment was published on the 1st of October! (edition 13) Clause 4.16.9 is still there.

8th October 2007

Sent following question to the council's Head of Democracy.

"On what date was Clause 4.16.9 written and on what date was it decided to include it in the Agenda for the council meeting held on the 31st of July 2007? Was the wording of that clause or the date of its submission to council influenced by, or in any way the result of any questions recently asked at Public Queston Time, say for meetings back to the 28th of June 2007?"

I await a reply, I have requested to ask the question at the next council meeting (any chance?) or to receive a written reply before then under the Freedom of Information Act (FOI)

6th October 2007

Spoke to The Leader of the Council, Bob Wellington, Saturday. He was not aware of the extent of Clause 4.16.9 and thinks the frequent changes to the constitution are un-necessary and often passed without due discussion. He want to re-establish a committee to look into the constitution and scrutinise changes. In the meantime however he will not support the removal of the clause or go against the recommendations of his officers regarding its application.

4th October 2007

Lady from BLAST emailed advising us the petition should be modified. She said "There was a first petition within Blaenavon re our leisure centre that was totally ignored by Torfaen and never counted in the total figures, because it was just a return to civic centre by anyone petition. I reckon we easily lost 3,000 signatures there."

Amazing! A petition represents a collective opinion of a number of people that is brought to the attention of the council (in this case). Are the council saying that this collective opinion no longer exists because of some technicality? This is a bit similar to the mayor saying " And now we come to Public Question Time but unfortunately there have been no questions from members of the public."   How could he refuse me permission to ask my question if there was no question?

Anyway I have altered the petition, so now please return them to us.

I notice that the minutes of the meeting on the 31st of July said

" Lynda Willis, the Chief Legal Officer and Monitoring Officer advised
that Parts 4 and 5 of the Constitution, which referred to the Council
and the Executive needed to be updated following a Council Policy
Development Seminar in November 2006. The amendments were
due to the need for general clarity or to reflect legislative
requirements. "

So was Clause 4.16.9 needed for general clarity? I don't think so. So which legislative requirements did it reflect?