IF NOT WELLOW, THEN WHERE ?

After enduring 13 "I'm all in favour of renewable energy, but......"s last evening, I wonder where exactly the Development Control Committee members would approve of wind turbines ? Otherwise they are just trotting out mealy-mouthed platitudes. Given that just about all other suitable spots are in AONB areas, this was the best bet. Still they will all be dead when future generations have to pay the cost.

TORIES SPEND A FORTUNE..............

..........of our money on Communications consultants from LB of Westminster and fail to have the impact that Deborah and I have as a two-person band !!!!

Just look at front page of County Press this week, or indeed the CP overall any week.

I'd help them out if I wasn't an opposition councillor. One thing I will say though - you get nowhere insulting the local media, either publicly or privately. On the Island things always get back to people. Basic stuff !

NOT WINNING FRIENDS & INFLUENCE....

I went along to the Board meeting of the new IW NHS Primary Care Trust today. I have never been to anything like this before and I found it very strange. No papers are published in advance of the day and on the day you still cannot access them on the Webpage. There is also no provision for public questions

I was interested to learn that the new Trust still has to recover from a £4.9m inherited deficit apart from eventually having to achieve a surplus of a further £3.7m. So things still aren't good on that front.

Most astonishing comment was from the new Chairman who asked the County Press jourmalist present if the press understood a discussion they had just had on MRSA incidents at St Mary's. Naturally the journalist - a very experienced one - was rather put out by this. I would have been too.

WELLOW WIND TURBINES

As Island Labour takes a neutral stance on the Wellow Wind Turbines planning application, leaving it up to individual members, I want to declare myself !

I am not a member of the Development Control Committee as I prefer to be able to campaign against planning proposals when necessary, so I can safely say that I think the Committee would be irresponsible not to approve this planning application. However, I have no doubt that they won't approve it, because after all that was in the Tory manifesto and there are more Tories than anything at County Hall.

So future generations will reap the consequences of the short-sightedness of current decision-makers.

DOING THE DAY JOB

The last week has been fairly typical of what I do these days, without much excitement or significant events:

Thursday - mainly in County Hall, dealing with ward and scrutiny matters all day; Friday - all day in Downside Middle School where I accompanied a 10 year old boy from Pan in his school day. Fascinating and very, very useful; Saturday - monthly surgery in morning then rest of day off. Spent time in evening having a drink and chat with a political 'enemy' !; Sunday - catch up day, as usual; Monday - work all day, followed by Newport Town Management Committee in evening. Home at 9; Tuesday - work all day, followed by ward work and ward visits. Home at 9.

OCTOBER FULL COUNCIL

Well I got a reasonably satisfactory response from the Council Chairman to the one of my 3 outstanding emails regarding religious toleration (signed by himself), so I was able to attend Full Council last night.

I nearly didn't get to do the 'walk of the heathen' though as I was firstly subjected to pressure about my monthly Scrutiny report. The powers that be didn't like my reporting the Wightcare staff announcement (see post of Oct 8) - which they continue to deny - and wanted me to remove that section. I refused, so they circulated it to the meeting for me, but only after cautioning me that I may be referred to the Standards Board for breach of the code of conduct. Sorry chaps - for that is what they are - I stand by the truth no matter what. In the meeting itself they again claimed my report on Wightcare was untrue, but I defended myself robustly and will continue to do so.

My first intervention was immediate as I asked for clarification on a proposed amendment to the Minutes after I had complained that they omitted entirely any reference to last month's attack on my lack of faith. Goebbels could have learnt something from this !

There were two motions - one agreeing wide public consultation on the recent Fire Service options report (agreed nem con); the other committing the Council to seeking a significant reduction in the number of councillors in next years Boundary Commission review. That went through overwhelmingly, though I (quietly) abstaned as there was a load of nonsense in the motion about parish councils being 'local democratic leadership'. In some areas yes, but everywhere ? Get real.

I spoke twice in the debate about approving the Newport Town Council petition. Of course this went through easily - 2 against - but I also tried to make overtures to the member for Carisbrooke West, which are not so far falling on stony ground.........

A new Members' Allowances Scheme was approved unanimously. I am a keen advocate of compensating working age and work-dependent people to stand for public office, and that will only happen if allowances help them to take commensurate unpaid time-off - as I do with my allowance. No doubt we will be vilified in the press, but all parties and groups supported the scheme - which is actually a reduction on the budget of the previous Council, probably because we now only have one Scrutiny Committee instead of SIX Select Committees......

After that it was Reports time, which whistled by. Of note all evening was the quietness of the Council Leader, who only spoke for his Leaders' report !

'BEYOND THE PALE'

I am now categorised with the so-called 'difficult' Council Tax papers, just because I sent three emails to the Chairman of the Council in the space of about 10 days.

The subjects were - 1. the cost of his Cowes Week Reception; 2. religious toleration at Full Council; 3. getting Cabinet members to respond to a Scrutiny 'call-in'.

I have been told that the Council's Solicitor (aka the Deputy Chief Executive) will reply on the Chairman's behalf to this 'flurry' of emails. Perhaps the Chairman should try dealing with my email Inbox !

So I am left waiting for answers to very straightforward questions ...... what wonderful communications this Council has, when a councillor has to have a solicitor replying to his emails.

PLANNING SUCCESS

I was delighted to get notification on Friday that a particularly difficult planning application in Pan had been dismissed on appeal. I had managed to persuade the local Development Control Committee to reject the application last March, contrary to officer advice, but was doubtful about the appeal.

I now have eight household who are all delighted with their local councillor and the local planning committee !

STUDENT NO TO 6th FORM COLLEGE

Spent most of yesterday at a High School as part of Local Democracy Week. Interesting talk with some sixth-formers who were very clearly and cogently OPPOSED to the proposal of a one size fits all 6th Form College - as proposed by the Learning & Skills quango.

A 'NO COMMENT' COUNCIL !

Well the official response of the Council to my 'good news' Wightcare press release earlier this week was 'no comment' ! And they wonder why I don't trust them to fairly handle press coverage of Scrutiny ?

Hello ! Scrutiny is an integral part of how a Council is run. You can't just rubbish or deny everything it does and refute that it has any effect on Council decisions. My interview with the next CPA inspectors - which I will have no matter whether they throw me out as Scrutiny Chair or not - will be very interesting.

If you can't manage your communications better after all the money currently being thrown at it then you never will. My press operation consists of...........me !

COUNCIL TO KEEP WIGHTCARE IN-HOUSE

I have issued the following press release for tomorrow:

SCRUTINY CHAIR WELCOMES DECISION TO KEEP WIGHTCARE IN-HOUSE

After the Scrutiny Committee enquiry last Spring into the Council's proposal to privatise their Wightcare homecare service the Council has decided to keep the service in-house.

The Scrutiny recommendations last June that the privatisation proposal be deferred whilst a full financial Review was undertaken was accepted by the Council Cabinet, and an independent Review has been undertaken over the last 3 months.

The Chair of the Scrutiny Committee, Cllr Geoff Lumley, has been advised by staff that the Review has recommended the Council keeps the Wightcare homecare service in-house, to ensure a mixed economy of homecare on the Isle of Wight, and that this recommendation has been accepted. Homecare staff were told at a meeting last week by the Director of Adult Services and Cabinet member.

Cllr Lumley said, "I am delighted at this decision, which reverses the Council's budget decision to privatise Wightcare. I am sure that the Scrutiny enquiry conducted by myself, Cllr Deborah Gardiner and Cllr Brian Mosdell, went a long way to securing a change in Council policy as it became clear that this excellent and popular service was not being allowed to compete favourably with private operators. The evidence given by three Homecare organisers to our meeting last April was very powerful indeed. If anyone had doubts about the value and influence of Scrutiny I would suggest that this will lay them to rest."

THE BIG SULK

Tomorrow morning I should be having my monthly meeting with the Council Leader to discuss issues of mutual interest to my Scrutiny brief. Should be .............but it has been cancelled for the foreseeable future because he does not want to upset me again, especially when Cllr Gardiner and I are reporting him to the Standards Board over his attack on our lack of religion or faith (see 20.9.06).

The lack of insight on this matter is almost incredible.

THE TORIES - LEST WE FORGET

As one of my readers comments,

"Every time I hear Cameron going on about the new Conservatives I remember what the old ones are doing right here."

TORY 'B&B TAX' FIB

From the Council's own web forum, 'Ade' says:

"Conservative leaflet

Having just received the leaflet 'The Island Community', issued by the Isle of Wight Conservative Association, I was intrigued by the item with the sub-heading 'Local Conservatives fight against Labour's B&B tax'. As I was not aware of any such tax having been implemented or even proposed I looked further into this and the following is what I discovered.The Government launched an inquiry into local government funding headed by Sir Michael Lyons (Lyon's Inquiry) back in 2004 which produced an interim report in December 2005. This interim report outlined the consultation that had been undertaken with various interested bodies with a view to producing proposals at the end of 2006. These proposals would produce recommendations on local taxation and how local authorities would raise revenue through local taxation. These new forms of taxation would take over from the present council tax, for example.One of the bodies that the inquiry took evidence from was the Local Government Association (LGA) who had produced a document titled 'Balance of Funding Review'. In this paper the LGA had proposed a tourist tax as one way of supplementing local revenue. The argument being that people visiting and staying in an area benefitted from the services without contributing directly.The Isle of Wight Unitary Authority is a member of the LGA and therefore was a party to this proposal to introduce a tourist tax (B&B tax) being included in the paper that was given to the Lyon's Inquiry.The Lyon's Inquiry interim report Part2 Para 2.100 states quite clearly that there are pros and cons for introducing a tourist tax and certainly does not state at this time whether this would be in the final recommendations. Consequently it is somewhat misleading for the Isle of Wight Conservative Association to label it as 'Labours B&B Tax'."

And the LGA is overwhelmingly under Tory control.....

FROM FORESIGHT TO 'FOUR SHIRTS'

What a difference a weekend makes! Last week in Manchester was all policies and planning for the future of Britain. Today, back home, the most that can be found to say about the leader of the Tory party, in the absence of any policies whatsoever, is that he changed his shirt 4 times in one morning. Still I suppose at least he blogs - unlike any Tory here !