LABOUR CANDIDATE FOR BY-ELECTION

In a break with tradition I am very pleased to announce the Labour candidate for the Newport North by-election a whole week ahead of the nominations deadline. It is LARAINE PASCOE (pictured) who I am personally very confident will be an excellent addition to the Labour Group and an effective councillor.

Lariane is currently the Women's Officer of the local party and is a resident of Carisbrooke. She is a former special needs teacher, who has now lived on the Island for over a decade. She has been a governor at two schools in Newport and also engages in prison voluntary work.

With the Conservative's nationally in their usual disarray over their leadership and locally figures of fun in the national media, and with Labour returning to some of its core values, Island Labour members are all determined to win this ward back. Laraine has the endorsement of former Labour councillor for the ward, Tony Tiltman, and the Labour Group at County Hall feel very strongly that Laraine is the right person to join us in effective opposition. Something the LibDems have singularly failed to deliver over the last 2 years.

WHEN WILL LIB DEMS TAKE OPPOSITION SERIOUSLY?

Press Release issued today:

The Labour Group at County Hall has issued a challenge to Liberal Democrat councillors to start taking opposition to the Conservatives seriously. Their call came in response to the latest LibDem failure to vote with a Labour challenge to the ruling Conservatives over the interminable and costly Undercliff enquiry. A Labour motion seeking a time limit to the £1 million plus enquiry at this month's Council meeting was voted against by the four LibDem councillors as well as all the Conservatives and Independents.

Labour group leader Cllr Deborah Gardiner said, "Being in opposition entails a responsibility to your electorate to pose alternatives to what the Conservatives are doing in this Council. Cllr Lumley and I take have taken that responsibility very seriously over the last 2 years, but we have repeatedly seen LibDem councillors voting with the Conservatives on major issues like this Undercliff enquiry, the proposed changes to the organisation of schools on the IW, and against our alternative Budget proposal when they had no alternative of their own. We are sure that is not what is expected of them and we invite them to work with us in offering effective opposition, whilst retaining their separate political identity. Of course they may be very happy with the damage the Tories are doing, in which case they should be honest and say so."

THE SCRUTINY JOKER

Some joker has decided to put a Report on next week's Scrutiny Committee agenda on an enquiry - Educational Attainment 2006 - that I lead on and Cllr Mosdell assisted with. The joke is I am away next week, this meeting having been uniltaerally moved from 19 July without any consultation with opposition members, and Cllr Mosdell has been turfed off the committee by the Tory group.

You wouldn't make it up !

BLAST FROM THE PAST

Last week the man who told me back in 1984 that Gordon Brown and Tony Blair would be Labour prime ministers - in that order - was elected to replace Tony Blair for Sedgefield, back in my home county. Phil Wilson MP was one of the five original 'Blairites' - from a quite different 'left' background originally - and was someone I had quite a lot to do with at that time. We went our different ways within the Labour Party not long after that- leading to him becoming a Labour MP in his home area - and my becoming a Labour councillor here. What would have happened if I had returned north-east back in the early 80s ? Nothing different I suspect. I was never politically ambitious for myself.

Of even more interest in the by-elections last week was the terrible performance of 'David Cameron's Conservatives'. 3RD in both contests. Made me feel better about Labour's prospects than I have since late 2001.

FOCUS ON PAN

The last few days has seen me giving an absolute concentration on Pan matters. My main aim is to ensure the medium-term future of the current community centre - the Isobel Centre (pictured) - for which I have been getting advice from GOSE (Govt. Office of the South East). Quite a few complications have got in the way in recent times and I am doing my best to resolve them. Hopefully we will get more people coming forward in the coming weeks to help with the stability plans.

BACK IN THE MUD....

After missing last month’s Full Council as I was at Glastonbury I would like to say it was good to be back last night, but it wasn’t. At times it felt very similar to Glastonbury – like wading through mud to make the smallest progress.

On the bright side two councillors said they agreed with me during the evening – one a Cabinet member – which must be a first in my time on this Council. It was during a discussion about publication of the annual Best Value Performance Indicators, when I pointed out that having a ‘traffic light’ system to show how Council performance actually was against targets – red, amber and green – was meaningless if they insisted in publishing the papers in black and white.

Earlier my motion calling for a time limit to the Undercliff enquiry – amended to 30 September after a briefing earlier in the day that suggested that date was very achievable – was lost by 2 votes (us) to 32, with the Liberal Democrats and Independents once again voting with the Tories on an important issue. The Tories tried to paint me as wanting a guillotine on the enquiry; I told them my main concern was the continuing expenditure on this enquiry – I estimate £1m by end of September – when the procurement of the Undercliff contractor has never been shown to have cost the Council anymore than it should have.

We then learnt that we may get a new Scrutiny Chair in September ! Now that Brian Mosdell has left the Tory Group he counts as an opposition member – though still sitting as an un-whipped Conservative – and he is eligible to be the Chair of the new Tory-controlled Scrutiny Committee. Consequently the Tory leadership are keen to put him forward to September Full Council, provided they can get him a place on the committee as he cannot keep his current Tory group place. That may be more difficult than it seems as of the 4 places on the committee for opposition members, 3 are occupied (including me) and the LibDems won’t lend theirs in case they want it in the future.

Personally I feel that if we are not to have an opposition-controlled Scrutiny Committee as it was when I was Chair, then Brian is as good a person to have as Chair under the new regime as we will get. If necessary I will facilitate him getting a place on the committee. He may be a Tory, but both Deborah and I have grown to like and respect him over the last two years. And his speech subsequently on no longer being the Champion for Civic Pride (and public conveniences) was the best hoot of the evening ! A man unleashed from the mogadon......

Finally, under questions to Cabinet members I asked the Deputy Leader for an update on his April commitment not to use portakabins when year 9 is retained in middle schools. He maintained that commitment for the first wave of retentions in 2009, but NOT for the remainder in 2010. Now there’s a surprise ! Tories – they can’t keep a commitment for more than a moment…..

ALIVE & WELL (ish)

No Sgt-Major Sutton's shock troops haven't bumped me off - or cobbled together some suspension charge. Yet.

I spent a long weekend at the TUC Tolpuddle Martyrs festival - Island Labour members go every year - and have returned to numerous media enquiries about my Council motion on tomorrow night's agenda. Thankfully Deborah has now dealt with that. Will probably be a bumpy ride with the usual personal insults.

Newport Labour now has its candidate for the Newport North by-election and as I will be the Election Agent I'm not going to have much of a quiet summer this year !

TIME FOR SOME OPENNESS

With Deborah's support I have tabled a motion to next week's Full Council that simply states, "Council resolves that the Undercliff enquiry be wound up by 31 August 2007." It will probably get 2 votes and at least 35 against, with Liberals sitting on their hands. Nonetheless:

It is now over 5 months since suspensions of five senior staff (now seven) were imposed and just seven weeks until the end of the summer. The Chief Exec told all councillors a month or so ago that this enquiry would be wound up by the end of the summer. A fortune is being spent from our Council Tax. It is time that we had some public accountability for that expenditure.

I said here back in March, "If a councillor cannot be told things, there is little hope of openness improving." Unsurprisingly I remain as much in the dark as I did then.

WILL THEY HEAR WHAT THEY ARE BEING TOLD ?

Missed the Cabinet in Bembridge tonight so that I could listen in to the parents meeting at my local middle school about the Year 9 proposals. Only 10 parents there, but I understand that is pretty much the norm with these meetings at the Island's 16 middle schools. The strong belief amongst parents is that the Council leadership have already made their minds up so there is little point in turning up.

Of the 10 parents there, including 2 parent governors, all were totally against the retention of Year 9 in middle schools. I understand this has been the clear view of parents at at least three other middle schools where I have had reports.

When the Report on this consulation is presented to the Cabinet in September, I doubt if such continuing opposition will be listened to. After all the Conservative group didn't listen to their electorates prior to the April Council decision on this issue. It will be interesting to see how the Tories play that lack of responsiveness and accountability in the upcoming by-election.......

GOING SOFT ON TORIES ?

Two councillors left the Tory group recently. Brian Mosdell left them, but will sit as an independent Conservative for the remainder of this Council. Not sure what that is all about, but I suspect it is something to do with Deborah and I giving him our Labour place on the Planning Committee after his own group turfed him off for being independent thinking. Neither Deborah nor I are that interested in the Planning Ctte. So it was a thank you to Brian to let him have our place in return for all the excellent work he did on the Scrutiny Committee when I was Chair and he was a challenging, but fair minded, Tory member of the committee - in the minority. Interestingly the now Tory-dictated Scrutiny Ctte seems no nearer being effective after my resignation last May, with its latest monthly 'informal' meeting cancelled yesterday.

Today we learnt that Julian Whittaker is standing down from the Council with immediate effect, for career reasons. The reason is really sad as Julian is one of the younger councillors, and one of the few who is still a wage-earner. But with demands on councillors for increasing daytime commitment (whatever happened to mainly evening meetings?), he was always going to find it harder. I lost very narrowly to Julian (32 votes) in an April 2003 by-election in Newport North - just days after the US tanks rolled into Baghdad. The by-election was caused by the resignation of a Labour councillor, Tony Tiltman, and we will be looking to get this ward back, especially since Julian's majority over us was only 56 in May 2005. This ward is a usually a straight Labour-Tory fight.

Whilst being a bit soft on Tories, it makes me realise that many of the local Tory group are decent, 'one nation' Tories. Shame about the leadership caucus of about five - what I call the nasty Tory tendency !

WHO CAN HE MEAN ?

We got a new post from Joe Blogs yesterday, which contained the following enigmatic comment,

"Imagine an organisation, something like the WI. One branch is incredibly successful with a charismatic if controversial leader. This syndrome sees the persons attacked with no proper discussion about their methods and policies."

Who can he mean ? Clues, please.

REDUNDANT ? NOT LIKELY !

While catching up with the CP for the week I was away I noted the following headline, "Peter is new champion for Pan". Bloody hell I thought, I must have been in a coma or something and they have had a by-election in my absence !

Anyway I read on and learnt that this bloke is someone who has been appointed by the Tory IW Council and Medina HA as Development Manager for the Pan development - in other words someone whose loyalty is to his employers and no one else. And yet he is claiming, to quote, "I see my role as being a champion of residents as the new estate rises, as well as a focal point for residents who wish to air their concerns about Pan. "

Clearly this man hasn't worked much in local government before, but in case there is any doubt - employed officers serve councillors and I was elected as the champion for Pan. Damn cheek!

ANOTHER NUDGE FOR JOE

Joe Blogs clearly needs another nudge to remind him that you are supposed to post on a blog reasonably regularly. I last got him to post on May 16th after a sly comment here. Some 7 weeks later there has been nothing else - and not much prospect of anything in the next 2 weeks as he is off saving other local authorities or at the LGA conference in Brum.

NEW POODLE COMMITTEE

While I was away it was unilaterally decided by the Tories that they would only have formal meetings - Cabinet & Commissions, etc - every 6 weeks instead of monthly. Included within this blanket decision was the previously opposition lead and independent Scrutiny Committee, whose new Tory majority is more than happy not to have to do any scrutiny.

I think I will propose to the next Full Council a new name for this committee !