Full Council tonight - my only real forum at County Hall these days, especially as I have missed the last two Cabinets due to holidays and then Vestas. Pleasant surprise to see Vice Chair Ian Stephens presiding, as the Chairman is in the Baltic, when I joined proceedings at 6.05pm - after prayers.
First motion from the Tories on the ferry companies, urging the OFT to make a reference to the Competition Commission, which built on my successful motion from last March. It went through nem con, though I also got a commitment to have a tracker of actions resulting from Motions in future as I wasn't convinced that much had happened after my last motion.
Then to Vestas, with my Motion calling on the Council to exert pressure on government to facilitate moving the Vestas plant into alternative ownership. I moved the Motion, got support from Cllrs A Whittaker, Barry and Howe (all Liberals), and then the Deputy Leader tabled an Amendment that made a 'more precise statement of aims". Basically more flowery language. Unaninimity then took hold and the Amendment was agreed nem con. Lets hold them to it !
Consensus then fell apart during Cabinet member questions, particularly when the matter of who actually controls scrutiny panel workplans was raised. No matter what the Leadership says, scrutiny since May 2007 has been entirely controlled by the administration and is pretty much a waste of time, with the nodding dogs majority all keen for advancement. Just look at the manoevures they used earlier this year to prevent a scrutiny enquiry into child protection services.
The meeting finished at 9pm having run its full 3 hours course and there are still 10 members of this Tory group yet to make a contribution to debate - none from the opposition side. Bet they were all going to be a 'strong voice at County Hall' on the doorstep !!!!!
3 comments:
Well done again Geoff. Keep up the pressure, you are the voice for the Vestas workers within the Council. Glad to see George Brown was once again supportive even if he did have to 'ammend' Good also to see the Lib Dems coming out of the box!! what about the 'Independents'?
What did the original motion say? Could you post both versions here?
Why didn't you call for public ownership?
I don't usually respond to anonymous comments, but in this case -I did not push for public ownership in the interests of getting something supportive through this Council rather than something going down with one vote - mine.As the sole Labour councillor on the IW pragmatism sometimes has to be my approach. I don't always like it, but I don't beleive I have much choice if I am to be a real representative of local people.
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