Another 4 weeks passes by and we were back at Full Council on Wednesday evening. An evening that will probably go down in history as the end of the day when the Tory/Liberal coalition government agreed to wreck our economy and destroy the decent society we have aspired to since 1940.
So in that context our Council meeting was pretty small beer as everyone gets their heads around what government has proposed for local government over the next 4 years.
We started off with a minutes silence on the death that day of Canon Jim Buckett - a wonderful man even if we did not share a belief . Next was my motion on the Council's 'One Island' magazine, where I wanted to reduce its publication to twice per year rather than 10. The Tories really threw the kitchen sink at me to defeat this motion, demonstrating as ever how much they seem to fear me.......At the end my motion was defeated with 8 votes in favour (me, the 3 LibDems present and 4 Independents) and all the Tories and 2 Independents against.
Independent Wayne Whittle was then elected as the third Chairman of the Overview & Scrutiny Committee of this Council in just 16 months after Jonathan Bacon's resignation. Good luck to him, but I'm afraid luck won't help him get this Council to allow proper scrutiny.
Next was a leadership proposal to move meeting times for Scrutiny Committee/Panels to 5pm rather than 6pm. On this I was entirely isolated with everyone in favour of effectively making it difficult for most people to observe these meetings and me against. C'est la difference.
We then all agreed a new Corporate Parenting Policy for looked after children. Everyone was on their best behaviour and no one mentioned the elephant in the room....our record as a Council as corporate parents hasn't been good enough to date.
And that was about it. Questions to Cabinet members took up the last hour or so, but it all felt a bit flat. The calm before the storm as people begin to realise what the public service cuts really mean to them ???????
