Friday 4 October 2013

Meetings - past and present


Next week's full council meeting, which will be webcast of course, will feature Plaid's Motion calling for cross party support for a vote of no confidence in the Welsh Minister for Health, Mark Drakeford. It concerns his decision to downgrade the A & E department at Prince Phillip Hospital, Llanelli to a nurse led unit.

One thing that is not on the agenda is the attendance of representatives from Scarlets Regional Ltd together with a council report, which was expected at the October meeting. The purpose of the visit remains unclear but perhaps it has been postponed until there is a more 'favourable' atmosphere, financially, and that 'other matters' will have safely blown over.

Somehow I think the wind has stopped blowing this time.

It goes without saying that those other matters are focussing the minds of many - the two unlawful payments, pension and indemnity, identified by the appointed auditor.

At the moment we don't know whether there will be any further announcements prior to Wednesday's meeting. What is certain though is that any attempts by councillors to raise the issues will be swiftly shot down, despite both being at the forefront of public interest.
Failing that, I expect the cameras will suddenly develop 'technical issues'.

At the last full council meeting you may remember that when the issue of the failure of grant compliance was brought up, the Chief Executive commented that once they'd 'had a word' with the Wales Audit Office they usually ended up agreeing with them. I'm not so sure that's going to happen this time.

I mentioned 'meetings past' in the title of this post and there is little I can add to the information already disclosed through this blog and of course, Cneifiwr's, concerning the pension and libel indemnity meetings of 14th November 2011 and January 23rd 2012 respectively.

There is one thing I would like to mention concerning the libel indemnity meeting. Particularly as the information is already in the public domain.

The council's recent press release stated that the officer in receipt of the indemnity, the Chief Executive, was not the author of the report and did not participate nor offer any advice during the process.

However, the council itself disclosed an email via a Freedom of information request earlier this year which clearly shows that the Head of Administration and Law, Linda Rees Jones, and the Chief Executive, Mark James discussed the contents of the report on the 19th January 2012. Four days before the decision to grant the indemnity was taken at the Executive Board meeting as an 'Urgent' item. The public and press were excluded of course, no declarations of interest were made and no one left the meeting.

I strongly recommend readers have a read of these two thought provoking blog posts published today;

Broken Barnet; The Sky falling in - Daft Arrest - more unanswered questions

and

Y Cneifiwr; Pensions and indemnities - where next?

Where, or what next, indeed....

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Cllrs the meeting of the full council is your chance to demonstrate to the public that you will not condone transactions that are considered to be unlawful. You owe it to the electorate to stand united on this one. Speak up and show the public that you work for us not CCC!

Anonymous said...

I think the public deserve answers as to why the Returning Officer was paid 20K in advance of an election. Here you have another thought provoking blog

http://www.aberdareonline.co.uk/content/strange-payments-election-returning-officer

Anonymous said...

Oh dear, CCC accused of theft!


https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/request_for_emails_relating_to_t#incoming-411369

Anonymous said...

Just so that everyone is clear on this. CCC "disclosed an email via a Freedom of information request earlier this year which clearly shows that the Head of Administration and Law, Linda Rees Jones, and the Chief Executive, Mark James discussed the contents of the report on the 19th January 2012." On the 23rd January 2012, there was an Executive Board meeting where the indemnity was discussed as an urgent item. Among those present at the meeting was Mark James and Linda Rees Jones.

caebrwyn said...

Thanks for your comments.

Anon 12:36 Precisely.

Tessa said...

Enough rope given yet, I wonder?