I start with my customary apology. I have not had time to blog for a while and I never got around to writing up the July meeting of Full Council but I want to write up the meeting of Full Council held Thursday night.
MAX WHITLOCK
The evening started with tributes being paid to Olympic medallist and Freeman of the Borough Max Whitlock. It is always somewhat jarring to see the UKIP Group joining in with this, given that they abstained on granting him the Freedom of the Borough – allegedly because their leader, Cllr Linda Allport-Hodge (UKIP, Langdon Hills), was bitter that her own nominee was rejected – but it is great to see Max’s Olympic achievements being recognised.
PQT and MQT
Public Question Time was a humdrum affair, with a question about allotments from a lady in Wickford and the now customary two questions about the Local Plan from the ubiquitous Roland Lazarus directed at Cllr Richard Moore (Con, Burstead), our long-suffering Cabinet Member for Planning. Member Question Time consisted of, amongst others, Labour leader Cllr Gavin Callaghan (Lab, Pitsea North-West) asking the Cabinet Member for Environment & Community, Cllr Terri Sargent (Con, Crouch), a couple of questions that he knew full well ought to be directed at Essex County Council, plus an inevitable question about ‘Brexit’. Cllr David Burton-Sampson (Lab, St Martin’s) asked a question of the Cabinet Member for Resources, my ward colleague Cllr Stuart Sullivan (Con, Billericay East), worrying in its economic illiteracy – not least because Councillor Burton-Sampson is the vice-chairman of the Audit & Risk Committee. There was then much mirth as Cllr Alan Ball (WI, Wickford Castledon) asked a question about the rather pithy “Don’t be a tosser” anti-litter campaign advertisements.
GAMBLING
The first item of business on the agenda was to adopt the revised Gambling Act (2003) Statement of Licensing Policy. Cllr Allan Davies (Lab, Fryerns) raised quite a reasonable point about ATMs being permitted in betting shops. It produced an interesting debate. I for one have always abhorred gambling. I am even reticent about participating in sweepstakes at work. Even charity raffles give me pause. Such objections are, however, strictly a matter of my own personal morality and, as a libertarian at heart, I have to concede that it is my personal choice not to gamble but, in a free society, mature adults are at liberty to do so, should they so choose.
There would clearly be a strong business case for placing an ATM machine inside a betting shop and it would be useful for gamblers, whom we have to assume are mature, responsible adults, and entitled to the convenience of such a service. I understood Councillor Davies’ scruples about the possible effect that such provision could have upon anyone with a gambling addiction. He posited that a gambling addict, exhausted of cash funds, would simply go home. I find this, however, implausible. Any serious gambling addict is not going to be so easily thwarted and is quite capable of walking down the road to the nearest cashpoint and returning to the betting shop. Nowadays, of course, the hardened gambler can also just as easily gamble at home online. I know this all too well – having worked in credit card collections in a previous life and seen all too many over-limit credit card statements with online gambling transactions for frightening amounts. In any case, as Councillor Moore pointed out, this is a matter of Central Government policy. So I voted to adopt the policy. Councillor Davies and Labour abstained. I still hate gambling but I have to recognise that it is a perfectly legal activity.
TREASURY MANAGEMENT
We then moved onto the extremely pedestrian Treasury Management Annual Report and Prudential Indicators (exactly as sexy as it sounds), during which our officers and Councillor Sullivan – the Iron Chancellor of Basildon – were quite rightly lionised for their sound management of the Borough’s finances. There was another interesting intervention from Councillor Burton-Sampson, attacking the Administration for borrowing too much. I must say, I did find it fascinating to hear a socialist criticising the Tories for taking advantage of historic low interest rates in order to fund capital investment, particularly when said socialists have opposed every penny the Administration has ever tried to cut, has entreated us to spend more, and would undoubtedly tax and spend and borrow to their little hearts’ content should they ever again obtain power in Basildon.
STANDARDS
The next item should have been the tediously straightforward consideration of a report by the Monitoring Officer, Lorraine Browne, into the arrangements for the Joint Standards Committee. The Monitoring Officer’s report ensures that our arrangements meet national legislation and included a recommendation to reappoint the four independent persons who currently sit on the Committee. This should have been a simple formality but then, extraordinarily, the Deputy Mayor, Cllr Stephen Ward (UKIP, Pitsea South-East) – Chairman of the Joint Standards Committee no less! – moved an extraordinary amendment to the report, altering the Monitoring Officer’s recommendation to reappoint the four independent persons in favour of sacking them and appointing four new people!
I cannot stress enough how utterly bizarre and unacceptable this amendment was!
For a start, the amendment was moved apparently at the last moment, with no advance notice given to Group Leaders or, apparently, officers – including the Monitoring Officer, who looked pretty dumbfounded. As the Monitoring Officer makes clear in her report, the independent persons were appointed to serve on the Joint Standards Committee in 2012, to comply with the requirements of the Localism Act (2011). The current four were appointed to serve a four-year term with the option to renew and all four have indicated a willingness to continue serving the Committee and the officer says in her report “I believe the Council is really fortunate to have such a resource available to it for a further four years”. Now, I am sure you can all imagine what a sexy, interesting, adrenalin-pumping job it is, serving on the Joint Standards Committee of Basildon Council, so obviously there are literally dozens of candidates just hurling themselves at us to do it (please note heavy use of sarcasm) but when you already have four people who have, between them, accumulated sixteen years of experience and whom you have already invested in training in standards issues, why on earth would you go to the time and expense of advertising for four new ones? Why would you imply dissatisfaction with the four serving independent persons? Are they no longer ‘independent’? I have to say, I was totally appalled and completely baffled that, of all people, the Chairman of the Committee himself would move such a dim-witted amendment. I am happy to say that the amendment was defeated and the unaltered report adopted. Quite how Councillor Ward will be able to look the independent persons in the eye at the next Standards meeting is beyond me. I cannot think what on earth possessed him to try and get rid of them.
The next item was to review the allocation of seats on the Council’s committees. This has been necessitated by the very wise decision of Cllr Peter Holliman (Con, Wickford North) to defect from the Wickford Independents (or ‘Windies’) to the Conservative Group. Councillor Holliman has been quoted publicly as saying, quite rightly, that he can better serve his residents by operating within the ruling group. Between you and me, dear reader, I also hear rumours of fractious relations between Councillor Holliman and our illustrious Mayor, Cllr David Harrison (WI, Wickford Park), who it has to be said does have a reputation for ego and for not being a great ‘team player’. Far be it from me to comment on such scuttlebutt but, nonetheless, it means the composition of the Council is now slightly altered, taking the Tories from 18 to 19 and reducing the Windies from three to just two. The other political groups remain unchanged. Although entitled to greater representation, the Conservative Group opted to forego this due to the disruption it would cause the Committees, so the recommendation of the view was to leave the Committees unchanged.
We then arrived at the Notices of Motion, with the first being a motion by Councillor Sargent expressing the Council’s gratitude to the Veolia North Thames Trust (VNTT) for all the support they have given to projects across the Borough and our disappointment at the decision of Veolia UK to disband VNTT. Councillor Sargent and the Conservative Group are keen to encourage the new centralised trust – the Veolia Environmental Trust – to prioritise projects within the Borough of Basildon, given the ongoing landfill activities in the Borough. This motion, I am pleased to say, was unanimously passed.
We then moved on to probably the most contentious item of business of the evening: a motion by Cllr Stephen Hillier (Con, Langdon Hills), a member of the Housing & Growth Scrutiny Committee, to remove Councillor Allport-Hodge has Chairman of the Committee. Now, I should state clearly for the record that the Housing & Growth Scrutiny Committee (H&G) has met three times since it was created by the Unholy Alliance in their conspiratorial Order Paper at the Council AGM following the 2016 Local Elections and I have not personally attended any of those meetings. Under Councillor Allport-Hodge’s chairmanship, H&G has concerned itself almost exclusively with the Local Plan and, in line with my longstanding declarations under the probity regulations, I do not attend or vote on any matters pertaining directly to the Local Plan. Nevertheless, like all councillors, I receive minutes of meetings, etc, and because I commute four hours a day, I certainly have time to read them. The Conservative Group also receives briefings from Tory members of committees at our fortnightly Group meetings and Councillor Allport-Hodge’s chairmanship of H&G has been a regular cause for complaint.
The penultimate motion of the evening was from Cllr David Sheppard (UKIP, Fryerns) and concerned the Police & Crime Plan 2016-20 currently being consulted upon by Essex Police Commissioner Roger Hirst. In particular, Councillor Sheppard’s motion was critical of the alleged failure of Mr Hirst’s plan to prioritise burglary. Nobody would disagree, of course, that burglary is a very disturbing and upsetting form of crime. Indeed, it is probably the most invasive form of crime outside of an actual physical assault. Councillor Callaghan afforded the topic the gravity it deserved by having a crack at Councillor Holliman’s expense, saying “Wickford has had more burglaries in 48 hours than Peter Holliman has had political parties”. Of course, the elephant in the room with this motion is that the Police Commissioner is currently consulting on his crime plan, and Councillor Sheppard and everyone else can all feed into that process, and should do so. Obviously, the Commissioner cannot prioritise all forms of crime, otherwise it is not really ‘prioritising’, and my understanding of Mr Hirst’s rationale is that the majority of burglaries are drug-related – eg, funding a drug habit – and that by prioritising drug crime and the vicious drug gangs that operate within our society, that will have a knock-on effect on burglaries. Nevertheless, with a little bit of re-wording to make the motion less combative and antagonistic towards the Commissioner, the Conservative Group supported the motion. It is also worth noting that the local District Commander, Chf Insp Shaun Kane, posted on Twitter on Wednesday night that his team had arrested four burglars overnight in Basildon. So it would be quite wrong to imply that this is an area where Essex Police do not act.
The final motion of the evening was from Cllr Gary Canham (UKIP, Pitsea North-West) concerning illegal Traveller encampments. I had a problem with this motion, largely due to the wording. Unfortunately, we had reached the guillotine by this point, so it did curtail debate on the issue. The issue of illegal encampments is one that exercises the patience of nearly all ward members. Just recently, we here in Billericay suffered problems from an illegal encampment at Queen’s Park, which later moved onto the playing field behind The Billericay School. Those of you who follow me on Facebook will have been aware of my frustrations at the time, as the legal process for removing these illegal encampments is quite laborious and time-consuming but, that said, I am satisfied that Basildon Council, working with the Police and the Essex Countywide Traveller Unit (ECTU), already do all in their power to deal with these issues as quickly as possible. But the problem with Councillor Canham’s motion is that it was specifically directed at Travellers and we just cannot do that as a Council. While it is probably true to say that nine out of ten illegal encampments will be the result of Travellers, you cannot single Travellers out in the way that Councillor Canham’s motion did. Because, while there are unfortunately some Travellers that will give that community a bad name, there are plenty of perfectly legal Gypsy and Traveller settlements that do not cause trouble and who get on harmoniously with the local settled community and who are just as horrified by illegal incursions as the rest of us. Councillor Canham did make some hurried alterations to the wording but, like I say, we had reached the guillotine and there was insufficient time to properly consider the new wording, so the Conservative Group voted against the motion.