Feedback from Copeland Council

Copeland Council met this afternoon at Millom School.

I asked questions about Whitehaven Gold Course and the Keekle Head former opencast mining site: details of my questions and the answers will be covered in more detail in specific posts.

There were numerous references to the Places Survey. This was a national survey assessing public satisfaction with public services all over the counrty. Provisional results from the 2008 survey have recently come out, and put Copeland as one of the worst councils in the country in terms of customer satisfaction. A Task and Finish group has been set up to look into what the council needs to do to improve performance in the areas criticised by the survey.

Much of the executive report was taken up with concerns expressed by my colleagues in rural parts of the constituency about the refuse collection service, particularly as it affects those who live in roads that the council refuse vehicles will not drive down. This is a huge issue in the rural areas of the borough.

There was a brief report at the end on the measures in place in the borough to deal with the situation if the Swine Flu problem gets worse.

High Points of the meeting:

1) Following on from the recent unfortunate events at the hospital meeting, I made a point of asking the leader of the council a constructive, non-partisan question about the need to continue working together to support the hospital. I was pleased to get an equally constructive reply.

2) The council has finally voted on and passed a very sensible position on various forms of energy including nuclear and wind farms. I wasn't very pleased with the way this was handled but I was pleased with the motion eventually passed. This was extremely similar in meaning to the motion which was proposed by Norman Clarkson months ago but had been batted back and forth for no good reason between the full council and an Overview and Scrutiny Committee.

Low Points of the meeting

3) A recent public meeting at which 70 ordinary local residents expressed concern at the council's rubbish collection policy was described by a member of the Labour executive as a "Tory Ambush" for no better reason than that some Conservative councillors representing other wards had come to hear the discussion.

Some Labour politicians just do not "get it" when the public complain and appear not to realise that when ordinary residents are not happy with a public service it does not necessarily mean that they have been put up to complaining by tory politicians.

4) The recommendation on energy policy which had been endorsed unanimously, twice, by all the members of the Overview and Scrutiny committee (including the Labour councillors on the committee) was changed at the full council meeting, with zero notice for most members of the council and for no convincing reason.

We were told that the wording of the recommendation was being changed: the Leader and deputy leader of the opposition were provided with the new wording by email that morning, too late to get it to most of us before we set off for Millom. One printed copy - one copy - was provided at the start of the debate which was passed along the shadow executive table: the Independent group did not see the motion until I took that copy round to them.

As one of about half a dozen opposition members of the council who got to see the actual wording of the amended motion before the council voted on it, it is my view that the meaning was virtually identical to the form of words sent up by the committee. Which is why I've listed the actual decision as a "high point" above. But it was really bad form not to make a copy available to all members before the vote.

Comments

prashant said…
Thought ful article.
Work from home

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