Waiting game
Regular readers will recall that more than ten weeks ago I published a post about the grant-aided office block in Johnston in which I calculated that there had been an overpayment in excess of £100,000.
Remembering Miss Tate’s instructions to “always show your working” I sent a copy of my calculations to the finance department of PCC.
This grant scheme is rather complicated in that it is a joint venture between several local authorities in south west Wales with Carmarthenshire C C designated as the lead authority.
This means that, although the final grant payment for Johnston was reported to PCC’s cabinet, elected members of PCC don’t have the usual statutory rights to inspect documents in the possession of the council of which they are a member.
So, I have had to try to complete the jigsaw while missing some of the pieces.
I understand that PCC forwarded my conclusions to Carmarthen for comment, but, despite several reminders nothing has been forthcoming so far.
On 22 November I was copied into an email to PCC from Carmarthenshire’s chief financial officer Chris Moore which said: “Sorry, I was promised the final report earlier this week, but obviously the final drafting has been delayed. I will get an update tomorrow.”
On 29 November I emailed PCC: “Is there any progress on this?”
On 2 December PCC informed me: “Spoke to Chris Moore yesterday and he now has the report from Internal Audit. He has not yet had a chance to read it and will respond once he has.”
On 7 December, having heard nothing, I emailed PCC and asked: “Am I entitled to conclude that Mr Moore is a slow reader?” and, when that piece of sarcasm failed to move things along, I emailed again on 15 December to say: “This seems to be taking forever!” and again on 20 December: “Any word from CCC?”
On January 2, I was copied into an email from PCC to CCC asking if there was anything to report.
No answer came the stern reply, so I concluded that this must be a very long report.
Things seemed to be moving when I was told verbally about ten days ago that Mr Moore had provided PCC with a copy of the report which explained why I was wrong to claim that there had been an overpayment.
PCC were unwilling to go into detail but I was told that one reason for CCC’s confidence was that the grant scheme had been audited by WEFO (Wales European Funding Office).
Regular readers will know that a whole alphabet soup of auditors, including WEFO, had given the all clear to the grants in Pembroke Dock which are presently the subject of a lengthy police investigation.
So I asked the council if I could inspect Mr Moore’s rebuttal in order to see for myself where I had gone wrong.
PCC’s director of finance replied:
“Out of courtesy, I asked Chris [Moore] whether he was happy to share the report and he wasn’t sure it was appropriate. He would prefer I provide you with details of the outcome.
I don’t see why you can’t have a copy of the report, but to make sure I don’t fall foul of the agreement with Carmarthenshire, I have asked the Head of Legal Services for confirmation.
That was the 18 January, and nothing has been heard since.
Poetry in motion
I have to admit to being a bit of a fundamentalist when it comes to matters constitutional.
My enthusiasm is based on the belief that, because they restrict the ability of those in power to do as they please, constitutional rules are our last line of defence against tyrants.
In the case of PCC the constitution also gives ordinary elected members the right to put down Notices of Motion at full council on matters that they think deserve an airing.
Traditionally council has sent these NoMs to either the corporate governance committee or cabinet for consideration with a report back to the next meeting of council with a recommendation.
At the December meeting of full council, I put down an NoM calling for a report into the council’s dealings with convicted paedophile Mik Smith to be made public, while another dealing with the sale of frontages to owner occupiers on council estates was submitted by Grumpette.
The council remitted mine to the corporate overview and scrutiny committee, while Grumpette’s was sent off to the corporate governance committee.
Despite the similarity in their names these are two very different bodies.
So it came as a bit of a surprise to find both NoMs on the agenda for last Thursday’s corporate overview and scrutiny meeting.
What was even harder to take was that, rather than being charged with debating the issues with a view to making a recommendation to full council, in both cases the committee was being asked to decide if it wished to place the two NoMs on its “forward work programme”.
Whether by accident or design the effect of this was, as Cllr Bob Kilmister likes to say: “to kick the matter into the long grass”.
As there is no time limit on these forward work programmes, very long grass indeed.
Naturally, I wasn’t too pleased with this development so I reached for the constitution and was encouraged to find that the terms of reference of this O&S committee didn’t include consideration of the matters covered by my NoM.
When I put this to the committee, the legal officer responded: “It is important to remember that council made a democratic decision to send this matter, to remit this matter, to this committee.”
Then, after accepting that more thought might have been given to the question of which was the most appropriate committee, she concluded: “However, that decision has now been taken.”
I think this analysis is flawed because before a decision can be said to be “democratic” it must also be lawful.
And any decision that doesn’t accord with the constitution is, by definition, unlawful.
What is the point of setting down terms of reference for a committee if they can be varied at the whim of council officers?
Indeed this point seemed to be conceded with respect to Grumpette’s NoM which the council decided should go to the corporate governance committee, but which found itself instead before the overview and scrutiny committee.
The legal officer’s explanation for this change of venue was that, under the recently revised constitution, “Corporate governance committee only deals with constitutional issues”, i.e. the notice of motion was outside of the corporate governance committee’s terms of reference.
So it’s a case of heads I win, tails you lose, because when it suits those in power the “democratic decision” is sacrosanct, but when it leads to a result they don’t like the “democratic decision” can be disregarded.
At least nobody can accuse the council of consistency.
