In what is becoming an annual event I made enquiries with Monitoring Officer and joint guardian of the Council's Constitution, Linda Rees Jones, as to what progress had been made, if any, to remove the unlawful, and still suspended libel indemnity clause from the constitution.
The clause was suspended, but remains struckthrough 'until the legal position is clarified' (pages 12, 17 and 27) , following the Extraordinary meeting on February 27th 2014. Almost three years ago. And before Plaid's Emlyn Dole acquired 'power', but, unfortunately, lost his memory.
Back in 2015 Ms Rees Jones claimed that the cross-party Constitutional Review Working Group (CRWG) would look at the matter in due course. Naturally, they didn't as this is clearly, for Mark and Linda, a no-go area.
This time round she claims that "CRWG has had enough business to consider without prioritising something that’s already marked as “withdrawn". That busy schedule is reflected in the fact that the group have only met once since June 2015. They met in July 2016 when, aside from a few minor tweaks, the main concern was to tighten up, even more, the availability of exempt reports following an embarrassing leak.
CRWG, you might recall, was set up to chew, reluctantly, over the 39 recommendations set by the WLGA Governance Review. The Review, which recognised the toxic officer-led culture, had been required following the publication of the Wales Audit Office reports on the pension and libel indemnity scandals.
The role of the Monitoring Officer, also enshrined in the constitution, is to keep the constitution up-to-date and to monitor and review the operation of the constitution and 'compare practices in this authority with those in other comparable authorities, or national examples of good practice'.
Indeed, following the Governance Review, and as and when required, changes, amendments and deletions to the constitution have been made, and as for 'good practice' I've yet to find national examples, or comparable authorities which include such a sinister clause, withdrawn or otherwise in their constitution.
Clearly the clause would never be used again; it is impotent, obsolete and unlawful but the problem for the Monitoring Officer, and the chief executive is one of finally admitting illegality, and the implications that complete removal would mean.
The constitution places a duty on the monitoring officer to ensure that all decisions, and her advice to Members, are lawful, in this case it most definitely wasn't. As for the chief executive, his legal position would be further compromised, if that's possible, by its removal. This blog has often remarked on the curious interpretation of the constitution by the Monitoring Officer and chief executive, one such example being the permanent appointment of Ms Rees Jones herself.
As for the offending clause, the 'legal position' has of course been clarified, Welsh Government legislation (adopted by the council) prohibits the public funding of libel claims by officers. It is of note that, so far, no attempt has been made, by Mr James, to take enforcement action against me for the unlawful counterclaim costs, which would then bring the matter before a court.
An additional issue is that this all flies in the face of the Derbyshire Rule which prevents a governing body from suing for defamation, by itself or by proxy. The previous Labour and Independent administration, mainly Meryl, Pam and Kevin Madge are equally culpable.
Whether or not the enforcement of damages is, in effect, an attempt to profit from an unlawful decision in public office, is an interesting point. Incidentally, the majority of the damages were awarded for my reference, on the blog, to this very clause.
The clause remains, for now, as a monument to bad practice, a banana republic council, and a tin-pot dictator. Quite a legacy. As for the '39 steps' to perfect governance, the use of good old threatening behaviour, as we saw before Christmas, is still a preferred tactic.
Further to my earlier post The Pembrey scandal - An Employment Tribunal, the judgement has been reserved until the near future so this week's Carmarthenshire Herald (not online) covers the final couple of days of the hearing and features the evidence given by Ms Stephanie Thomas. Ms Thomas held the catering contract at the park for a number of years and was, in March last year, subject of an assault by the Council's Countryside and Coast manager Mr Rory Dickinson. Mr Dickinson was allowed to resign his post a few days before pleading guilty to the offence.
Ms Thomas's evidence further corroborates Mr Morris's claim that the knowledge of serious mismanagement, bullying and underhand tactics went up the corporate ladder.
Despite the audit report clearly referring to missing money and assets, the minutes of the most recent audit committee meeting reveal that an external investigator (a former policeman) had found 'substantial failings' within the service but the police had told the council that there was insufficient evidence of 'deliberate' criminal activity. Interesting use of the term 'deliberate'. The Director of Corporate Services, Mr Chris Moore told the committee that there was 'no need' to prepare an official report on the findings. Really?
The closing statements were interesting. The council's barrister suggested that the idea that the restructuring plan was engineered to deliberately remove Mr Morris was fanciful, and the witnesses were unreliable. Counsel for Mr Morris rather turned that on its head.
You may recall that a very similar post to Mr Morris's was advertised shortly after he was made redundant. Mr Morris's barrister suggested that there had been no proper business case, nor consultation with the union, in an £800,000 efficiency plan, a plan which, curiously, placed Mr Morris in a redundancy pool of one. The new post was titled Active Facilities Manager, something which, as Ski Centre Manager, Mr Morris would have been eminently experienced and qualified for.
The Panel asked the Council's legal team how the point scoring for the new post, and for Mr Morris, was worked out, and how they had come up with 'Five' for Mr Morris, "Five out of what?" they asked, the council's team didn't know. The Panel had also asked, several times, how long Head of Leisure Ian Jones knew of the potential new jobs in the very short pipeline after Mr Morris's redundancy, he couldn't give a definitive answer. The Chair of the Panel observed that he should have known as it was he who wrote the job descriptions.
It is understood that Ms Stephanie Thomas has also brought a case against the council.
The clause was suspended, but remains struckthrough 'until the legal position is clarified' (pages 12, 17 and 27) , following the Extraordinary meeting on February 27th 2014. Almost three years ago. And before Plaid's Emlyn Dole acquired 'power', but, unfortunately, lost his memory.
Back in 2015 Ms Rees Jones claimed that the cross-party Constitutional Review Working Group (CRWG) would look at the matter in due course. Naturally, they didn't as this is clearly, for Mark and Linda, a no-go area.
This time round she claims that "CRWG has had enough business to consider without prioritising something that’s already marked as “withdrawn". That busy schedule is reflected in the fact that the group have only met once since June 2015. They met in July 2016 when, aside from a few minor tweaks, the main concern was to tighten up, even more, the availability of exempt reports following an embarrassing leak.
CRWG, you might recall, was set up to chew, reluctantly, over the 39 recommendations set by the WLGA Governance Review. The Review, which recognised the toxic officer-led culture, had been required following the publication of the Wales Audit Office reports on the pension and libel indemnity scandals.
The role of the Monitoring Officer, also enshrined in the constitution, is to keep the constitution up-to-date and to monitor and review the operation of the constitution and 'compare practices in this authority with those in other comparable authorities, or national examples of good practice'.
Indeed, following the Governance Review, and as and when required, changes, amendments and deletions to the constitution have been made, and as for 'good practice' I've yet to find national examples, or comparable authorities which include such a sinister clause, withdrawn or otherwise in their constitution.
Clearly the clause would never be used again; it is impotent, obsolete and unlawful but the problem for the Monitoring Officer, and the chief executive is one of finally admitting illegality, and the implications that complete removal would mean.
The constitution places a duty on the monitoring officer to ensure that all decisions, and her advice to Members, are lawful, in this case it most definitely wasn't. As for the chief executive, his legal position would be further compromised, if that's possible, by its removal. This blog has often remarked on the curious interpretation of the constitution by the Monitoring Officer and chief executive, one such example being the permanent appointment of Ms Rees Jones herself.
As for the offending clause, the 'legal position' has of course been clarified, Welsh Government legislation (adopted by the council) prohibits the public funding of libel claims by officers. It is of note that, so far, no attempt has been made, by Mr James, to take enforcement action against me for the unlawful counterclaim costs, which would then bring the matter before a court.
An additional issue is that this all flies in the face of the Derbyshire Rule which prevents a governing body from suing for defamation, by itself or by proxy. The previous Labour and Independent administration, mainly Meryl, Pam and Kevin Madge are equally culpable.
Whether or not the enforcement of damages is, in effect, an attempt to profit from an unlawful decision in public office, is an interesting point. Incidentally, the majority of the damages were awarded for my reference, on the blog, to this very clause.
The clause remains, for now, as a monument to bad practice, a banana republic council, and a tin-pot dictator. Quite a legacy. As for the '39 steps' to perfect governance, the use of good old threatening behaviour, as we saw before Christmas, is still a preferred tactic.
---------------------------------------------------
Further to my earlier post The Pembrey scandal - An Employment Tribunal, the judgement has been reserved until the near future so this week's Carmarthenshire Herald (not online) covers the final couple of days of the hearing and features the evidence given by Ms Stephanie Thomas. Ms Thomas held the catering contract at the park for a number of years and was, in March last year, subject of an assault by the Council's Countryside and Coast manager Mr Rory Dickinson. Mr Dickinson was allowed to resign his post a few days before pleading guilty to the offence.
Ms Thomas's evidence further corroborates Mr Morris's claim that the knowledge of serious mismanagement, bullying and underhand tactics went up the corporate ladder.
Despite the audit report clearly referring to missing money and assets, the minutes of the most recent audit committee meeting reveal that an external investigator (a former policeman) had found 'substantial failings' within the service but the police had told the council that there was insufficient evidence of 'deliberate' criminal activity. Interesting use of the term 'deliberate'. The Director of Corporate Services, Mr Chris Moore told the committee that there was 'no need' to prepare an official report on the findings. Really?
The closing statements were interesting. The council's barrister suggested that the idea that the restructuring plan was engineered to deliberately remove Mr Morris was fanciful, and the witnesses were unreliable. Counsel for Mr Morris rather turned that on its head.
You may recall that a very similar post to Mr Morris's was advertised shortly after he was made redundant. Mr Morris's barrister suggested that there had been no proper business case, nor consultation with the union, in an £800,000 efficiency plan, a plan which, curiously, placed Mr Morris in a redundancy pool of one. The new post was titled Active Facilities Manager, something which, as Ski Centre Manager, Mr Morris would have been eminently experienced and qualified for.
The Panel asked the Council's legal team how the point scoring for the new post, and for Mr Morris, was worked out, and how they had come up with 'Five' for Mr Morris, "Five out of what?" they asked, the council's team didn't know. The Panel had also asked, several times, how long Head of Leisure Ian Jones knew of the potential new jobs in the very short pipeline after Mr Morris's redundancy, he couldn't give a definitive answer. The Chair of the Panel observed that he should have known as it was he who wrote the job descriptions.
It is understood that Ms Stephanie Thomas has also brought a case against the council.
2 comments:
Great, I was too treated like dirt by these people.
In my 10 years working for the local authority, bullying was endemic. An occupational health nurse told me that the then Technical Services, had a terrible record for stress, resultant of poor management. She said this had been brought to the attention of the hierarchy, but they had merely ignored her. I was told she had been head hunted for the role, due to her qualifications. Shortly after I saw her she left the job for another post. She was evidently dissatisfied how things were run.
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