Oooh – now this will spoul breakfast for some people! Wouldn’t it be interesting if the watchdog got a few teeth!
Get that evidence folder started now.
“The Committee on Standards in Public Life (CSPL) is to undertake a review of local government standards during 2017/18.
In its Annual Report and Forward Plan 2017/18, published this week, the watchdog said it “maintains a longstanding interest in local government standards, and regularly receives correspondence from members of the public expressing their concern about this issue”.
The CSPL added that it was actively conducting research and engaging with partners on this subject throughout 2016-17.
It said the review would be based around a consultation that will be launched in early 2018. “Based on the submissions to this review and meetings with key stakeholders, we intend to publish our findings and recommendations in 2018.”
The CSPL revealed that it would be publishing in late 2017 the findings of research it had conducted as a follow-up on its 2014 report and 2015 guidance on ethical standards for providers of public services.
“We will use this opportunity to raise awareness about the importance of ethical standards issues in the delivery of public services across all providers.”
Other areas the watchdog plans to cover include how developments in social and political communication and media are shaping public life. It also plans to keep a watching brief on issues surrounding conflicts of interests and good governance in academies, and on standards issues in the NHS.”
Gordon Oliver, elected Mayor of Torbay and highly enthusiastic member of our Local Enterprise Partnership, has been upsetting most if not all of his councillors, who are finding it very difficult to do anything about it.
He got the job in 2011 and was re-elected in 2015. However, within the year, a public referendum had been organised on whether Torbay should have a Mayor was organised, and it was decided that, from 2019, the council would revert back to a Leader and Cabinet arrangement. Nothing could be done earlier than that.
Should the Local Enterprise Partnership ever be correctly constituted, as things currently stand, we would be forced to participate in an election for a Mayor of Somerset and Devon who would have a great deal of direct control over the two counties, deciding most things himself or herself and needing only votes from hand-picked colleagues to force through his or her decisions.
This is a situation similar to that where we were forced to accept a Devon and Cornwall Police and Crime Commissioner, when only 22.8% of registered voters bothered to turn out and we ended up with Alison Hernandez, a former Torbay councillor. Who now wants to employ her mate as her Deputy. And who can, if she goes against the wishes of our Police and Crime Panel, do so – and again there is nothing they or we can do about it until new elections in 2020.
And where is her mate from? Torbay! And who is a Torbay councillor. Who has been chair of planning there for several years.
Quite a little power block now built up from there. Must be something in the water.
“Battersea Power Station builder Carillion has shocked the City with a devastating profit warning after an £845 million hit on a clutch of contracts and spiralling debts left it vulnerable to a takeover.
The company — whose chief executive Richard Howson has stepped down immediately — has axed its dividend this year and is desperately looking to prop up its creaking balance sheet by selling off parts of the business.
Carillion’s debt pile is likely to soar to £800 million this year and interim boss Keith Cochrane said that “no option is off the table” for the company, whose shares tumbled by 30%, or 62.5p, to 129.6p today.
RBC analyst Andrew Gibb said: “In our view, the group would need to raise a significant amount — £500 million-plus — to restore stability. And in the near term, we would expect others to be running the slide rule over the business.”
Carillion — whose roster of projects included the conversion of London’s power station into flats — called in accountants KPMG to review nearly 60 contracts earlier this year after deteriorating cashflows.
A host of major players including Sir Paul Marshall’s Marshall Wace, fund giant Blackrock and George Soros’s SFM UK had lined up big bets against Carillion, borrowing shares in the firm to sell in the market in the hope of buying them back more cheaply later and booking a profit.
Three major public-private partnership contracts — the Midland Metropolitan Hospital in Smethwick, Merseyside’s Royal Liverpool Hospital, and an Aberdeen road project — are understood to be behind the bulk of the UK’s £375 million losses. Its £470 million writedowns in overseas markets are driven by losses on a major project in Doha, Qatar.
The business slashed guidance on revenues this year to between £4.8 billion and £5 billion and is pulling out of public-private partnership construction deals altogether after the shock blow. It is also withdrawing from construction markets in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Egypt and only pursuing jobs in future “via lower-risk procurement routes”.
“The decision to cancel this year’s dividend will save £80 million and Carillion also plans to raise £125 million through “non-core” sell-offs over the next 12 months in a bid to ease the pressure on the balance sheet. “
“The chancellor, Philip Hammond, who helped spearhead the government’s housebuilding programme, could make more than £1.5m in a previously undisclosed deal over a possible housing development on green-belt land.
Land Registry documents reveal Hammond has agreed an option with a housebuilder on about three acres of land he owns next to his home in Surrey … ”
Sunday Times (paywall) page 10
He says it is a standard provision and doesn’t need to be declared … the former Chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life disagrees.
“South Ribble Borough Council has held an external investigation into a leak even though an opposition councillor admitted to being the culprit.
It appointed law firm Weightmans to investigate how a confidential report into a long running scandal around its taxi licensing service and child safeguarding ended up in the now-defunct New Day newspaper.
The report had been written by another law firm Wilkin Chapman, and had a limited circulation in the council.
After it was published the council called in the police, who concluded that no criminality had occurred. …”
Owl says: Two parties working together, both using dirty money to buy votes and manipulate power – are East Devon Tory voters happy with this?
“When the law over political donations was overhauled (or rather, introduced – as it had previously been pretty much a secret free-for-all), an exception was made for Northern Ireland. The requirements for transparency of donations in the rest of the UK* was not applied to Northern Ireland as, still fresh from its years of bloody violence, it was felt by many that forcing political donors to be named was not yet appropriate.
That secrecy has, however, come under recent sustained criticism as it has opened up a loophole for secret donations to impact not only elections in Northern Ireland but also UK-wide contests. In particular, a secret £435,000 donation to the DUP went on campaigning in favour of Brexit across the whole UK.
Now, however, the government has announced that donations in Northern Ireland will be subject to the same transparency rules as in the rest of the UK.
One catch – up until now, the source of large secret donations has still had to be recorded even if not published. The government’s plan is for those records to remain secret despite the Electoral Commission’s calls for transparency over donations made in recent years too. So the full story of that £435,000 for the Brexit referendum may never be known.
* This transparency is not perfect, as continuing disputes over unincorporated associations in particular demonstrates, but it is pretty widespread.”
“Councils have turned on the NHS over “secretive, opaque and top-down” reforms that they say will fail patients.
Simon Stevens, chief executive of NHS England, has staked his tenure on co-ordinating care more effectively and has said that local authorities are crucial to the process because they oversee public health and social care for the elderly.
However, only a fifth of councils think the plans will succeed amid widespread complaints that they have been shut out of the process by the NHS, according to a survey by the Local Government Association.
Not one councillor who responded said they had been very involved in drawing up plans and nine out of ten said the process had been driven from Whitehall rather than locally. Cultural clashes with a “command and control” NHS that did not trust elected councillors meant that more local authorities believed the process was harming social care than helping it.
Mr Stevens has created 44 “sustainability and transformation partnerships” (STPs) where hospitals and GPs are meant to plan with councils on how to improve care and help close a £22 billion black hole in the NHS budget. However, four out of five councillors said the system was not fit for purpose and criticised the NHS for prioritising cost-cutting and closing hospital units over preventing illness.
Izzi Seccombe of the Local Government Association said: “Many councillors have been disappointed by the unilateral top-down approach of the NHS in some of the STP areas. As our survey results show, the majority of local politicians who responded feel excluded from the planning process. If local politicians and communities are not engaged then we have serious doubt over whether STPs will deliver.”
Half the 152 councils with social care responsibilities responded to the survey and 81 councillors with responsibility for health contributed. “The way in which the STP has been handled (top down, secretive, lack of engagement) has harmed relationships between the council and some NHS colleagues,” one said.
The NHS simply does not understand the decision-making of local government
Another said: “It is entirely driven from the top, via budget pressures. The process has been overly secretive and opaque. It has got in the way of closer working between councils and health.”
Councillors criticised STPs as “complex and full of jargon”, saying “the NHS simply does not understand the decision-making of local government”.
Ms Seccombe said that in a centralised NHS, managers often did not want to share information with party political councils accountable to local voters, saying that the process was “trying to mix oil and water”.
Chris Ham, chief executive of the King’s Fund think tank, said: “This survey suggests worrying numbers of council leaders are still frustrated by the process and lacking in confidence in their local plan. A huge effort is now needed to make up lost ground.”
A spokesman for NHS England said: “By creating STPs we have issued a massive open invitation to those parts of local government willing to join forces, while recognising that local politics can sometimes make this harder. The fact that public satisfaction is more than twice as high for the NHS as it is for social care underlines the real pressure on councils. It should serve as a wake-up call to every part of the country about the importance of joint working.”
… conveniently forgetting that it has always been his job to ensure that this happens!
“Local government needs to open up and raise its game, Sajid Javid has told the Local Government Association’s annual conference.
Delivering a keynote address to the gathering in Birmingham yesterday, Javid highlighted the “serious failings” that emerged in the aftermath of the Grenfell tower fire in west London and said he wanted to reflect on what had gone wrong in local government.
“If the events of the past few weeks have taught us anything, it’s that we have to raise our game,” he said. “The ties that bind local government to local communities have not snapped. But if we don’t act now, such a time may one day be upon us.”
Councils would not be able to rebuild and reinforce trust with local communities if they hid away from public scrutiny.
“If people are going to trust their elected representatives, they have to see them working in the harsh light of the public eye, not in comforting shadows behind closed doors.
“Not only must democracy exist, it must be seen to exist. It can’t be about decisions made in private meeting rooms… local government must show it is for the people – not just of the people.” …”
Words – so much easier than action, as we well know in East Devon.
“Documents show plans to create 36 sheltered apartments for the elderly should be worth nearly £1million to the Sidmouth community – but the developer has shown it is ‘unviable’ to pay more than £41,000.
Churchill Retirement Living hopes to demolish the former Green Close care home in Drakes Avenue to make way for the development.
Its five-figure offer towards off-site ‘affordable’ housing was slammed as an ‘insult to Sidmouth’ by town councillors, who suggested the developer should pay at least £360,000.
After failing to reach an agreement with East Devon District Council (EDDC), Churchill launched an appeal due to non-determination of its application.
Papers submitted to the appeal process from EDDC say there is a policy expectation that half of the site should be provided as ‘affordable’ housing and that there is a ‘substantial’ need for one- and two-bedroom units in Sidmouth.
If 18 ‘affordable’ homes cannot be provided on-site, a payment of £935,201 would be expected so the properties can be built elsewhere.
Churchill said a viability assessment showed building ‘affordable’ homes on the site was ‘impractical’ and ‘unrealistic’.
It added: “It has been demonstrated that the application development is not sufficiently viable to permit the imposition of any affordable housing or planning gain contributions above £41,208.”
An EDDC spokeswoman said: “Unfortunately, the development is not sufficiently viable to pay this [£935,201] sum and, following an independent assessment of the viability of the scheme, it was reluctantly accepted that the scheme could only afford to pay £41,208 towards affordable housing.
“Under government guidance, we are required to reduce our requirements where a development is unviable and so we have no real choice but to accept this position.”
EDDC also expected Churchill to pay £22,536 for habitat mitigation, plus an £18,400 public open space contribution. The total is nearly £1million.
The delay in EDDC deciding the fate of the application was due to officers trying to apply an ‘overage’ clause that would require Churchill to pay up if its profits exceed current expectations.
A Planning Inspectorate spokesman confirmed that the appeal had been validated and it is in discussion with both parties.”
“The claimant in Hussain v Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council [2017] EWHC 1641 (Admin), Cllr Mahboob Hussain, was alleged to have been engaged in various transactions in early 2012 which involved procuring the sale of council assets to family friends at a substantial undervalue.
The councillor, an elected Labour member of the Labour controlled authority, was also alleged to have used his power and influence as a senior politician within Sandwell to have parking tickets issued to his family expunged.
The council’s audit committee had commenced an investigation after various allegations circulated in 2014 in the press and on social media that there had been serial and longstanding wrongdoing by elected members.
An external firm of solicitors were brought in to assist. The firm interviewed Cllr Husssain on two separate occasions about the allegations.
“Regrettably, towards the end of the process, the solicitor conducting the investigation made a personal and derogatory observation about the claimant and his family to the chief executive,” Mr Justice Green said.
The chief executive, Jan Britton, then considered whether it was proper to continue with the firm given the risk of bias. It was decided that – with the investigation at an advanced stage – the work should be completed. But it was also decided that the evidence and report should be submitted to leading counsel for independent advice.
The solicitors’ report was presented to Sandwell Council in April 2016. A QC then advised in May 2016.
“The gist of the advice was that there was a serious case to be met by the claimant and that the solicitors report and the opinion should be placed into the public domain to address criticisms then being made in the press that the authority was suppressing wrongdoing and not taking its obligations seriously,” Mr Justice Green said in a press summary of the ruling.
Counsel also advised that a formal investigation of the allegations against the claimant under the Localism Act 2011 be initiated.
The judge said the investigation then became ‘political’ in the sense that the investigation was used by members against each other during elections of a new Leader of the council. The solicitors’ report and the QC’s opinion were leaked.
When the council said it intended to publish the two documents, Cllr Hussain sought permission for judicial review and an order prohibiting publication.
The High Court refused permission for a judicial review challenge, but the Court of Appeal went on to grant permission. Sandwell’s investigation was stayed by the High Court pending the outcome of Cllr Hussain’s challenge. This also prevented the authority from convening a standards committee investigation to hear and then rule upon the allegations against him.
The claimant advanced a number of grounds of challenge. The judge said these raised issues about the scope of the powers of local authorities generally to investigate alleged wrongdoing under the Local Government Act 1972 and the Localism Act 2011 and the interaction between these measures and the Data Protection Act 1998.
The claimant argued that:
The investigation was and remained flawed and unlawful because it was infected by bias, politically motivated, oppressive, irrational and unreasonable.
There was no lawful power to investigate alleged misconduct pre-dating the coming into effect of the Localism Act 2011 (1 July 2012), and no power more generally to invoke the powers in the Local Government Act 1972 and the Localism Act 2011 in support of investigations into this sort of alleged misconduct.
In relation to the decision to place the solicitors’ report and the QC’s opinion into the public domain, this was an irrational and politically motivated act, that it was infected by bias, and in any event the decision was unlawful under data protection legislation and violated the rights of Cllr Hussain and his family under Article 8 ECHR.
Dismissing the claim for judicial review, Mr Justice Green said: “On the evidence before the Court there is a serious prima facie case against the claimant. The allegations should now be investigated properly in accordance with the formal arrangement instituted by the council under the LA 2011 [Localism Act].
“The council has ample powers to conduct investigations into this sort of impropriety. The argument that Parliament intended an amnesty to be accorded to those engaged in wrongdoing before the coming into effect of the LA 2011 (on 1st July 2011) is rejected. The decision to publish the solicitors report and the opinion were fully justified and in the public interest and were not prohibited by data protection laws or Article 8 ECHR.”
The judge said he had also decided that even if he were wrong in his analysis of the powers of the local authority and that it had in the past acted unlawfully that none of these breaches would be material or have any real impact on the fairness of the investigatory procedure going forward.
“A striking feature of the case is that the standards committee, which will hear and adjudicate upon allegations made against the claimant, has not yet been convened, due to the stay that the claimant successfully obtained from the High Court,” Mr Justice Green said. [His emphasis]
“When the stay is lifted, which it will be by Order of this Court, the claimant will have a full opportunity to present his case and establish that the allegation against him are to be rejected.”
The judge said he agreed with the position adopted by the council that the allegations were serious and that there was a powerful public interest in those allegations being thoroughly and fairly tested and adjudicated upon.
“The fact that the issues have acquired a ‘political’ flavour to them is not a reason for the council, as a body, to act differently. On the contrary it must act independently and objectively throughout, as it has done,” he noted.
The stay on all proceedings was lifted.
Commenting on the ruling, Sandwell’s Britton said: “We welcome the judgment that the claim for a judicial review has been rejected in totality and that the council’s case has been vindicated.
“Now legal issues have come to a conclusion, the council is able to proceed with its standards process.”
A little late, as the meeting is tomorrow, but anyone with a spare couple of hours (!) might want to spend it poring over the agenda of the Audit and Governance Committee.
A rather thorough going over after their appointment as auditors has seen KPMG out EDDC under the microscope.
Too many to list here, it has identified numerous financial and procedural weaknesses.
Incapacitation of all staff for protracted period re Elections
In the event that all election staff were absent for a prolonged period the Council would fail to complete the canvass, fail to publish a revised register and fail to produce accurate data and registers for elections. In the event that the Electoral Services Officer/Manager was absent for a prolonged period it is unlikely that existing staff resources would accept managerial responsibilities.”
and finally – another coruscating reminder of the Section 106 scandal
“Devon’s newly revealed deputy police and crime commissioner is a “staunch” Conservative who once chained himself to a set of railings to protest about the downfall of his hero, Margaret Thatcher.
Mark Kingscote has now been officially revealed by crime czar Alison Hernandez as her second-in-command, a role which will come with an estimated salary of £30,000.
The 55-year-old NHS mental health support worker is a close ally of Ms Hernandez from the days the pair were jointly-elected Torbay councillors for Shiphay with the Willows.
Ms Hernandez faced criticism during her election campaign that she would politicise the role, including from predecessor Tony Hogg, who quit the Tories in protest at the end of his office.
However, she has opted to recruit a fellow party member from her home town, prizing his track record in mental health and diversity in an appointment which has been criticised as “smacking of nepotism”.
A brief glance at Twitter shows her deputy is a loyal Conservative who reveres Mrs Thatcher, adores the Queen and even refers to the current prime minister as “Mother Theresa” May.
Deputy police and crime commissioner Mark Kingscote once chained himself to railings in protest at Tory plot to depose Margaret Thatcher
Devon’s newly revealed deputy police and crime commissioner is a “staunch” Conservative who once chained himself to a set of railings to protest about the downfall of his hero, Margaret Thatcher.
Mark Kingscote has now been officially revealed by crime czar Alison Hernandez as her second-in-command, a role which will come with an estimated salary of £30,000.
The 55-year-old NHS mental health support worker is a close ally of Ms Hernandez from the days the pair were jointly-elected Torbay councillors for Shiphay with the Willows.
Ms Hernandez faced criticism during her election campaign that she would politicise the role, including from predecessor Tony Hogg, who quit the Tories in protest at the end of his office.
However, she has opted to recruit a fellow party member from her home town, prizing his track record in mental health and diversity in an appointment which has been criticised as “smacking of nepotism”.
A brief glance at Twitter shows her deputy is a loyal Conservative who reveres Mrs Thatcher, adores the Queen and even refers to the current prime minister as “Mother Theresa” May.
Councillor Kingscote insists his views do not prevent him from looking and thinking “outside the box” and he will not bring party politics into policing.
But he does nothing to conceal or play down his deep admiration for Mrs Thatcher and her “special aura”.
He staked out Brighton’s Grand Hotel in 1987, the first time the Tories had stayed there since the IRA bomb of 1984 which nearly killed the then prime minister, bearing a bouquet of flowers.
Three years later, he was so furious at Michael Heseltine for launching a leadership challenge that he chained himself to the railings outside the Tory MP’s Mayfair home.
“I am more of a Thatcherite than a Conservative – she was a great inspiration to me,” he told Devon Live.
“That is based on the free market, deregulation and giving people the tools to get on with their own life. I believe in giving people a hand up not a hand-out and give people a chance to make something of their life.
“People have short memories but I remember how sad and desperate Britain was before she came to power: the three-day week, public sector strikes…Britain was on its knees.”
Mr Kingscote said he received many hundreds of letters of support from around the country for his demonstration, which saw him moved on by police.
“I went to Michael Heseltine’s house and we chained ourselves to the railings – the police came along and said, ‘Behave yourselves and get on your way’.
“Later we went to Downing Street and were greeted by rapturous applause.”
Mr Kingscote also reveals how his floral tribute to the so-called Iron Lady also began on a whim in his hometown, Torbay.
“I met Mrs Thatcher on many occasions, the most memorable being the Tory party conference of 1987,” he recalled.
“I said to my friend Vera ‘its Margaret’s birthday tomorrow I want to get her some flowers’.
“We went to Brighton and bumped into Michael Heseltine around 7am. He said, ‘You had better check with the heavy mob’ as security was tight.
“It was all cordoned off so we went upstairs and waited and waited while she was having a cabinet meeting.
“All of a sudden the door opened and I saw the outline and said ‘it’s Maggie’ and she said ‘you had better come in’ – we said we had come to wish her happy birthday to show how much we loved her.
She looked at the flowers and said ‘oh, red, white and blue – the colours of freedom and democracy in our country. May we never betray these colours’.
“We were in there for 15 to 20 minutes. It is amazing when you think how powerful she was in the 80s – there were ambassadors and heads of state waiting – she didn’t have to do that.
“There are only two people who have ever made me feel nervous in their presence: one was Maggie – she had a huge aura about her – and the other was the Queen.
“The dress, the hair, the make-up – everything about her was powerful and she used it all to maximum effect.”
The post of deputy police and crime commissioner was first raised on the campaign trail by Ms Hernandez, who toyed with the idea of campaigning for office alongside a running mate.
She eventually stood alone on the Tory ticket and was elected in her own right.
But last month, Devon Live revealed that she was considering appointing Mr Kingscote to share the workload, including increased scrutiny.
On Friday, he was formally announced before being presented to a meeting of the Police and Crime Panel next week.
His knowledge of mental health during 25 years in the NHS, his experience as Torbay’s planning committee, and a councillor since 2000, persuaded Ms Hernandez to offer him the role.
Cllr Kingscote is passionate about promoting diversity and this area will be key to Ms Hernandez’s plans to include marginalised communities in policing decisions.
He says, as a gay man, he has never experienced any prejudice, but will “speak up on behalf” of those whose views may not receive sufficient attention.
“I have never in my life experienced any prejudice but that might just be because of the person I am,” he added.
“In this day and age sexuality is not really relevant. I am also a committed member of the Church of England but you have got to have a broad outlook on life.
“You don’t have to be part of a particular group to want the best for them.”
He says his “staunch” Conservatism will be channelled into getting value for money in policing for taxpayers in Devon and Cornwall.
Asked about the recent row over Ms Hernandez’s comments over armed citizens, Cllr Kingscote feels his new boss has been harshly criticised.
He says her suggestion that allowing registered firearm users to combat terrorists was simply stimulating debate.
“Sometimes you need to debate things to know if it is a good policy or not,” he added.
“Both Alison and myself have strong views. I am not frightened to challenge my views or to challenge hers: that’s what makes a good team to challenge and influence policy
“Of course I am a Conservative and my belief in Conservative values will never change but you have got to look at the bigger picture.
“My three principles are freedom, democracy and the rule of law.”
“Decline of advertising revenue and changing perceptions of ‘quality journalism’ have left no room for much needed local reporting
A day after the Grenfell Tower fire in West London, a Sky News camera crew is talking to writer, film-maker and local resident Ishmahil Blagrove as he delivers a polished exposition on the failings of the media as playing a part in the disaster.
“This is not just a story – this situation has been brewing for years … You the media, you are the mouthpiece of this government and you make it possible.” Later Blagrove describes the mainstream media as “a bunch of motherfuckers” to a small crowd surrounding him who break into polite applause. Channel 4’s Jon Snow faced an angry group outside Grenfell the same day, asking him where the press was when the fire safety concerns were first raised.
Among the many elements of failure which lead to the unacceptable and avoidable, the failure of accountability reporting on local communities is obvious to anyone who cares to scour the archives. The Grenfell Action Group blog carefully documented their repeated complaints to the council. Other reporting is scarce, and where it exists, hard to find.
Grenfell Action Group blogposts form the most reliable archive of concerns about the area’s social housing, and yet they were unable to make the council act on their behalf. Even in the aftermath of what the group describes as “social murder”, it continues to publish posts on other housing tenants and issues in the area. Inside Housing, the trade publication, has been full of good reporting on safety issues but it has a different constituency and no leverage over local officials.
The causes of the failure of local journalism are well known: commercialism, consolidation, the internet, poor management. The fixes for that, though, cannot be found in an environment which is commercially hostile to small scale accountability journalism, and for that we are all to blame.
The decline of in-depth reporting about London’s richest borough is a microcosm of what has happened to local journalism in the UK and beyond – the pattern is the same from Kensington to Kentucky.
A few minutes on Google will give you a snapshot of how local media has become a hollowed-out, commercial shell for an important civic function. In 2010 the Fulham and Hammersmith Chronicle launched a Proper Papers Not Propaganda campaign against H&F News, the Hammersmith and Fulham freesheet published by the local council at a cost of £175,000 of taxpayers’ money. Councils using advances in printing technology to cheaply produce professional-looking papers was the second part of a pincer movement on the local press, the first being the loss of advertising to Google’s search advertising.
In 2014, Trinity Mirror closed seven local papers and consolidated three West London titles, including the Fulham and Hammersmith Chronicle, and relaunched one Gazette to cover the territory of three defunct papers.
In truth the detailed coverage of local stories was already difficult for news organisations to maintain, and in some cases the idea of high-quality local reporting had always been a myth. But the evisceration of any sustainable professional journalism at the local level creates both an accountability vacuum and a distance between media and the communities it reports on.
As well as council-owned outlets, a plethora of glossy lifestyle and housing media mop up the advertising revenue not ingested by Facebook or Google. The local publication Kensington, Chelsea & Westminster Today – listed as the only free newspaper in the borough – has no local reporting at all.
The “news” site contains no information about its ownership or staff. However, in company filings its editor is listed as Kate Hawthorne, who is also the director of public relations company Hatricks.
The revolution in ground-level local media has never taken off in the way it was meant to. The local blogs run by tenants, activists and other citizens, find themselves isolated and crowded out in clogged social streams, short on attention, funding and traction. Often they rely on the tenacity and unpaid labour of their founders for survival.
As scale has become the sine qua non, choosing between the world and the local street has become the bargain for editors. The Guardian closed its own local city reporting experiment in 2011. The Daily Mail and General Trust sold its local newspapers to expand its global news and entertainment website. New players like Huffington Post and BuzzFeed are globalists not localists. The New York Times is putting more reporters into Europe than onto the local beat. The Washington Post was freed from a local remit and has soared since.
Senior editors are much more likely to be spending time in a departure lounge than a council chamber. Many have never held a reporting job that required them to sit in local courts or civic meetings.
Covering local housing meetings is an unglamorous beat for any journalist; hardly anyone reads your work, almost nobody cares what happens in the meetings, and the pay is extremely low. Yet it is hard to argue there are more civically important jobs for journalism than reporting the daily machinations of local power.
Local reporting serves another function which is seldom discussed. Local journalism should be a pipeline which takes young people from very different backgrounds into the profession of reporting; it ought to provide an access point for people to get to know and understand the importance of accountability coverage by participating in it.
The shallow wisdom of digital editors is often that when nobody reads your story, you are doing it wrong. But the stories worth covering that nobody reads are the fabric of the public record.
The immediate reach of a single story is only half the story. The record of what happens for instance at Kensington and Chelsea committee meetings is for the most part available in PDFs on the council’s website. There is no corresponding public record kept by independent reporters and without the Grenfell Action Group we would know almost nothing of the warning signs that were repeatedly pushed in front of the council.
The rise of vast advertising platforms has sucked money from the market, and the efficiencies have been good for business and bad for journalism. National and international media, who were numerous on the ground after the Grenfell fire, have conspired in creating an attention economy which leaves no room for the unread story.
Coverage of the “quality” of a media outlet often starts with a “how many….” metric about views and shares. There is decreasing correlation between high numbers and quality journalism; when it is set in a social environment, where gimmicks and outrage cause social “sharing”, the opposite is often true.
John Ness, who has been editor in chief of two US-based ventures to make hyperlocal journalism work on the web, Patch and DNAInfo, sees the difficulty of establishing and maintaining independent journalism at local level as feeding into issues of trust and transparency which blight all media.
“I think people increasingly understand that our news ecosystem is broken, to the point where we can’t agree with our neighbours about what news events actually happened the day before. And I think people increasingly understand that the base of that ecosystem, local news, has to be fixed if we’re going to get back to a place where we share the same reality with our neighbours.,” he says.
There is decreasing correlation between high numbers and quality journalism
Ness thinks the route to sustainability resides primarily with people paying more for local media. In the US, communities with high-density populations and engaged citizens have had some success at creating not-for-profit local outlets, like the investigative outlet The Lens in New Orleans, and the veteran Voice of San Diego, or the much larger Texas Tribune in Austin. These remain the exceptions rather than the rule.
The BBC is increasingly the best hope of a route to building sustainable local reporting, but the costs of broadcasting are even less compatible with the scale issues of local stories, and the political penalties for rooting out corruption at council level mitigate the appetite for the mission.
As national and global news outlets in all their many forms continue to flood into the Grenfell story, they will I am sure, unearth and report on the root causes. But the stories which expose the causes of the fire, however they emerge, will not make up for the lack of the stories that might have stopped it in the first place.
The bitter irony of course is that a story read by a thousand people might have had more impact than one seen by 10 million. It is with deep regret and shame that we will never know if that could have been the case. Like Blagrove says, it is not just a story, it has been coming for a long time.”
The councillor referred to – Rock Fielding-Mellor, the Deputy leader of the Council and Cabinet Member for Housing Property and Regeneration, has apparently fled his home
“We recently lodged a formal complaint with LeVerne Parker, the Chief Solicitor and Monitoring Officer of RBKC, in hope that it would lead to some scrutiny by the Standards Committee of the property holdings and business interests of Rock Feilding-Mellen, the Deputy leader of the Council and Cabinet Member for Housing Property and Regeneration.
We subsequently received a formal response from the Monitoring Officer in which she dismissed our complaint and declined to refer the matters we raised to the Standards Committee. We then prepared a rebuttal of the arguments she used to justify her dismissal of our complaint which we sent back to her, asking that it be escalated for the attention of the Town Clerk. We strongly recommend that you read her response via the link here:
EDDC has underspent its Disabled Facility Grants by £336,000 as “Demand not as high as budget/grant allocation from Devon County Council”.
page 42:
Freedom of Information
658 requests have been dealt with under the Freedom of Information Act (Environmental Information Regulations) during the year 2016/17.
This figure has risen from 588 in 2015/16.
There continues to be a trend for requests originating from commercial organisations asking questions relating to council contracts; information pertaining to businesses and their payment of business rates; and topics of general news interest like the impact of changing legislation.
The council’s major projects, such as the office re-location and the regeneration of Exmouth seafront are also continuing to generate interest amongst local residents, and campaign groups, although these requests form a relatively small proportion of the overall number received.
The service areas receiving the highest number of requests are Council Tax, Environmental Health and Planning. …”
“Crime czar Alison Hernandez looks set to name a Conservative colleague from her local council days as her second-in-command.
The Devon and Cornwall Police and Crime Commissioner admitted in April this year that she was considering appointing a deputy commissioner to share the workload, including increased scrutiny.
She had toyed with the idea of campaigning for office alongside a running mate last year but eventually stood alone on the Tory ticket and was elected in her own right.
Now fellow Conservative and Torbay councillor Mark Kingscote has emerged as the strong favourite and is likely to be announced later this month, Devon Live understands.
Ms Hernandez has declined to confirm the appointment of the 55-year-old NHS support worker, who specialises in mental health – one of the areas she has identified she needs extra help.
Cllr Kingscote, chairman of Torbay’s planning committee and a councillor since 2000, joined the commissioner at two public reassurance events in Exeter and Plymouth last week.
He told Devon Live on Tuesday that he had not “had a conversation about” nor been offered the post, which carries an estimated salary level of £50,000 a year though it is expected to be part-time and cost the taxpayer closer to £30,000 annually.
However, he said he believed he had the experience to take on the role.
“I am more than capable of doing the job so I don’t see why not,” he added.
“I am chairman of the planning committee, have been on the scrutiny panel for more than four years and am perfectly capable of putting my hand to lots of different things.
“I have known Alison for a long time and we have worked together on lots of community projects in the past.
“I went down to help her last week – she said “do you want to come along?” and I said “yes”. It was quite casual, just supporting her really.
“I have been doing community engagement for a long time so it’s not unusual that I would get involved in a thing like that.
“I have been involved in diversity and supporting the police in wards I represent.”
Ms Hernandez is free to appoint a deputy, as other commissioners have, without approval from the Police and Crime Panel, which is set to convene early next month.
However, the appointment would be subject to a confirmation hearing within 21 days of any announcement, the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner (OPCC) has said.
The commissioner’s predecessor, fellow Conservative Tony Hogg, also took on paid help in the role.
He recruited Jan Stanhope for strategic support after he was elected, paying her around £20,000 a year for a two-day post, although she was not officially designated as his deputy.
Phillipa Davey, a Labour city councillor in Plymouth and a member of the panel which oversees the work of the commissioner, said she had not been informed that an announcement ahead of next month’s meeting.
However, she said that if the appointment of Kingscote was confirmed, it smacked of nepotism.
Kingscote, who was born in Torquay and has been in the NHS for 25 years, is the elected member for Shiphay with the Willows, a ward Ms Hernandez used to jointly represent alongside him.
“I have to be careful what I say as at the moment I don’t know anything at all about the appointment or his credentials, she told Devon Live.
“It does seem a bit odd – jobs for people’s friends.
“I would be interested to know what experience he has and how qualified he is to do the job especially as this is a new post which we will all be paying for.
“We are going to have to wait and see what is announced.”
The plans for a deputy come after the £100,000 a year chief executive of the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner left last week.
Andrew White, who was recruited by Mr Hogg, has been hired by Lincolnshire Police to work as second-in-command to chief constable Bill Skelley.
Chief cons Skelly, who left his previous job as assistant chief constable in Devon and Cornwall last year, has hired White to become the force’s most senior civilian officer.
Ms Hernandez declined to comment on Cllr Kingscote’s potential recruitment, but she defended her plans for the appointment of a deputy in April.
She said: “Half of all police and crime commissioners, of all political colours, have appointed deputies – some also have assistant PCCs as well.
“Our strategic alliance partners in Dorset already have a deputy PCC.”
She also said a deputy could carry additional formal responsibilities on scrutiny and could play a greater role with elected members.
“This is the largest policing area in England, with a population of 1.7 million, 18 MP constituencies, three unitary authorities, one two tier authority, numerous districts and offshore islands.
“There are eight community safety partnerships, two fire services and a number of clinical commissioning groups. I plan to play an even greater part alongside all these partners.
“HMIC has identified a number of areas for improvement recently, including the critical area of crime recording in which the public must have confidence.
“Both these areas require considerable scrutiny.
“Therefore I am considering having a deputy to provide specialist support and advice in these areas and also to enhance our understanding of mental health issues.
“I have not made a final decision about appointing a deputy. It is something I am considering.
“Should I decide to make an appointment I will need to provide the Police and Crime Panel with terms and conditions for their confirmation hearing and that will be publicly available at that time.”
The Association of Police and Crime Commissioners has said the law allowed commissioners to appoint a deputy.
“It is a matter for the local PCC to decide if he or she wishes to do this,” it said.
“In the event that a PCC is incapacitated or unable to fulfil their duties for any length of time, it is the role of the Police and Crime Panel to appoint an acting PCC.
“If the absence continues for longer than six months, then a PCC election must take place.”
“The top three reasons that local government scrutiny is felt to lack impact are a perception that it exists to rubber-stamp cabinet decisions, fails to address pressing issues and ignores the public.
Those findings have come from the Centre for Public Scrutiny (CfPS)’s 2017 perceptions survey.
This also found that overall confidence in scrutiny’s ability to make an impact was down by 8.5% on the 2016 survey.
The greatest constraints on successful scrutiny were under resourcing, cited by 53% of respondents, internal culture, mentioned by 41%, and lack of skills (15%).
Responses showed that 74% of people thought party politics affected scrutiny, though 76% thought scrutiny’s role was understood.
Two factors found to be common in successful scrutiny operations were focusing on priorities and fostering a culture where challenge is valued.
The more positive this culture the more scrutiny was valued although 39% of respondents felt cabinet members were broadly negative about the role of scrutinisers.
Scrutiny was imposed on all but the smallest councils as part of the reforms of the Local Government Act 2000, which introduced the cabinet system.
The Communities and Local Government select committee had, before the general election was called, launched an inquiry into the effectiveness of scrutiny in councils.
CfPS is an independent charity that seeks to promote the use of scrutiny in public services.”
“Charities have been forced to change their key messages to the public during the general election because of the “chilling” effect of the controversial Lobbying Act, a group of leading UK organisations has warned.
Democratic debate on some of the biggest issues in the election campaign has been stifled by the law, a group of more than 50 charities writes in a letter sent to the main party leaders on Monday night.
“Voices are being lost at this crucial time, and our democracy is poorer for it,” they said. Their concerns echo those of many charities, particularly in the field of social care, which told the Guardian they were unable to raise vital concerns over, and experiences of, the impacts of current and future policies.
Charities say ‘gag law’ stops them speaking out on Tory social care plans
The Lobbying Act restricts what non-governmental organisations can say in the year before a general election. Billed as a brake on corporate lobbying as well as NGOs when it was brought in, its provisions have fallen harder on the non-profit sector, leading to an independent commission and the House of Lords recommending amendments.
In their letter, more than 50 UK charities called for the urgent reform of the controversial legislation, which they said was having a “chilling effect” on debates over policy ahead of Thursday’s snap election. They warned that charities were “weighed down by an unreasonable and unfair law which restricts our ability to contribute fully to a democratic society”. …
Theresa May’s decision to call a snap general election caused particular consternation because it means all charities’ communications in the preceding year fall under the rules retrospectively. When the act was introduced under the coalition, charities were reassured by ministers that parliamentary elections would be on a five-year cycle, giving them time to formulate and publicise key messages ahead of the formal start of any election campaign.
A review by the Conservative peer Lord Hodgson found that “the right balance” had not been struck in the act “as presently drafted”, and a House of Lords committee found the rules “threaten the vital advocacy role of charities”.
Labour and the Green party have called for the legislation to be repealed, while the Liberal Democrats and the SNP have urged reform. Baroness Parminter, the Lib Dem peer, said the act was “pernicious” and was having a chilling effect on democratic debate.
Within the next few days, the UN special rapporteur will present what is expected to be a critical review of the act and its impact.”
“Calls have been made for East Devon District Council’s returning officer to resign from his post after a total of 9,000 postal votes were sent out without the correct security mark.
The Acting Returning Officer for the East Devon Constituency, Mark Williams, issued a statement earlier this week to reassure postal voters who have not yet returned their postal votes after the postal votes after packs that were issued on May 25 contained voting slips that did not have an official security mark visible on the front of the ballot paper.
A total of 9,000 postal voters were affected by the mistake, which has been put down to ‘human error’ and people are being reassured that little damage has been done.
But the chairman of the East Devon Alliance has said they are appalled that Mark Williams is even in his post to be able to commit this unforgivable mistake after the ‘disaster’ of the 2015 elections, in which Parliamentary, District and Town council elections were all held on the same day.
The Electoral Commission have been informed of the postal voting error.
A statement issued by Mr Williams said: “It has come to my attention that the postal vote packs we issued on 25th May contained voting slips that did not have an official security mark visible on the front of the ballot paper. This has affected a total of 9,000 postal voters.
“I want to reassure those postal voters affected that if they have not yet returned their postal votes they should still do so. We have taken all the necessary steps to ensure the postal votes are valid and will be counted. I apologise for the error but want to reassure postal voters that they should still complete their postal voting statements and return their postal voting envelopes back to me for validating as part of the normal postal voting process.
“To be valid, a postal vote has to be accompanied by a valid postal voting statement containing the voters date of birth and signature. After these are checked, the envelope containing the postal voting slip is opened and the slip is put into a sealed ballot box where it is kept safe until the formal count. My postal vote opening teams will ensure that all validly completed postal votes are double checked so that they will go forward to the count along with all the other votes that will be cast on polling day itself.”
But the ‘cock-up’ has left Paul Arnott, chairman of the East Devon Alliance, furious, and said that he would have more confidence in a village raffle than in Mr Williams running the forthcoming election.
Mr Arnott said: “The East Devon Alliance is appalled that Mark Williams is even in his post to be able to commit this unforgivable mistake. In 2015, after the debacle of the elections for town, district and Parliament, we wrote a measured report, in which our concerns included his prematurely calling results at his chaotic count for district elections with no reference to candidates or agents even when majorities were easily within the need for a recount.
“As a result we are not confident that two current serving councillors were duly elected. He had no control over who was at the count itself, and we know about the 2015 disaster with the postal vote. All our concerns in 2015 were mirrored by a report from the Electoral Commission.
“As a result, I was successful this year in demanding that the County Solicitor’s office and the Electoral Commission observed the County election last month. Under this level of scrutiny the conduct of the 2017 county election was unrecognisable from the disgrace of 2015.
“Now we are witnessing the final tragedy for democracy in East Devon because Mr Williams remains in position to make what must be his final mistake.
“How is the electorate meant to trust that he forgot to check before sending out no fewer than 9,000 postal votes that they did not bear any proper markings? It’s his job to check them and to have a commissioning relationship with the printers.
“How did these ballot papers, which frankly any of us could have run off from a home printer, ever get to be created? This must be the last election he ever runs and we will be issuing a report on this and take it to the highest level. The dog has eaten his homework for the last time.
“Meanwhile the only honourable act for Mr Williams himself is to resign from all future electoral activities, including voter registration, his laxity in which was condemned by a committee in Parliament. I never thought I would live to be a 55-year-old citizen of one of the most beautiful parts of the world and be unable to assure my children that they are able to trust the electoral processes here anymore than in some underfunded and unfortunate part of the developing world.”
A spokesman for East Devon District Council said that the mistake was ‘simply the result of human error for which we apologise’.
They added: “A total of 9,000 postal votes were involved but as we have outlined in our statement the issue has been remedied. We want to reassure those postal voters affected that if they have not yet returned their postal votes they should still do so as we have taken all the necessary steps to ensure the postal votes are valid and will be counted.”
A spokesman for the Electoral Commission said: “The Electoral Commission is aware of the issue surrounding postal ballot papers in East Devon which were issued without an official mark. We were contacted by the Acting Returning Officer and provided advice, and steps have been taken to ensure that these ballot papers will still be counted and nobody will be disenfranchised in the UK Parliamentary General Election.”
Following the 2015 elections, the East Devon Alliance raised concerns with Mark Williams about some aspects of the election that required immediate corrective action as part of their response to the East Devon District Council request for comments on the 2015 elections.
THE FULL RESPONSE THEY PROVIDED WAS
Comment 1 about issues during voting: Mark Williams (as the District RO) would not take responsibility for ensuring that EDA candidates and agents across the District could have access to apply seals to boxes and packages as they were taken from Polling Places and, after verification and separation of the national election papers, were transported to the Knowle for final counting. For all District election concerns about issues outside the East Devon constituency, MW referred the EDA to the RO’s for the other constituencies within East Devon District.
This led to a number of unsatisfactory standards in the District elections, specifically:
1.The ballot boxes used in that part of the East Devon District in the Tiverton and Honiton Constituency were not rigid boxes (flexible cloth), so an elector could reach to touch previously cast ballot papers. At least one of these ballot boxes was damaged so that previously cast ballot papers were in full view.
2.None of the flexible cloth boxes could be sealed with the EDA seals, which were purchased following MW’s email illustrating what was a suitable seal. This caused great confusion and distress to candidates and polling officers alike.
3.The EDDC District election unused ballot papers and other information from the Central Devon Constituency RO were returned in an unsealed clear plastic bag.
4.When the ballot first opened at 7am Colyton Polling Place did not allow for privacy in voting. At first, only open tables were provided.
5.Conservative election advertisements for the District were placed within the premises of Polling Places in Otterhead. There was disagreement and delay between the East Devon RO (MW) and the Tiverton & Honiton RO as to who should take action to deal with this.
6.The Presiding Officer in Feniton illegally prevented a number of voters from casting their District vote. MW blamed the illegal behaviour of this PO on poor training by the Tiverton & Honiton RO.
7.Polling Places in Seaton had hour-long queues of voters. Who was responsible for predicting the popularity of voting in this town?
8.A Liberal Democrat candidate was allowed to hand out an electioneering leaflet (it said “Vote Liberal” and had the candidate’s imprint on it) inside the Polling Place at Axminster. This was reported by EDA to the Presiding Officer but no action was taken to prevent it happening.
We believe that the RO for the District elections should have responsibility for ensuring the safe and secret transport of information from the casting of electors’ District votes to their receipt at the final count location (Knowle). We also believe that the RO for District elections should have overall responsibility for the satisfactory conduct of the whole District ballot.
Comment 2 about Candidates’ and Agents’ experiences at the District election count.
Whilst we acknowledge the difficulty of running three elections on the same day, we believe that there was sufficient notice and central government funding so that the organisation could have been much more effective. At our meeting on March 4th we signalled our concern about this, and were concerned that MW refused to consider providing separate ballot boxes for the district and parish elections. This mechanism would have done much to ensure the visible integrity of the counting process
“Bearing in mind that most of the EDA candidates had no previous experience as a candidate, we believe that more help should have been forthcoming from MW to ensure that their legal rights as candidates were not inhibited.
“Specifically:
1.There was no general briefing for candidates and their agents about the procedure that would be followed at the count
2.There was no check of who was allowed into the count. As a result, the room was very overcrowded and observers were inhibited from carrying out their function of observing the counting agents.
3.It is a requirement for the RO to provide facilities for Party agents to check that their seals on ballot boxes are unbroken. The arrangements for this were inadequate because the EDA agent was kept out of the area where the boxes were brought prior to opening them.
4.It is a requirement for the RO to share the verification results with candidates and/or their agents prior to proceeding to the count. This is the relevant statement in the EC instructions for ROs: “Any agent may make a copy of this, and indeed you should make available copies of this for the agents present once verification has been completed”. This was not done with EDA candidates/agents.
5.It is a requirement that the RO should share with candidates and agents the reasons why he has decided to reject various ballot papers. This is the relevant instruction from the EC booklet on dealing with doubtful ballot papers: “When undertaking the adjudication of ballot papers it is important to ensure that the process is carried out in full view of all candidates and agents present at the count”. This was not done with EDA candidates/agents.
6.The multi-member Ward ballot papers were sorted in different ways by different counting agents. There was no standard way of doing it. Observers watched as some agents were trying to sort ballot papers into piles based on all the possible permutations of voting. At this point the agents were very tired, so this was an enormous task for them and led to many challenges from observers. We recommend that a simpler standardised approach be taken to pre-sorting the ballot papers that requires decisions between at most three or four different piles on each sort.
7.The multi-member Wards were counted using the “grass skirt” method.
[For an explanation of the “grass skirt method” see here
Only one person was involved in preparing and counting the grass skirt, which is the most complex of the vote permutations, whereas other, simpler counts were always checked by at least one other person. The grass skirt was used extensively in the counts for some of the closest Ward results in the District.
8.It is a requirement for the RO to share the count results with candidates and/or their agents prior to announcing the result for their Ward. This is so that candidates can request a recount if the result is close. This is the relevant instruction in the EC instructions for ROs: “7.34 Once satisfied, you must advise candidates and election agents of the provisional result and you should seek their agreement on the announcement of the result. You should make clear that the candidates and agents are entitled to request a recount”. This was not done with EDA candidates/agents.
9.Many of the declared results for the District Council do not have a complete statement about the reasons for rejection of ballot papers as required by law. Given that candidates and agents were not made privy to the reasons for rejecting individual ballot papers during the count, this gives some cause for concern.
We understand that previous East Devon District elections have not been hugely competitive and this may have led to some casual practices in verification and counting of votes. However, publicity and debate prior to the 2015 elections should have led the RO to expect a high turnout and close results. Because of this we believe that the RO should have taken particular care to ensure that election law and the spirit of election law were more carefully followed.
A report from Elizabeth Gorst, the Electoral Commission representative for the 2015 elections, said:
Feedback for the attention of Mark Williams, Returning Officer:
1)You explained to me that postal vote identifiers were not checked for postal votes delivered to the count. You should ensure that you make provision to check 100% of postal vote identifiers, even for postal ballot papers being delivered last-minute to the count. A 100% check is now a legal requirement.
2)Some less experienced candidates and agents were not clear on the processes being followed to count the multi member wards – separation of block votes, grass skirts etc. At one point this resulted in a heated exchange between an observer and a non-supervisory member of count staff as to whether there was a better way to count the votes! We would recommend that you provide a written guide to attendees in advance of the event of the processes that will take place.
3)Some count staff themselves did not appear to be clear about the processes they had to follow and particularly in respect of the multi member count. For example I noted staff at the start of the count who were not familiar with extraction of block votes or the use of grass skirts and were initially looking puzzled/confused about the processes they were being asked to undertake. This in turn impacts on the confidence of observers. Additionally, as I raised with you, during verification there was a mixture of face up and face down verification being carried out. We would recommend that you review your provision of training to count staff. Also that written instructions are provided in advance of the event to all count staff.
4)You announced the start of each local government ward count (no PA system in place). It is also helpful if the ward name on the empty ballot box is positioned in such a way as to be visible to observers throughout the count. The same advice applies to verification.
5)When the ballot papers have been removed from a ballot box at verification or count stage, the empty box should be shown to agents and observers so that they can be satisfied that it is indeed empty.
6)A PA system should be in operation to ensure that all attendees at the count can clearly hear announcements
7)We recommend that you review your processes for stacking and signposting ballot papers on the individual counting tables. As an observer it was difficult to see what the various piles of ballot tables on the paper related to. Staff were also confused by moments about what ballot paper should go where. Sorting trays with labels would improve transparency and auditability.
8)We recommend that you develop a suite of paperwork for count staff and supervisors for recording counted votes. I noticed staff on count tables relying on A4 pads of paper to add up the total number of votes for each candidate.
9)Count staff seemed to be missing other stationery items – personal mobiles phones were being used as calculators and I noted staff working on grass skirts having to share pencils.
10) Because of space constraints there was at times insufficient room on the tables for ballot papers. Completed grass skirts and other items were having to be stored on the floor beneath the tables. Wider tables would have alleviated this to some degree, but we would recommend that the detail of the count processes you will undertake are considered at an early stage as part of the selection and layout of your venue.
11) I was not clear that candidates and agents were being consulted on provisional results before proceeding to a declaration. Our advice to Returning Officers is that ‘you should advise candidates and election agents of the provisional result and seek their agreement on the announcement of the result…… This process should be undertaken within the framework of maximum openness and transparency….. so that all candidates and agents can have confidence in the processes and the provisional result provided.
12) I was also not clear on the process for adjudication of doubtful ballot papers. Because there was no distinct tray on the counting tables for doubtful papers (see point 6), it wasn’t easy to see the audit trail of those papers and how they were being adjudicated on and who was carrying this out. I also couldn’t see that agents were being given the opportunity to review rejected ballot papers.
13) It may be that the points I mention in 11 and 12 were being undertaken, but because there was no PA system, I was unaware that candidates and agents were called by the Returning Officer to hear the provisional result and review the rejected ballot papers. Usually the candidates and agents are called over a PA system to receive the provisional results. This ensures that all those entitled to hear the provisional result are aware that the Returning Officer is ready with this information.
14) You mentioned to me the space constraints of the venue and your consideration of other venues. Certainly for the local government count, the number of observers present meant that it was impossible to move freely around the count tables and clearly observe the processes taking place. We would recommend that you consider venues other than the council offices for future counts – not only in terms of the number of observers, but also the number of count staff you require to conduct the count to your planned timescale.
15) Your actual count timings varied from the estimates you had announced. High turnout, three-way verification, the complexity of the multi-member local government counts, available staffing resource (determined by venue size) and the lesser ability of some count staff all impacted on this. You will have gathered some valuable experience on timing and we would recommend that for future elections you review the experience of 2015 and factors influencing the timing of the count in establishing your resource requirements. For future events, it could be worth making calculations of likely numbers of ballot papers to be processed and then producing a sample of mock ballot papers on which you carry out tests of your timings and processes
16) At the local government count on Friday morning, there was no control of admission to the count. Given that only certain individuals are permitted by law to attend the count, such controls need to be in place.
The news comes after it was revealed East Devon was chosen as one of eight UK constituencies to be monitored as part of an international mission to ensure elections are fair.
The Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA) has announced that the constituency will be one of its target seats for the general election.
An Election Assessment Mission (EAM) will be conducted in the area from June 4 to 9 by Phillip Paulwell, an MP from Jamaica who will lead a team of Observers from the Commonwealth.
The Mission, which is being arranged by the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association UK Branch (CPA UK) as it did in the 2015 and 2010 general elections, will also observe elections in seven other UK constituencies to oversee:
polling
counting
post-election complaints or appeals
The team will compromise of three parliamentarians and one election official from Tonga who will monitor Election Day procedures at polling stations, meet with candidates, returning officers, local officials, community groups and other relevant stakeholders in order to assess the conduct of the election.
In addition to the omnishambles about postal vote mistakes (twice) we should not forget this, too:
“East Devon’s returning officer has defended the delays at the count for the General Election in Sidmouth.
In a statement given to the press Mark Williams said: “This the first time since 1979 that we have had three elections in one night. The reasons why the government stopped this was that in rural areas like East Devon means the sheer volume of ballot papers that are prepared for counting causes a huge volume of work.”
Earlier Mr Williams said his team was ready and said the count would conclude at 2.30am. …
Question: How come other rural areas didn’t have this problem?
AND remember Mr Williams is paid EXTRA for his election duties. Wonder how much extra and whether cock-ups mean a pay cut? We will never know, because the job is not covered by the Freedom off Information Act and EDDC refuses to tell us. AND the Returning Officer has a big budget but because of that Freedom of Information block, we are not allowed to know what it is and, crucially, what happens to any underspend.
However, we do know that the Sheffield returning officer refused his fee of £20,000 in 2015 and here is a list of what other election staff are paid:
“Fees
Election officials’ fees vary widely from constituency to constituency but might typically be:
Presiding officer: £250-£300;
Poll clerk: £115-£190;
Postal vote issuer: £8 per hour;
Postal vote opener: £9 per hour;
Count supervisor: £150 night shift;
Counting assistant: £12.50 per hour (plus £10 training fee).”
East Devon Watch 