Minutes:
(A) Mr Kaufman asked the following question of
the Leader or his nominee:-
“a) What contingency arrangements have been made by the County Council in the event of there being no deal over Brexit?
b) What arrangements have been made to inform members of any such arrangements?
c) What contingency arrangements have been made with our partner agencies to mitigate the effect of the country leaving the European Union without an agreement?
d) What arrangements have been made to inform the residents of Leicestershire?
e) Would the Leader make a statement on the expected impact of Brexit to the next full Council meeting in December?”
Mr Rushton replied as follows:-
“In response to a) to e) above:
The Chief Officers are carefully
considering the risks arising from Brexit and are closely monitoring the
situation as it evolves. Senior Officers
are collecting information on their key services in order that, in the event of
a no-deal scenario, appropriate actions can be taken. This includes collaboration with Partner
agencies and other organisations such as East Midlands Airport. Elected Members
and members of the public will be informed if any changes to service delivery
or service performance are anticipated.
I will make a statement to Full Council at
the most appropriate time following the conclusion of the national
negotiations.”
(B) Mr Hunt asked the following question of the
Leader or his nominee:-
“English councils have spent almost £4 billion on redundancies for more than 220,000 staff in the past eight years, according to recent research by the Local Government Chronicle.
Could the Leader tell me:-
i) how much Leicestershire County Council has spent annually since 2010/11 on redundancies for staff directly employed by the Council?
ii) the annual reduction in FTE staff from each council in the county from 2010/11 according to figures published by the Leicestershire County Council Pension Fund?”
Mr Rhodes replied as follows:-
“i) The County Council has spent
£34 million in the eight years since 2010/11. This is broken down as follows:
10/11 - £7.6m
11/12 - £9.4m
12/13 - £3.7m
13/14 - £2.0m
14/15 - £2.9m
15/16 - £3.9m
16/17 - £2.5m
17/18 - £1.7m
ii) The pension fund does
not publish this information. To obtain this information the other councils in
the county would need to be contacted individually.”
(C) Mr
Miah asked the following question of the Leader or his nominee:-
“a) How many members of the Council have produced and published annual reports for the previous council year?
b) Which members, if any, have annual reports outstanding?
c) Who is responsible for ensuring that members produce annual reports and what is being done to get them to publish a report?”
Mr Rushton replied as follows:-
“a) In accordance with the Independent Remuneration Panel’s (IRP) 2017 report and recommendations forty four out of fifty three members produced an annual report for the municipal year 2017/18.
b) The following Members have not submitted an annual report:-
(i) Mr. Bill CC
(ii) Mr. Bray CC
(iii) Mrs. Broadley CC
(iv) Mr Galton CC
(v) Dr Hill CC
(vi) Mr. Mullaney
(vii) Mr. Welsh
(viii) Mr. Wyatt
c) The IRP as part of its recommendations made it the responsibility of Group Leaders and Group Whips to ensure that Members of their Groups complete and submit an annual report. They were provided with a weekly update as to which Members of their Group had submitted an annual report to help them comply with this recommendation.
The IRP in all its reports has always had a strong view that Members should demonstrate their accountability to the people of Leicestershire via the submission of an Annual Report. The IRP in its September 2017 report advised the Council that it would meet in the autumn of 2018 to review annual reports. That meeting has been arranged for Friday 12th October following which a report will be submitted to the Constitution Committee.”
Mr Miah asked the
following supplementary question:-
“How can we ensure for next year that we do not have the same reoccurrence where eight members or nine members of one particular group do not submit their Annual Report as per the recommendations of the Independent Remuneration Panel?”
Mr Rushton replied as
follows:-
“As an administration we take this extremely seriously. There is no point having an Independent Remuneration Panel that makes recommendations, which we all adhere to bar these eight or nine Liberal Democrats. I would ask the Independent Remuneration Panel when they meet to consider the fact that these members have not completed an Annual Report, which is not onerous. After that I would intend to report it to the Constitution Committee to make some recommendations and if they do not do it by Christmas I'll bring a Notice of Motion to Full Council condemning them and asking them to claim no allowances until they have completed their Annual Reports.”