Labours’ first cabinet meeting happened tonight, and whilst it was mostly boring and prescribed, there were a few interesting howlers. Bear in mind that Councillors Foster and Dean have both been Councillors before, and Dean has been a Councillor for some time now, it appears that the basics of how a council is run are lost on them.
Having blasted through some arguably more important items quickly, they decided as a collective to dwell heavily on what is a statement of fact. Write offs. Basically, if the council can’t get their mitts on what they’re owed, they have to write it off. Every Councillor should be well versed in what this is and why it happens because it happens every year. Quite simply, think of it like this, if someone dies or a business goes bankrupt then the council are not going to get their dosh.
For some reason though, questions such as ‘is this thousands?’ [Referring to the figures in the report] from Carol Dean managed to show her complete ineptitude for the job as leader. If the council had millions in written off debt Carol love, it would be bankrupt (Labour spoiler alert?) and the subject of national headlines (Labour are used to that though). After expressing relief at being told it was actually thousands, she moved on. Other gems from Nova Arkney such as, ‘why is there such a large difference between this year and last year?’ were also put out there, missing the fact that Council officers do not possess crystal balls, and oddly enough things do not stay the same.
Councillor David Foster then asked whether Tamworth was doing well on collecting what are basically unpredictable debts compared to other areas. Oh dear dear. Whilst Tamworth Borough council do indeed do well on collecting what is owed, it cannot be compared to other areas. Please bear in mind that Councillors Foster is the Labour deputy leader, out of all the more capable people in their group.
Councillor Foster who apparently was eating the microphone during the meeting, made a few statements to prove he was alive and present and supposedly relevant. Such as the need to ‘jazz up’ documents for the public to read (suprise: they’re not going to Councillor), which had Dean agreeing with him that there was no point producing them if people didn’t read them. Interesting statement considering most people couldn’t give a toss anyway, and the digital dust on such documents is an inch thick.
The point is, this is what Councils spend most of their time doing, producing documents to prove that the officers are actually working (although one assistant director still in post apparently has a penchant for sticking his feet up on his desk all day and ignoring his phone). They also have to make sure that people like Major Conspiracy Ron Brown see things like the accounts, which according to him have still not been produced (go and watch the audit and governance meetings for answers Ron if you’re that bothered). Basically if the documents were not there, someone like Brown would moan about it and call it a conspiracy.
Foster also pointed out the ‘deficit’ years down the line, which if you’ve ever been paying attention to council meetings around finance, is always there, because again no-one has a crystal ball for three years ahead. We assume he pointed this out as some kind of pop at the Tories. You might hear them use the deficit trope again if this has been raised tonight. Former Councillor Daniel Cook used to do a hero act every year stating how well he and officers had managed to get the budget balanced for three years after dire warnings of the Councils financial situation. No doubt he has taught them this one.
Talking of former Councillor Cook, if this is the fruit of his wife’s company Corkscrew Communications training of the new cabinet, then gawd help Tamworth. This is a new and interesting direction he’s taken since doing his level best in helping the Labour party get elected, maybe the training of them is the sabotage.
Dean then proceeded to finish off the meeting with something they were ‘very excited’ about which drew exactly zero questions or comments from her cabinet. You can view all the excitement here.
Gripping gripping stuff. But since we were told off in the Mailbag for not covering meetings, we thought we’d best at least do this one.
