Question
During the past few weeks the Council, through the Standards Committee and the Audit Committee, have been shown to be infringing the rules of the Council Constitution. As regards the Standards Committee this has been going on for nearly two years. These are serious breaches of the Wokingham Borough Council Constitution and reflect badly in the eyes of the public on our Council. As such, I would like to ask through the Leader of the Council for these serious shortcomings to be formally investigated through an independent person such as a retired QC or judge?
Minutes:
Question
During the past few weeks the Council, through the Standards Committee and the Audit Committee, have been shown to be infringing the rules of the Council Constitution. As regards the Standards Committee this has been going on for nearly two years. These are serious breaches of the Wokingham Borough Council Constitution and reflect badly in the eyes of the public on our Council. As such, I would like to ask through the Leader of the Council for these serious shortcomings to be formally investigated through an independent person such as a retired QC or judge?
Answer
Councillor Halsall has already explained that there was no constitutional breach with regards to the composition of the Standards Committee and why this was so.
You then go on to suggest that the report considered by the Audit Committee at its meeting of 23 November was changed before being presented to the Executive on 28 January. I can category confirm that this was not the case.
The report reviewed by Audit Committee was presented to the Executive fully and unabridged as required in the Constitution. Audit Committee is required to review progress against Treasury Management indicators (which they rightly did) and note further information in the report.
Executive on 28 January was asked to (and did):
“note Appendix A, the Treasury Management Mid-Year report, which was agreed at Audit Committee on 23rd November 2020”.
This is stated quite clearly in the covering report recommendations and, furthermore, is covered in more detail at the second paragraph of the executive summary to the Executive report.
Therefore, the report that the Audit Committee debated and agreed democratically is the one being presented to Council and does not need to be presented back to Audit Committee.
However, in passing on the report noted by the Audit Committee to the Executive, our statutory Chief Finance Officer thought it would be helpful for Executive and the public to be aware of the broader impact of the treasury management activities by including the income generated by our commercial activities funded by our borrowing. This information was conveyed by way of a covering report and I would consider it to be extremely helpful, particularly given recent media debate around the cost of Council debt to the local taxpayer. So the Treasury Mid-Year report presented to the Audit Committee was not changed, the Audit Committee discharged their responsibilities under the constitution and the Chief Finance Officer is required to provide a covering report in passing the Mid-Year report on to the Executive. There is no constitutional breach here whatsoever.
Supplementary Question
Councillor Kaiser, thank you for not answering the question.
Councillor Halsall, Wokingham Borough Council is daily becoming more like Handforth Parish Council under your leadership, for the following reasons.
It is chaotic – three quick examples:
· Your response to two breaches of the Constitution;
· The comment that was going to be made by Councillor Conway tonight, querying why the Council bothers to have a Constitution when it can be so easily overridden;
· Publishing Ernst & Young’s report for the Audit Committee on 22 February when Ernst & Young stated that the report should not have been published.
In last week’s Wokingham Paper Councillor Halsall, as Leader of the Council stated that “the buck stops here”. Please can you advise, Councillor Halsall, how you intend to address these issues, to salvage the credibility of Wokingham Borough Council under your leadership in the eyes of the electorate?
Supplementary Answer
That was a question for John Halsall. You obviously weren’t listening because I answered both your questions.