I have been posting a lot lately on the dry subject of Brent's Constitution. Whilst dry this is very important, and in my view the councillors _ who are the decision makers in this case _ simply don't have enough information to make a sound decision.
One thing that the proposed changes later this evening seem to ignore are the Area Forums and User Forums. I don't think the User Forums actually achieve very much, and would not be sorry to see them go. The Area Forums are not necessarily covering the best areas, I wonder why there is no mention of review of either? If one of the purposes of Scrutiny is to engage with the public, the Area and User Forums should surely be included in any systematic review.
On the basis of the reports I have read online, it seems to me that the councillors cannot make a rational decision. For instance, any rational authority would see changes to the User Forums as affecting equality issues, possibly for the better. I don't see that the councillors have any information in front of them to fulfil their "due regard" under the Equality Act. I am afraid that the whole report is uncharacteristically slipshod nd needs to be thoroughly revised.
UPDATE
I have chosen to respond to the comments below here.
3 comments:
At a Kilburn Forum meeting I went to a couple of months ago there was a woman there who said a review was being done on the Forums. She was a Brent Council employee I think. The meeting was mostly taken up with HS2 and not much time given to a discussion about the Forums.
Some interesting posts on this James, unusually I find myself in agreement with you. A question: if you had argued against these proposals within the Labour group but lost would you have disobeyed the whip? I understand the need for whips and collective decision-making but where would you draw the line?
Interesting question above but no answer from James?
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