Wokingham Tories cut Council Meetings (Wokingham Liberal Democrats)

Wokingham Liberal Democrats <info@wokinghamlibdems.org.uk>

Wokingham Tories cut Council Meetings

April 30, 2004 12:00 AM

"Tory plans to hold fewer council meetings will undermine democracy" says Councillor Coling Lawley (Leader of the Wokingham Lib Dem Councillor Group). "The Tories don't believe in the administration working co-operatively with the opposition and they do not want public debate."

His comments come in response to the Wokingham Tory administration's proposals to reduce the number of Council meetings from 10 a year to 6, and the number of Executive meetings from 10 a year to 5.

Coling Lawley said, "This is the Tory version of democracy. They make all the decisions in secret and make sure the public has little opportunity to see or join in the decision-making process. Cutting the number of Council Meetings goes hand in hand with the Tory trend to hold more secret meetings.

"Over the last year, to our knowledge the Tories have held 94 secret meetings - there may have been many more, of course, as these are just the ones we've managed to find out about. These 94 meetings have all been held in the Council Offices, with council officers attending to write the minutes.

The opposition councillors have not been invited to 92 of these meetings

(Beth Rowland was invited to attend a part of a Tory Education Policy Team meeting, and I was invited to attend a Capital and Finance Policy Team meeting for half an hour), and Lib Dem councillors have not been allowed to see the minutes of any of these meetings. When the Liberal Democrats regain control of the Council, we will end the secrecy and work with the whole community for the good of all our residents. We will re-introduce more open local government.

"The Tory leader of the Council has said that he wants more openness in local government, but what he says and what he does are two completely different things. He has effectively locked the Council doors to the public."