INTRODUCTION - LABOUR GROUP LEADER - Cllr CLIVE HARTIt was quite a short agenda at Thursday evenings TDC Cabinet meeting but I was pleased to see an excellent turn out by our Shadow Cabinet team. We were also joined by a very conscientious Cllr. Alan Poole who had serious concerns about open space in his Moses Montifiore ward. As always our members were ready to both assist and challenge whenever each proved necessary.
Cllr. Clive Hart - Phone: 01843 298770
Item 5 POTENTIAL ASSET DISPOSALS FOR 2009/2010 - Cllr. PETER CAMPBELL & Cllr. ALAN POOLE
Cllr. Campbell raised concerns about the substance and structure of a proposed report on the 99 year lease for Ramsgate Maritime Museum that would cover legal issues around the long length of time and whether it actually amounted to disposal.
Cllr. Campbell also raised concerns about land at Effingham Street in Ramsgate in relation to access for the fire service and provision of possible disabled parking for residents using local facilities.
Cllr. Peter Campbell - Phone: 01843 585738
Cllr. Alan Poole said he was pleased that TDC had finally seen sense and removed land at Montefiore from the process whilst the village green application was being discussed. He said it was green open space used by the community who had not only clearly spoken but also produced several petitions. Cllr. Poole was insistent that TDC should have withdrawn the open space from the list as soon as the village green application was made and that it will have to remove it completely when village green status is finally given.
Cllr. Alan Poole - Phone: 01843 602594
Item 6 SELF FINANCING CAPITAL INVESTMENT AT HARTSDOWN LEISURE CENTRE - Cllr. IRIS JOHNSTON
Cllr. Iris Johnston pointed to earlier plans to create such a facility back at the beginning of the decade and said she was concerned at how long it had taken to get to this stage and that it would now presumably cost considerably more.
Cllr. Johnston also asked about consultants costs which were reported to be £3,960 shared equally by TDC and Thanet Leisure Force and she also asked for a joint presentation to members from Leisure Force and Alliance Leisure.
Most importantly, Cllr. Johnston raised serious concerns about TDC being the guarantor for a Thanet Leisure Force loan of £1.62 million. There was a long debate between council officers concerning a previous legal case but eventually members were finally assured that all was in order as far as the Hartsdown project was concerned.
Cllr. Iris Johnston - Phone: 01843 299207
Item 8 UPDATED ICT STRATEGY & INFORMATION MANAGEMENT STRATEGY - Cllr. PETER CAMPBELLDespite promising to be brief, Conservative Cabinet member Cllr. Simon Moores gave a long and very laborious speech on this item. In it he also tried to make a political point about Government and the mismanagement of costs concerning IT systems.
Cllr. Peter Campbell also promised to be brief and he was. He simply pointed to 4.1.1 in the report being discussed which said 'The details of associated costs of the ICT Strategy have yet to be identified'.
Cllr. Campbell asked if Cllr. Moores had anything to say about a report which clearly showed his scheme was as yet uncosted?
There was a very long silence before Cllr. Moores fumbled together a feeble excuse of a reply!
Cllr. Peter Campbell - Phone: 01843 585738
Published by Thanet Labour Group Press Office - 44 Northdown Road, Margate, CT9 2RW.
Ed as I said the other picture of St Michael & St Bishoy Coptic Church in Northdown Road, I know this is a bit of a party political broadcast on behalf of the Labour group and I have asked the Conservative group to come up with something on these meetings but no luck so far.
They are but a shadow team in comparison with Richard Nicholsons lot. Especially the intelligently challanged now leader
ReplyDelete14.01 lay off the anonymous personal comments if you wouldn’t mind please.
ReplyDeleteWhose been running TDC? Here we are in 2009, Computers have been around for 50 years or more, the internet for nearly 20 and TDC IT does not have a stategy already in place?
ReplyDeleteHow many councils are there in England? All TDC has to do is to fins a successful one and copy their stategy. Best of Breed I think its called. You dont need to be an IT wizz kid to do that.
ReplyDeleteHere's a start for you A council whose ICT strategy plan includes costings!
Of course we have a strategy... but on Thursday, approval was sought for a new strategy from 2009!.
ReplyDeleteWe have an existing IT budget too but in view of the public sector finances catastophe about to fall on all councils, we need to review the same and make savings where possible.
As for "Best of breed", I'm not sure what planet 21:33 comes from. The public sector has rarely had "Best of Breed" because it simply can't afford it. That pleasure goes to big Government projects like the Health Service NPfIT where "Best of Breed" invariably fails horribly and expensively.
Please refer to my "Kalashnikov Theory" of eGovernment!
Dont councils share information and ideals freely and help each other, why reinvent the wheel? Why dont adjacent councils pool many of their admin services to save money, maybe they will need to when the cuts come. I suppose they all hang on to their indepenance and jobs. Maybe for Kent there should just be a few councils and not the two tier system, has this been costed? East Kent could be stand alone from Maidstone led KCC and determine its own destiny.
ReplyDelete