I did try to get the full Council to discuss whether it is appropriate for Hedge End to be thinking about twinning our town with Mockmuhl in Germany, taking the opportunity provided by item 1 on the Agenda, which was "Public Questions not on the Agenda".
Bizarrely, because the subject of twinning was not on the Agenda for this evenings meeting, the Town Council wouldn't discuss it. I kid you not. They were hiding behind procedures. What is the point of having "Public Questions not on the Agenda" if the Council won't actually discuss issues that are not on the Agenda...?
I was told that the way the Council works is to delegate such decisions to its sub-committees, which I already knew of course, but the twinning issue seems to be such a big decision affecting the whole town that I think it is far too important to be taken by just a handful of people, literally just a handful of people.
At yesterdays meeting of the Community & Culture sub-committee, where twinning was discussed, only 5 of our Town Councillors were present. From where I was sitting, they all seemed luke-warm about the idea of twinning, clearly very aware of the many problems and issues, but nobody seemed willing to say "Hang-on a minute, we shouldn't be thinking about twinning in the current political and economic climate".
Which is why I attempted to raise the issue this evening. In my opinion, all 21 of the Town Councillors need to be involved in the huge decision about town twinning. It should really be discussed in full Council.
So despite what is in theory a great opportunity for a member of the public to raise questions with the Town Council, it proved impossible to get the twinning issue discussed this evening. Nerves and tiredness didn't help me tonight, if I'm honest. For some reason, I don't find that public questions forum an easy thing to do, I struggle with it. If it puts me off, I bet that others will find it difficult too...
Anyway, all I achieved this evening was to obtain a brief summary of the current situation from Cllr Welsh, the leader of the Town Council. No discussion, no decision. Not what I wanted. It was pointless asking the question really...
Which brings me to the main point behind this blog posting.
Public attendance at these Town Council meetings is routinely poor. Four people were in attendance this evening, and two of those (Paul Redding & myself) are candidates in the Shamblehurst by-election. There was no sign of the Lib Dem candidate.
I have sat in several Town Council meetings recently where I've literally been the only member of public in attendance, it is a very lonely place to be. I understand from the Town Councillors that having five members of the public in attendance is actually considered a good turnout these days. It is a problem that our Town Councillors generally refer to as "apathy".
But I'm more inclined to think that it is disillusionment, i.e. "what's the point of attending?" rather than "I can't be bothered to attend?"
Perhaps the format and the structure of these Town Council meetings needs to be reviewed and modernised, if the Town Council wants more members of the public to get involved...?
Thank you for reading
Ray Turner
http://www.facebook.com/hedgeendindependents
2 comments:
Interesting observations Ray. Although as you say there were only four MOPs present (seven if you count the Community First Responders who were there for part of the meeting) I thought the informal part of the meeting (public q&a and police report) was very informative and it went on for about half the meeting.
The problem with having a formal debate and decision on something that is not on the agenda is that it would in effect exclude people from coming along and having their say. That's the whole point of publishing the agenda .. people know what is going to be discussed and councillors can have a few days to think about the subject rather than have to make a decision on the spot.
You brought up something that is already on the committee agenda, but if it was something completely new, the chair has the option either of giving an immediate answer (not always possible), offering to investigate and have the clerk reply, delegating it to a committee or referring it to the next meeting of full council when it can be on the published agenda and fully debated.
That said, any town councillor can have something put on the agenda, and it will be debated (as long as there is another councillor willing to second the motion). So the other route to getting something discussed is to lobby your individual councillors.
A very fair comment thanks Keith.
My argument is that the general public almost certainly won't know the intricate detail of how the Council works, all the rules and procedures and so on.
We'll just want to turn up, ask a question and will expect to see the matter discussed. Even if no decision can be taken immediately, it would be good to get the Councillor's initial thoughts on the matter.
Being fobbed-off contributes to the feeling of disillusionment with the process of local Government.
If members of the public do make the effort, we find ourselves in the "Dragons Den" situation, stood in front of a microphone right at the start of the meeting, before anything else has happened, facing a fearsome looking panel that unless you are a regular attendee, you may not know very well and you will have no idea how they'll respond. It is not a nice place to be.
Taken together, the high-pressure situation and disillusionment could well explain why ordinary members of the public typically don't bother to attend Council meetings.
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