Blog error

For some reason my iPhone WordPress app keeps filing my posts into a drafts folder it won’t let me open – so I’ve lost some posts. Can anyone offer advice?

From little acorns grow

This evening we had the first meeting of the social media focus group. When I was on Corporate Scrutiny last year we set up the group to look into new ways of communicating with the public, and for the public to communicate with the Council. Actually this issue is a lot wider than social media and I think opening up data is also a key point.

There were councillors there from other parties and council officers of all ranks and departments. We all sat there as equals with no protocols or formal meeting structures to bounce around some ideas – what do we do already, who should get involved, what should be the outcome, etc. It was really positive and people were there because they genuinely wanted to be.

We need to look at communication flows – how can the Council educate the public about what services it offers and how can the public educate the Council about what they really want?

Everyone went away to think about what was discussed, what we think the outcome should be and how the public should be involved. Ultimately I want this process to really involve the public because that’s what it is all about!

Btw – as of today I have swapped portfolio with Cllr Rachel Walker. I will now look after the environment portfolio, whilst Rachel will look after Children’s Services. I have a full time job and after a few weeks in the role it became clear that there would be too many daytime commitments I wouldn’t be able to attend. Rachel has more flexibility so it made sense to do a swap!

Video: Parliament requires a shock to the system

Our Member of Parliament, Richard Shepherd, is one of our best kept secrets in Aldridge-Brownhills. Watch this short video which demonstrates why he would make an excellent Speaker.

Campaigning in Aldridge

Just returned from campaigning out and about in Aldridge. We split our time between the Coppy Hall estate canvassing residents and then moved onto Aldridge Town Centre. I joined Anthea Mcintyre and Dan Dalton who are Conservative MEP candidates and also Councillors John Rochelle, Eddie Hughes and Keith Sears – plus other activists. The weather was good, people’s spirits are high and we were well received by people. Clearly MPs expenses has had an impact on everyone but I think although people are rightly angry about this issue, most acknowledge that we have a very hard working and principled MP in Richard Shepherd. I hope he will consider standing for Speaker of the House of Commons – we need someone to defend the rights of people in the Commons, just as he has done for us in Aldridge-Brownhills for thirty years.

Enjoy your bank holiday – lets hope the sun continues to shine!

Follow up and bail hostel

Well I didn’t expect to have over 400 page hits over the last 24 hours! I’ve had an interesting mix of messages from councillors and the public. Two things and then i’m moving on:

- An experienced Northampton Borough councillor once said to me, “I like to believe in something and debate policy as much as the next but it shouldn’t get personal and we should be able to go to the pub afterwards and still be able to have a pint together.”

- My message to people on Children’s Services – i’ve been in the job just 25 hours. Please give me the time and the chance to get to know it and do something with it.

Moving onto Aldridge North – I attended another protest outside of the bail hostel on Saturday. Residents are determined to keep the pressure on the Probation Service. Cllr Garry Perry has posted about it on his blog and he will ensure that it is kept on the Safer Borough Partnership agenda until it is closed.

There is some confusion over a meeting with the bail hostel people. I haven’t received an invitation, nor have the other elected representatives. I find that a bit odd seeing as the Probation Service spokesperson said we had been in the Express and Star.

In the meantime I am trying to set up a meeting with the Council, Probation Service and Ministry of Justice to see if we can breathe some life into their idea – now of two years ago – to look for an alternative site. Work in progress… will keep you updated.

Possibly the worst Council meeting yet

I’ve just come back from a meeting of Full Council and return feeling completely deflated.

I guess I thought i’d return full of enthusiam as tonight is the night Council appointed me as Cabinet Member for Children’s Services. What a fantastic opportunity – both for me and for all young people and children in the Borough!

This was a massive portfolio so the Leader has decided to take Building Schools for the Future out of the portfolio and into the hands of Regeneration. The Leader has also decided that he will personally deal with the issues around Sneyd School, because it is such an important issue. As such therefore this issue is largely in the hands of the Leader. This then gives me time to learn about Children’s Services – education, child care, adoption, contract management, youth services… the list goes on! Hopefully when I get to grips with it I can begin to have a positive impact.

As the saying goes “you can’t eat an elephant in one sitting” so i’ll be doing what I can to learn about the portfolio section by section over the next few weeks and months. I’ll post more about this position and my hopes another time and focus back on the Council meeting.

What I witnessed today was nothing less than shameful. Councillors shouted down councillors, councillors spoke and others heckled so loud they couldn’t be heard, councillors picked arguments with the Mayor, the public gallery booed councillors as they voted name by name and tried to shout down speakers. Councillors of all parties joined in. One councillor who made his maiden speech was heckled and jeered – even in the Commons people get a chance with their maiden speech. I just didn’t get it. It didn’t achieve anything.

I sat there and genuinely wondered why i’d become a councillor. We’re all supposed to be “corporate parents”, community leaders and role models and yet the behaviour from many people was bullying and intimidating. If the people of Walsall had seen it then none of the 60 of us would be reelected. Some people must think its a bit of fun but if teachers held staff meetings like that or children behaved in a classroom like that then there would be serious consequences. Why would any person give up their evening to sit there and accept that behaviour? I just hope other Council meetings don’t head that way or I may think twice about my participation in them.

Planning permission granted for mining memorial

The final administrative hurdle has been passed for the Walsall Wood Mining Memorial to be build on Oak Park. Planning permission was granted by the planning authority yesterday. Coupled with Council’s decision to give permission for it to be built on the land then it should be all systems go! Will post an update as and when.

All change on Walsall Council’s Conservative Group

The Council’s thirty-four Conservative councillors met on Friday evening to elect a new leader, deputy leader, treasurer and secretary for the group. Cllr John O’Hare was stepping down as leader to take up position as the Borough’s Mayor.

The group elected Cllr Mike Bird as Leader, Cllr Adrian Andrew as deputy leader, Cllr Rose Martin as treasurer and Cllr Barbara McCracken as secretary.

As the Conservatives have thirty-four seats out of sixty the Leader and Deputy Leader of the Conservative Group will also become Leader and Deputy Leader of the Council (subject to a vote at Full Council).

It is also Mike Bird’s job to select the cabinet – a group of councillors who take the executive policy decisions and look after a portfolio/department. I was suprised to receive a call from Mike on Saturday morning to ask me to join the cabinet as the portfolio holder for Children’s Services and Young People. This is also subject to a vote at Council.

Some people may think I am a little young to be on the cabinet but it is only by doing a job and getting stuck in that one can gain experience. I won’t be perfect at the job (who is?!) but I will do my best.

The Conservative group meet again on Wednesday to iron out the committee places and chairmanships. There will be some changes for Aldridge North and Walsall Wood as I will no longer take a place on the Development Control committee this year – Keith or Anthony will take over. I also won’t be on Corporate Scrutiny anymore – a committee i’ve really enjoyed – but hope to still get involved with the communication and new media working group.

So all change and some interesting challenges ahead. My first question to readers then – what do you think of Children’s Services in Walsall? What works, what doesn’t work and what should I look at first?

New job…

Sorry I haven’t posted for a while. I started a new job two weeks ago and i’m still settling in. It is now the end of the municipal year so when I post next i’ll explain the party political group structure and what happens at our Annual General Meeting on Friday when we pick the new Leader of the Conservative Group, who will in turn become leader of Walsall Council. If you have any questions on this then post in the comments and i’ll try and address them in my post.

National Conservatives want your views on opening up data

Coincidential timing! The national Conservative Party are interested in hearing your thoughts about data sharing in national government to engage with the electorate. Have a look here: http://www.conservatives.com/News/Blogs/Making_Government_data_work_for_you.aspx

Seeking permission for Walsall Wood memorial

Walsall Wood will feature on the agenda at Full Council on Monday evening. It will be nice to focus the attention of the Borough’s councillors solely on Walsall Wood for a short period of time.

I will be presenting this report (http://www2.walsall.gov.uk/CMISWebPublic/Binary.ashx?Document=6942) to ask councillors permission to errect a memorial mine head on land at Oak Park. It will still have to go through the planning process – the reason it is coming to Council is because the councillors when sitting as Full Council are also the trustees of the land on behalf of the Cannock Chase and Pelsall Miner’s District Charity which reverted to the trust of the local authority.

I will be asking “that Council acting as trustees on behalf of Cannock Chase and Pelsall District Miners Charity, for the land approves the installation of the piece of public art to the site at Oak Park, Walsall Wood subject to planning permission being granted and consent being given for the long-term maintenance of the installations”

I have posted about the Walsall Wood consultations, steering group etc many times before on this blog. Many of you have got involved and I thank you for that. There is still a chance for you to comment on the work as it goes through the various planning stages. As the report states:

“Community consultation has been undertaken recently to ensure that the
opinions of the Walsall Wood community have been considered and more than
90% of the forty one responses that were received concerning the Mine Head
were positive. A planning application has also been submitted to the planning
authority and through neighbourhood consultation it will give residents of Walsall Wood a further opportunity to comment on the Mine Head proposals.”

I will let you know what Council decides to do – I am hopeful after presenting the report to the controlling Conservative group this evening. Please comment on the planning application as it goes through the consultation period. Pictures of the proposed memorial are in the report i’ve linked to above.

Moving into the 21st Century

A very happy Easter to family, friends, constituents and colleagues.

A few thoughts reflecting on the Corporate Scrutiny meeting last Thursday. My colleague, Cllr Marco Longhi, has already posted on the subject here: http://marcolonghi.wordpress.com/2009/04/10/new-media-social-networking/

We discussed the ICT Stretegy and a value for money review of the Communications Unit. I believe that it’s time ICT and Communications begin to overlap and use each other more. The key point I raised is that communicating with the residents of Walsall is a two way process and it should strengthen accountability, educate and participation. The Council need to provide value for money but they also need to tell people what services they offer and what they can do to use them or change them. How can we do this in the modern age whilst maintaining more traditional forms of communication? Is issuing 900 odd press releases over a few months really the best way of talking to residents? Also what can the Council do with the data it has in order to inform residents and councillors in their decision making? Should it open data up to public through API’s etc?

The topic is a lot bigger than the time allotted at the meeting so we have agreed to set up a working group to look at the issues around Communcations and ICT. I hope to be on this group with Cllr Marco Longhi and we’d like you to join in too. If you are a resident, professional or just someone with an interest then come along. Details will be thrashed out in May so i’ll post more then.

If you are interested then get intouch. Maybe we can start something in Walsall that will get picked up by the public sector across the country…

Your opportunity to comment on Walsall’s New Children & Young Peoples Plan

I’ve been emailed the following link. The Walsall Children and Young People’s Plan for 2009/10 – 2011/12 is now open to consultation and they recommend that all groups working with Children Young People and Families in Walsall take a look and forward comments on via the feedback form.

Link is here: http://www.walsallva.org.uk/2009/04/08/your-opportunity-to-comment-on-walsalls-new-children-young-peoples-plan/

Canvassing in the sunshine

This week we’ve started canvassing in the ward. Hopefully, at some stage, you’ll see us around and about with blue rossettes on so if you see us then do say hello and come and have a chat!

As ever it is difficult to get around everyone in the ward but we’ll work on it. We have over 10,000 electors in the patch – so no small task. If you have any particular issues you’d like to raise drop me an email and we’ll come and canvass your patch. Richard Shepherd MP will also be joining us as and when he can.

How can Councils use the web to serve you?

I’m quite interested in both Information Technology and Communications. My IT interest stems from getting a computer when I was really young and facination to make the machine do new and menial tasks for me. Communcation is of interest because it’s so important and we don’t realise just how much information we are bombarded with every day.

So as I sit on Corporate Scrutiny i’ve asked for a debate on communications and IT as I see the great need now to overlap the two. I think the Walsall Council website does a basic job of providing some information – but what can it do to empower people? How can it help councillors make decisions and how can it make citizen’s get their money’s worth out of the Council they pay for?

We’ll be debating the role of this on Thursday at 6pm in the Council House. Corporate Scrutiny is a public meeting so come along to watch. If you have ideas and want to participate then please comment below, email me, tweet me or give me a call! Here are some questions for you:

- What do you need from the Council website? Information, payment facilities, education on what the Council does, accountability, transparency, particpation in decision making, consultation, petitions?
- Do you want to know more about services in your area? Should content be postcodea and map driven like sites such as fixmystreet.co.uk?
- Should the Council use email lists and RSS feeds to update citizen’s via their inboxes and mobiles?
- To what extent should a Council or councillors use twitter and facebook to engage with citizens?
- How can new media, internet, etc help people like me to make good decisions on your behalf?

Also on wider communications issues – what works and what doesn’t? Do you read Walsall Pride, read local newspapers or would you prefer less Council material and more Party political material – afterall the Parties form the policies.

Please think outside of the box and let me know your thoughts and ideas.