Anyone wanting to know what is wrong with Politics needs only to have been at Barnet House on Thursday. I attended as a member of the spanking new committee named Business Management Overview and Scrutiny Sub Committee. Nothing else was new. The membership of the committee had changed slightly.

There are six Conservative Members, four Labour and one Liberal Democrat (me). There is currently a vacancy on committee so the Conservatives had five members present.

This Committee scrutinises the decisions of Cabinet. Well, as I told you all before the ruling Conservatives backed new rules which severely limits the items that the Committee can scrutinise. The trigger for deciding which decisions should be scrutinised is pulled by a member of the committee “calling in” the item.

On Thursday more new rules were proposed about what the Member calling in the item must do. Once the call in has been triggered, the member of the Committee must give a reason for wanting the item scrutinised. The Officer in charge of administration will be able to send it back to the Member if they think the request is incomplete or inadequate. They will take this decision in consultation with the Committee Chair (well that’s all right then). We will soon need permission to breath at this rate .Having overcome this hurdle the Member will then have to submit questions in advance to the Cabinet Member. No further questions allowed on the night. Yes I hear you scream why then bother to have a meeting! This is plainly nonsense. The Committee agreed that supplementary questions will be permitted. In my opinion this is still nonsense on stilts.

The cynic would say how convenient all of this is for the Cabinet Member to brush up on tricky questions or to rely on an Officer to come up with answers that gets the Cabinet member out of a hole. In case I get in to trouble over that last sentence. I should clarify that the Officer will only provide the facts and not a Political justification. But surely the test of whether the Cabinet made the right decision is whether they knew or understood all the facts at the time they made the decision. Surely scrutiny should be a dynamic engagement not a sterile bureaucratic exercise.

The other point worth making that normally it is only opposition Councillors that call in items. So we do all the work and preparation. I leave it to the reader to guess what I am getting at.

Back to last Thursday’s meeting. I had called in the Cabinet’s decision to scrap The Sheltered Housing Warden Scheme. Being a good boy I had submitted a load of detailed questions in advance, but as the new rules had not yet kicked in, I had one or two other questions up my sleeve. Rumours are rife that many rank and file Conservatives are very unhappy about the doing away of the Warden Service.

All members of the Committee have to declare if they subject to whipping arrangements. As usual no such declaration was made so all the Committee were free agents. Members have also to declare whether they have a personal or prejudicial interest in the item under review. I believe one Member declared that their mother is resident in one of the Sheltered Homes.

What of the questioning of the Cabinet Member? Well clearly in my view the decision had not been thought through. For example the Cabinet Member could not provide any information about the scope and extent of the proposed floating warden Service. We were told that the floating service will help people living independently in their own homes. How many? Did not know, will it cover the whole Borough? Not sure I then took a question from up my sleeve. Had the Cabinet member attended any of the consultation sessions or had meetings with the user group. No came the reply. How many of the other cabinet Members had attended the meetings? None! He was then asked why he had not been to any of the consultations he replied “I might have got upset” As someone else on the Committee remarked the Officers of the Council who attended had to take the flak and ire of the sheltered housing residents and witnessed some very distressed and anxious elderly residents. Reminds me of an old adage “Power with out responsibility …….” I had better not complete the saying.

The Labour group asked some more questions. The Conservatives never said a word throughout (well not that I recall). We then moved to vote on my motion to send this back to cabinet to reconsider. Four of us, me and the Labour members voted in favour. The Conservatives all but one voted against, one abstained. The vote was tied. The Conservative Chairman used her casting vote to defeat my motion.

So that was that not much joy for our residents and their families. But remember there was no Party whip declared. This means in my opinion, that the Conservative Members on this committee must personally believe that scrapping the Wardens is a good idea. So where are all these rumoured unhappy rank and file Conservatives?

I am off on a break.