Agenda item

4.1

Public Questions Concerning Non-Receipt of Full Answers to Previously Asked Questions

4.1.1

Nigel Slack commented that he wished to conclude some long outstanding questions still awaiting responses, and he asked when he might receive full answers to the questions posed about:-

(a) Mount Pleasant and the questions posed over the Scrutiny meeting in March 2018?;

(b) Due diligence - When reporting on spending and other proposals, he had asked about greater detail being made available about what 'Due Diligence' meant, and the Chief Executive at that time had suggested this should be possible, but since then nothing had been done or heard of this issue?; and

(c) Equality Impact Assessments – his question asked about these being published as part of reports, rather than having to be requested, and again this was suggested to be a minor issue easily changed, but he had heard nothing since.

4.1.2

Councillor Terry Fox, the Deputy Leader of the Council, stated that he would investigate the issues raised by Mr. Slack, and arrange for him to be supplied with a written response within one week.

4.2

Public Questions Concerning Hanover Tower

4.2.1

Nigel Slack stated that, at the last Council meeting, the Cabinet Member for Neighbourhoods and Community Safety responded to a question about the further delay on the Hanover Tower Cladding Report with a comment that 'legal' required the Council’s contractor at the time to have a further period to respond to the report.  Mr. Slack asked, why? Is it the Council’s policy that contractors are more important than the residents of the city? Why should Lovell's be given more time to respond when the report has already taken 2 ½ years - did they not have an opportunity to put their side of the case?

4.2.2

Mr. Slack added that his own experience of the legal department within Council suggests that they are more concerned with protecting the Council's reputation than conducting effective & timely investigations or providing for complete transparency, an example being 10 months to investigate a standards complaint that involved 3 interviews and taking those interviews as gospel truth with no corroborating evidence.  He asked is it the Council's legal team that determine decisions, or are they there to interpret the law for Councillors who then make the decisions?  He commented that there is in this situation, as in others, a perception of the tail wagging the dog.

4.2.3

Mr. Slack further asked will the Council publish the report and let the contractor have their say in a public arena?  If not, will the report be published in its original form with the additional comments from Lovell's or will it be amended before publication to save face for the contractor?

4.2.4

In response to Mr. Slack’s comments regarding the conduct of the Council's legal team, Councillor Terry Fox, the Deputy Leader of the Council, stated that if a member of the public had a criticism to make about the conduct of a Council officer, then he/she should bring this to the attention of the (Interim) Chief Executive for investigation, in preference to expressing it in a public meeting.

4.2.5

Councillor Paul Wood, the Cabinet Member for Neighbourhoods and Community Safety, commented that he receives advice from the Council’s legal team and would need to have a very good reason to overrule the advice or be confident that a decision contrary to that advice would not later have to be reversed.  In relation to the Hanover Tower Cladding Report, he stated that he had been advised that anyone named in the report has to be given the opportunity to respond to its contents.  He added that Lovell’s had originally been given 7 days to respond to the report, and that had been extended to the end of January, following representations having been made to the Council by Lovell’s.   He stated that if this matter has not been dealt with by 31^st January, it is his intention, as he stated at the last Council meeting, to publish the report thereafter, unless legally prevented from doing so.

4.2.6

Councillor Wood commented that he didn’t agree that contractors have priority over residents, and believed that contractors were never more important than the residents.  He commented that there were many issues within his Cabinet Portfolio where he was taking contractors to task to ensure that work was undertaken correctly for the benefit of residents.  In his opinion, no Council officer, contractor, or fellow Member, was put above the importance of the job that Members do for people within the city.

4.2.7

He stated that his experience of the Council’s legal team was that he had yet to receive any proof that advice given to him was incorrect, and therefore he had confidence in the service provided by the team.  He was not aware of the standards complaint referenced by Mr. Slack.  He added that the legal team interpret the law and advise on what the Council is legally able to do or not able to do, and that the team do protect the Council from claims and financial penalties which could result from the Council not dealing with matters correctly.

4.2.8

Councillor Wood agreed that 2 ½ years for the production of the report was far too long.  He confirmed that the Council will publish the Hanover Tower Cladding Report in full, and the report would, in the first instance, be provided to the residents of Hanover Tower and a meeting would be arranged with the residents.  The report would then be released to the wider public and media, and he added that he had indicated to the media that he was prepared to hold a meeting at which the report would be circulated and to which the public could attend.   However, he would not be able to ensure the attendance of any third party named in the report, although their attendance would be welcomed if they should choose to do so.

4.2.9

Councillor Wood referred to issues which had been raised by Mr. Slack, at the last Council meeting, regarding the repairs service, and he stated that he had already recognised that there were issues within the repairs service and had identified that this was an area which needed to be reviewed.   He added that levels of satisfaction with the service were around the 90% mark, but that there was nevertheless scope for improvement.  He commented that this was a large service and improvements can often take time to achieve, but he recognised the importance of the service, particularly for disabled people in the city. He stated that he had recently met with the Executive Director, Place, to discuss how to progress this review, and he added that there would soon be an announcement on how the Council was to plan the restructure of the service.

4.3

Public Questions Concerning Webcasting of Council Meetings

4.3.1

Nigel Slack commented that the Council’s webcasting system appears to be having a very high proportion of teething issues, with the failure to be able to broadcast live, issues over the sound system and very poor signposting on the website to enable people to engage effectively. He added that even maintenance scheduling seems to be interfering in the smooth operation of delivering transparent meetings.  He asked when might the public expect these technical issues to pass and a regular webcasting schedule to be operational?

4.3.2

Councillor Terry Fox, the Deputy Leader of the Council, stated that the Director of Legal and Governance had appraised him of the issues recently encountered with the system, and of the work being undertaken to improve its operation and resilience.  He agreed that webcasting was an important aspect of delivering open and transparent decision-making, and added that the webcasting system was working ok for this meeting.

4.4

Public Questions Concerning Sheffield City Council-Sheffield Tree Action Group Joint Inspection Report

4.4.1

Russell Johnson stated that the Deputy Leader will have noted the long-awaited report on the Joint Investigations, published before Christmas.  He added that this unequivocally showed that the reasons given for condemning the assessed trees were spurious, and that this would have been known to the Council and the contractor.  Mr. Johnson asked, in view of this, will the Deputy Leader now apologise for the lies to the public and the High Court about the so-called ‘last resort’ fellings, and for the destruction of over 5,000 mostly healthy street trees before the Council’s, probably illegal, activities were stopped by public protest?

4.4.2

Councillor Terry Fox, the Deputy Leader of the Council, stated that he would arrange for a written response to be supplied to Mr. Johnson.

4.5

Public Questions Concerning the ‘Big City Conversation’

4.5.1

Russell Johnson commented that he was fortunate to be present at the full Council meeting the previous week to hear the officer’s report on the interim feedback on the ‘Big City Conversation’ exercise.  He asked does the Deputy Leader and Cabinet share his disappointment that a paltry 2,200 people have engaged with this exercise so far (compared with over 26,000 for the ‘It’s Our City’ petition conversations) and that, of these, 72-73% feel ‘not well informed’ about how decisions are made, how services are performing and about local services overall?

4.5.2

Mr. Johnson further asked does this not support the widespread view that governance under the current leadership is lacklustre, or possibly disastrous, and will the Deputy Leader agree with him that this fact has caused many to celebrate the announcement that the Council will have a new Leader very soon, possibly even before the elections and that this enables us to look forward to vibrant, open and honest governance under a modern committee system?

4.5.3

In response, Councillor Terry Fox, the Deputy Leader of the Council, stated that as regards the feedback on the ‘Big City Conversation’ exercise, the initiative was ongoing and in its infancy and that, although 4 months’ into the exercise, with many events held and still planned to be held, the announcement of the General Election had impacted on the delivery of the exercise, as the requirements of the Pre-Election Rules on Publicity had prevented many Councillors from conducting their events and obtaining feedback from their local communities.  He added that he welcomed any feedback that is received by the Council, good or bad, as this enlightens the Council as to the way forward.

4.5.4

As regards Mr. Johnson’s comments about the Leader and leadership of the Council, Councillor Fox stated that the Leader of the Council remained as the Leader and that, after a decade of leading this Council and this city during an unprecedented period of austerity and getting the Council to where it is now, he was proud that she had led the Labour Group, and he was proud to have served behind her, and that it was up to her, and her alone, to determine when she deems it is right for her to step down.  He wished to applaud Councillor Dore and added that he had been appalled by the vile comments that had been placed on social media platforms since Councillor Dore had announced that she would not be seeking re-election in May.

4.5.5

Councillor Mazher Iqbal, Cabinet Member for Business and Investment, stated a that a ‘Big City Conversation’ event had recently been held at the Fox Valley centre, and that he would be attending a ‘Big City Conversation’ event on Saturday at the Handsworth Asda supermarket, which would give residents of his Ward an opportunity to be heard, and he encouraged members of the public to attend the event, or to participate in the Conversation online or via local libraries.

4.6

Public Questions Concerning South Yorkshire Police Operation Quito

4.6.1

Russell Johnson stated that the leadership of the Council will no doubt have seen the press coverage of a Freedom of Information (FOI) obtained email showing that a senior Sheffield City Council officer asked a senior South Yorkshire Police officer for the names of members of the public attending a Police briefing on how the Force intended to apply the law whilst policing protests in the city.  Mr. Johnson asked will the Deputy Leader, on behalf of the Cabinet, distance himself from this and assure him that this officer was not politically authorised to make that highly dubious approach to the Police, and that, if no authorisation was given, appropriate action will be taken to discipline the officer?  Mr. Johnson further asked that, if the Leader of the Council did instruct the officer to do this, would the Deputy Leader please explain and justify this apparent conspiracy?

4.6.2

Councillor Terry Fox, the Deputy Leader of the Council, stated that he would arrange for a written response to be supplied to Mr. Johnson.

4.6.3

The Interim Chief Executive stated that officer conduct was her area of responsibility.  She stated that Mr. Johnson had made a serious allegation, in public, relating to the conduct of a Council officer, and she requested Mr. Johnson to supply her with information and evidence to support his allegation, so that she could conduct a full investigation and then respond to him.

4.7

Public Questions Concerning an Independent Inquiry

4.7.1

Russell Johnson asked, following the FOI revelations late last year around the Council’s behaviours connected with the PFI debacle, and the Joint Inspection Report, alongside the obvious failure of Amey to meet contractual quality obligations, would the Deputy Leader consider instigating, as a parting act of generosity to the city from the Leader, an independent inquiry into all aspects of the contract?  Mr. Johnson added that, at the very least, such a gesture might perhaps do something to repair the regime’s, and, by association, the city’s, reputation nationally and internationally.

4.7.2

Councillor Terry Fox, the Deputy Leader of the Council, stated that he would arrange for a written response to be supplied to Mr. Johnson.