Page 42 - Phonebox Magazine March 2012

Mercury Report – Olney
Council Meeting of Monday 6th February 2012
Public participation
The first person to speak was Paul Watson, a former Mayor of Olney. Paul had read in last month’s Mercury that the Council had increased its precept, the part of your Council Tax which goes to Olney Town Council (OTC), by 10%. He’d been astonished by this, given that he believed the Council’s reserves to be very healthy. During the six years ended 31st March 2009, he stated that income and expenditure had been under strict financial control, resulting in increases in the cash and bank reserves every year from £195,000 on 31st March 2003 to £386,000 on 31st March 2009, not including the money provided by Milton Keynes Council (MKC) for planning gain and land purchase.
He stated that this financial discipline appeared to have been abandoned and, in each of the years ended 31st March 2010 and 31st March 2011, cash and bank balances had fallen, by in total almost £80,000. Whilst current numbers were only available to the end of December 2011, an extrapolation of those figures to a 12 month period to 31 March 2012 suggested that the same downward spiral was continuing: Even with the 10% increase in the precept, the Council was staring at an overspend of more than £65,000. Further, he noted that, if the Council had approved the Market Place Toilet renovations, which seemed to be so strongly supported by the Chair of Finance, that would have required a further £38,500, based on OTC’s estimates.
Paul felt this was in stark contrast to OTC’s staff having been on a pay freeze for three years, bar one Government allowance of £250 paid some time ago. He stated that OTC’s current spending level was profligate, and that it wasn’t too late to reduce spending by instructing the Chair of Finance to rescind the budget approved last month, eliminate the precept increase and prepare a budget which balanced income with expenditure.
Members of the Public speaking in this slot are allowed a maximum of three minutes and, in this meeting, the limit was enforced vigorously by Steve Clark. So, Paul didn’t get to finish his contribution. Later in the meeting, Mike Hughes spoke to express his concern about this, and register his disgust at how harshly Steve had called time on the former Councillor’s contribution. He felt it was a disgrace. Steve noted his comment.
For information, the minutes of December’s Finance Committee meeting show that, of the eight people on the committee, two were absent and, at the vote to set the level of the precept, three voted in favour, one against and two abstained. This proposal was then brought to full Council and finalised.
The second person to speak was Carole Russell, asking the Council to continue part- funding a Specialist Nurse for the Elderly at Cobbs Garden Surgery. The Friends of the Surgery had been campaigning to raise
funds but, while they’d raised nearly £2,000, this was nowhere near enough to fund the post. Carole felt that the nurse was a lifeline for the elderly in the area and that, particularly with Olney having a higher than average proportion of elderly people, it would be a travesty if the post could no longer be funded. She concluded by saying that the Friends would not give up raising funds in future and that she was sorry to have to fall back on the Council.
The third speaker was Terry How, expressing his concerns about the disposal of the land to the rear of 57 – 59 Moores Hill, a topic also covered later in this meeting. Terry felt that certain individuals had pocketed vast sums of money over the sale of the land. He stated that there’d been no representation from Olney’s Ward Councillors, who seemed to know what was going to happen in advance of it happening. He was sure that the disposal of the land could have been handled better – it seemed to him to be a case of collusion at MKC, with Olney’s Ward Councillors having something to do with it. He stated that the situation stunk and asked that, if some individuals have made £200,000 to £300,000, how much would go back to Olney residents? He felt that the correct procedures had not been followed by MKC, who are under investigation by the Ombudsman about the issue. Terry felt strongly that a similar situation should not be allowed to happen again, and that OTC had a duty to make sure it didn’t. For information, Olney’s Ward Councillors are Debbie Brock, absent from this meeting, and Peter Geary, present and seated in the public viewing area.
Circus
Pinder’s Circus is due to visit Olney, with the likely time and place being 7th – 9th May on The Pyghtle. The Council will inform local residents.
Grant Application for Nurse post
Following on from Carole Russell’s contribution, this agenda item was for the Council to decide whether or not to accept a Grant Application for £11,550 which, added to the money raised by the Friends, would fund the Nurse post for another year. Tony Evans and Mike Hughes thought the post was important, were in favour of funding it but nervous that the commitment was open ended. Deidre Bethune stated that the Council had budgeted for the funding. Colin Rodden felt that there were certain things that the Council needed to do, but that it mustn’t duplicate things that should be done by the Health Authority.
The Grant Application went to the vote, with all voting in favour bar one abstention – the Council will fund the position for another year.
Land to rear of 57 – 59 Moores Hill
First, some background on this long running issue. Over the years, a number of Planning Applications to build houses on the land to
the rear of 57 – 59 Moores Hill have been made and rejected. Now, an Application has been accepted by MKC and, contingent on that acceptance, a developer has purchased two thirds of the garden of one of the Council houses in Moores Hill from MKC, which has also granted an easement for access to the site via a thin strip of its land off Dinglederry. In addition, the developer has purchased part of the garden of a nearby privately owned Moores Hill property, a key area which joins the access strip with the Council house garden area. The purchase of the two areas of garden, the granting of easement for access and of Planning Permission all come together to create an area of land on which houses may be built.
There were questions as to whether MKC has handled this process correctly, so a complaint was raised in order to discover what happened. MKC complaint investigations can pass through a number of stages – surf to http://bit.ly/z98jJZ for further information. The main findings of Stage two of the investigation were:
• There was no evidence of MKC consulting with OTC or OTC’s Ward Councillors about the land disposal;
• The land was not advertised for sale in an appropriate publication. This was because MKC’s Valuer felt that sale to this developer was the only viable option for achieving a development rate for the land, since this developer had already secured the key area of private garden. The Valuer should have set out the justifications for not advertising the land in writing, but appeared not to have done so.
• MKC used independent expertise to value the land at a development rate, and secured a price higher than this valuation.
• Summary: “In my opinion, the Council... disposed of the land in accordance with relevant law and largely in compliance with Council Policy. There were some procedural issues which appear to have been missed but in reality these issues are unlikely to have resulted in any different outcome in the disposal.”
Presumably, the investigation had been escalated further, as the Council had received the following letter from MKC: “The outcome of the stage three investigation into the Council’s processes surrounding the disposal of the above property interests concluded that Property Services had not properly administered the processes in regard to consultation with Town and Parish Councils and their respective Ward Members. Although this maladministration occurred during the time of my predecessor (2010) I should like to apologise for any inconvenience caused to each of you. The protocols put in place ensure that evidence of timely consultation is included as part of the sign-off procedures, such that there is
42 Phonebox Magazine