| Topic: | Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Cllr Ruth Cadbury at today's read-in | |
| Posted by: | Phil Andrews | |
| Date/Time: | 06/02/11 18:55:00 |
| Ed I am encouraged by what you say about area committees and I would be interested to know what improvements were being considered, but I am aware that they are not popular amongst some chief officers and I would be surprised if there had not been some attempt to take advantage of the change of administration and the election of some new and inexperienced councillors (as is always the case, of course) to try to bring about some abatement of their powers. Therefore if I am to take your news at face value, which I see no reason not to do, then that suggests somebody must really have made a stand on their behalf. As you say the area committees were created by a Labour administration. As they have generally not reached out to the public in the way that in my view they ought to, one must therefore call into question the rationale behind their introduction. If the current thinking is to make them more community-friendly then I would suggest that that must self-evidently represent a departure, albeit a positive one, from the original concept. Some of your colleagues who were around during the previous administration will know that I have offered ideas which could improve the level of engagement between area committees and the general public without increasing the frequency or the length of the meetings, and which therefore at worst would be cost neutral. I would be interested to know whether any of these ideas are in the mix today. |