Many of our community, including Ferret at times, have been astounded by the actions of some of our Town Councillors and the Town Clerk Alan Draper.
The Town Councillors to whom Ferret refers to, are of course, the Independent cabal members who control Hemsworth Town Council, simply because they can muster the majority of votes to pass the resolutions they wish to inflict on this Township, usually to its detriment.
However, when a resolution is passed no matter how small the majority, it becomes a “corporate” decision of the full council.
That is why it is essential that any Councillors opposed to the proposal for any reason, must protect themselves by having the way they cast their vote recorded, to save themselves from any repercussions, legal and or financial.
One of the Town Clerk’s roles is to seek and offer advice to the Council and if the action being proposed and passed is illegal or unlawful, he is in a unique position to prevent any further miscarriage simply by not progressing any payments or purchases as the orders must be authorised by him.
If he is unsure about an issue, as some issues may be lawful but they may not meet the Nolan principles standards of acceptable behaviour in public office, he can simply delay any authorisation while he seeks any necessary further clarification.
Unfortunately for us, occasionally there have been instances where resolutions have been passed that have not been to the cabal’s liking but they have then just chosen to ignore them.
One recent example was the decision taken by the Council when reviewing the future of the ill-fated Venga concert, was that any further advertising was to be “in house” only but they still chose to spend money, our money advertising on external sites and making purchases such as signage.
We have even witnessed the purchase of the infamous digger that had been parked in Kenyon’s drive for many weeks before, at a cost of over £40000, that was made without any Council approval whatsoever in place.
The list is seemingly endless and still ongoing under the new Chair Jean Eccles.
On this week’s Hemsworth Town Council agenda is an item:
12 PLANT MACHINERY – DISPOSAL
To consider offers received from prospective buyers for the council’s plant machinery.
Readers may recall that a previous meeting passed a resolution that the plant and machinery should be valued before any decision was taken about disposal.
One Councillor in particular stood out above the other dissenters and repeated pressed for disposal without prior valuations being sought. That one Councillor was no other than the disgraced former chair of the council, Jim Kenyon.
Yet what do we have on the agenda, offers to buy from prospective purchasers no less.
So much for a Council decision, that once taken cannot legally be altered by anyone other than the full Town Council.
There is of course, also the duty to seek best value when dealing with public finances and the need for sealed offers or a tendering/procurement process to be used prior to any decisions to sell being made.
Once again unfortunately for this community, we have already seen where the Town Clerk did not even see any alleged tenders that had been made for the asbestos being removed from the supposedly free store unit at the Waterpark.
As Mr Kenyon is involved and given his already exposed disastrous financial mismanagement and leadership, Ferret unfortunately believes there has got to be a hidden agenda that will prove to be detrimental to us as a community.
So here we have the Council deciding on one course of action yet Alan Draper has allowed on the agenda, the option, as wanted by Jim Kenyon and rejected by the Town Council.
There needs to be some serious questions asked by the elected members on behalf of this community to prevent and highlight as much as is possible, more financial disasters and mishandling, in this last year of the cabal’s term of office…