Brent revises process for dismissal of Chief Excutive & other senior officers

Cabinet will be asked to adopt new procedures and changes in standing orders at their meeting on June 22nd regarding the dismissal of senior staff, including the Chief Executive.  Other staff to whom it applies are the Chief Finance Officer and the Monitoring Officer.

In 2012 the then Brent Director of Finance, Chris Heaphy, was suspended over gross misconduct allegations( later withdrawn) shortly after Chief Executive, Gareth Daniel was ousted by Muhammed Butt. LINK

The proposal institutes a Dismissal Advisory Committee which includes'independent persons':

The Council will be required to invite independent persons to form part of a panel in the following priority order:

·      an independent person who has been appointed by the Council and who is registered as a local government elector in the borough of Brent;

·      any other independent person who has been appointed by the Council;

and

·      an independent person who has been appointed by another council or

other councils.

The Council has appointed one independent person to deal with Member Code of Conduct complaints but the 2015 Regulations explicitly allow theCouncil to utilise independent persons appointed by other councils.

This is why it is proposed that the Chief Operating Officer be authorised to explore the possibility of sharing independent persons appointed by other councils with a view to establishing a pool of 5 independent persons from which 3 can be selected to form a panel

Such a shared system may be a more cost effective and efficient use of a limited number of independent persons.

The Chief Operating Officer, who wrote the report, is Lorraine Langham, late of Ofsted and Tower Hamlets.

Apart from concerns that might arise from the above, there is an Alice in Wonderland feel about the flow chart.

In the top half of the chart you will see that action (or a decision not to act) is in the hands of the General Purposes Committee. The GPC consists of 7 Labour Cabinet Members and one Conservative opposition member.

In the bottom half you can see that the GPC notifies the Cabinet. In effect this is the 7 Cabinet members plus one Tory notifying 8 Cabinet members (Cllr Mashari is added to the 7).

They then have a kind of internal debate with themselves where they might object as Cabinet and reconsider as GPC, before the Dismissal Advisory Panel comes into play...

The Council will be asked to formally approve the appointment of Carolyn Downs as Chief Executive and Head of Paid Services with effect from September 7th 2015 LINK

Brent Council's green bin 'grab and smash'

Brent Council has been collecting green bins this month from those households not willing to pay the £40 annual 'garden tax'.

They collected from the close in which I live about 10 days ago and I don't think any household has kept their green bin.

We were told that the green bins would be stored by the Council for re-use and there was some discussion on Streetlife about possible re-use.

Now a Sudbury Court Estate resident writes:

Good afternoon Martin, 

I  thought you would be interested to know about a recent development in connection with the above.  

At home we compost the majority of our garden waste and did not take up Brent's most very generous offer to pay a surcharge for removal of our garden waste. We were advised that redundant bins would be collected during June. 

Today, two vehicles arrived, one to empty any bins containing waste followed by another to take the bins away. The Contractors then proceeded to smash the wheels and the bottoms of perfectly good bins with a hand axe. A pure act of vandalism and a total waste of resources. How environmentally friendly is that? At a time when Brent Council is whinging about Government cuts forcing them to cut services, they are destroying perfectly good equipment which could be used by others. 

I have issued my comments to our local councillor and chairperson of our Residents Association requesting their comments. 

I hope you can investigate this matter in your usual efficient way. 

With very best regards. 

Sudbury Court Estate Resident.

Can anyone shed light on Brent Council's, or is Veolia's, action?

Quintain's exhibition at Wembley Park opens - but do people know about it?

Quintain's exhibition on the next phase of the Wembley Park regeneration opens today at  The Yellow Pavilion, Olympic Way, Wembley HA9 0FA

Local residents are not convinced that the PR agency organising the exhibition have done enough to contact local people. This is what one residents' association wrote to them:

 Is this the minimum time for exhibitions/consultations you have to give to residents who are directly affected by this development?

We are very upset and disappointed that you have not advised every resident who will be directly affected, in good time,  i.e. all the residents who live in the areas around the Stadium development. Even residents at Raglan Court have not been advised and they live right opposite the development! Why wasn't the whole area, which is directly affected,  leafleted?

Now that the Wembley Observer is no longer published and only on line, even if you had mentioned this exhibition, many would not have seen it.

Many of us are already personally affected, as we now have no privacy, as our bedrooms are overlooked and it can only get worse!

Please advise why all the residents were not advised well in advance, as you must have known about this exhibition/consultation a long time ago? Perhaps you really did not want all of us to attend and make our comments and objections? This is totally unacceptable and we really need some answers and for you to extend the time of the exhibition, so that more people can be advised and attend.

We are very sorely aware that Quintain has all the power and finance to influence Brent Council and when there is a huge development with huge profits involved, obviously the residents wishes and needs tend to be ignored.

There is nothing wrong with making huge profits, money makes the world go round, but not at the expense of the existing residents, who feel we are not getting anything in return!  You should be putting back much more and also be far more considerate of  the feelings and needs of the existing residents, who are very side-lined.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Zerine

Zerine Tata, Chair of Hillcroft Crescent Residents Assoc. & Co-ordinator of the Neighbourhood Watch.

As background before visiting the exhibition you may wish to look at these previous posts on Wembley Matters:

http://wembleymatters.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/quintain-wembley-masterplan-public.html (particularly the comments)

http://wembleymatters.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/more-tall-blocks-for-wembley-park-in.html

http://wembleymatters.blogspot.co.uk/2014/08/a-decade-on-has-quintain-delivered-for.html

http://wembleymatters.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/brents-relationship-with-quintain-under.html

Click on image to enlarge

Click on image to enlarge

Join the Green Bloc on 'End Austerity Now' demonstration June 20th

Roe Green Walled Garden Open Day on Saturday

Raunchy Rockers offer music, dancing, food and laughter!

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Cara Davani leaving Brent Council to take a 'career break'

A Brent Council spokesperson today, said:

'Cara Davani, Director of HR and Administration, will leave the Council at the end of June. She intends to take a career break for a while.

The Council is grateful for the significant contribution that Cara has made over the last 3 years.

Mildred Philips will become interim Director of HR while we consider a range  of options for the provision of the Council's HR services.'

Hampstead & Kilburn CLP nominate Tessa Jowell and David Lammy for London Mayor

Hampstead and Kilburn Constituency Labour Party  tonight nominated Tessa Jowell and David Lammy as their Labour candidates for London Mayor.

This completes the nominations for the three Brent constituencies:

Tessa Jowell - Brent North and Hampstead & Kilburn
Sadiq Khan - Brent Central and Brent North
Diane Abbot - Brent Central
David Lammy - Hampstead & Kilburn

Interestingly, and perhaps marking the increasing distance of Brent's H&K wards from the rest of Brent Labour, of 100 or so individual members present at the H&K meeting, none spoke in favour of Sadiq Khan, the candidate of choice for many of the Brent Council Cabinet.