Richard Macrae, Stapleford Community Group writes: I have been told that on Monday there is to be a meeting between Broxtowe Borough Council and Town/Parish Councils. During this meeting both the Core Strategy and also the Neighbourhood Plan will both be discussed. This meeting is a private meeting and the public are not allowed in the public gallery to observe. There is no agenda on the internet either. Why?
Surely, as this is such an important issue which will effect all residents throughout the Borough of Broxtowe, we should be allowed to at least observe. The consultation or lack of consultation just gets worse.
Why are Councillors meeting behind closed doors to discuss this? Surely residents of the Borough of Broxtowe should be allowed to attend and listen to what these people who claim to represent us are talking about. Why are we being shut out? Why are we not being informed about such an important meeting and again why are we not allowed to witness what these people are saying.?After all its our future they are toying with.
Richard
This is an annual event where members of Parish Council’s get to quiz the leadership of the borough about absolutely anything that they want. I can’t see any reason why members of the public should not be able to attend it, but I won’t be at the meeting as I have a commitment elsewhere.
David
Could we please be informed who to ask about attending and what is the start time and exact location. Thanks for the reply as Rick says you seem to be the only person who replies.
I have contacted Ruth Hyde and Broxtowe Borough Council via twitter to find out when and where and no one has replied despite posting comments on there accounts after I have contacted them. So we still none the wiser and wanted to attend this evening.
Does anyone know ?????????????
“Apologies, the meeting you refer to is an annual meeting between @broxtowebc and town-parish councils. It is not a public meeting.”
Just had this message via twitter and the same via facebook. I replied saying I wanted to observe and am now waiting another reply.
“Hi Richard – As we say, the meeting is not a public meeting and attendance is by invitation only.”
Got another reply via twitter.
Its a joke that there are private meetings being held between Borough Council and Town/Parish councils were they in private will discuss the future of our neighbourhoods, yet we that actually live here are not allowed to attend. Its not like the Stapleford North Ward councillors represent the residents of Stapleford North Ward anyway. If they did, they would have argued against Field Farm being included in the Core Strategy.
I completely agree with you Richard.
It should be a public meeting or at least one where the public are allowed to observe. They obviously realise that neither Trowell or Stapleford Councils are fully supporting them and need to persuade them otherwise. Wonder what they will promise them.
Another case of Broxtowe Borough Council being open and above board on all matters??
And they reckon their consultation process is not flawed. They will do anything to avoid informing people in simple terms what is happening. Just a joke and a bad one at that.
Perhaps they are in more of a panic than we think about their ‘non-aligned’ core strategy.
Perhaps David Watts might like to tell us why such a meeting is taking place and what will be discussed as he is the only one who seems to ever respond.
There is a meeting between the parish councils and the borough council every year at this time. The parish councillors are able to raise any issues that they wish to and do so. There are of course also meetings with individual parish councils over the year about a whole range of issues, but this is the annual opportunity for everyone to get together. I was away on Monday and so didn’t attend so I have no idea what was discussed this year.
The issue of whether this should be a public meeting or not is an interesting one. As a councillor I have meetings with a whole range of people about different issues. I would never expect that these would be open to the public, but the details of the meetings are always disclosable under an FOI request, and I’ve never had any problems about telling people what is going on. In many ways the meeting on Monday was a large version of one of these with the leader of the council. I can see therefore why the expectation would be that this was a private meeting. However it is a larger meeting involving a number of councils and so I can equally see why members of the public wold expect that they should be able to attend this. However ultimately as I’m no longer the leader of the council it’s not my choice.
David