Rutland County Council, Special Meeting, Public Deputation, Rutland Anti Corruption, Bevan Brittan,

Rutland County Council
Catmose Oakham Rutland LE15 6HP

Telephone 01572 722577 Facsimile 01572 758307 DX 28340 Oakham

TWO HUNDRED AND SIXTEENTH (Special) MEETING of the COUNCIL held in the Council Chamber, Catmose, Oakham on Thursday 10 January 2013 at 7.00pm.


DEPUTATION FROM A MEMBER OF THE PUBLIC

In accordance with the provisions of Procedure Rule 24, the following deputation  from a member of the public were received.

Deputation received from Miss Helen Pender, Oakham

I should like to congratulate Bevan Brittan and officers of this council on this
report. Its speedy compilation was miraculously swift. The report was
authorised at a meeting on 12th November 2012. Appendix A is dated 16
November. Was it really delivered within four days?

Never in the field of legal conflict has so much been achieved by a legal firm in
so short a time.

So when were Cllrs Gale, Richardson and Wainwright shown this report? This
Council has, after all, had a copy of Appendix A since 16th November.
I am told they first saw a copy when the agenda and report were published
online at the end of last week. Incredible.

Unbelievable that three Councillors justified questions and concerns are being
brushed aside and deemed to be harassment.

One successful suicide and, it is rumoured, at least one attempted suicide by
members of staff should alert members of this Council to seriously examine their
personnel policies.

On 15th November Cllr Richardson wrote a private email to Kim Sawyer in
Peterborough. This has been published in full in Bevan Brittan report. Yet again
Cllr Richardson did not publish it himself. It reads:

3. “We are informed by the relatives that the meeting which resulted in the
suspension of Mr Mehra was only with the Chief Executive.” Mr Richardson
goes on:
“Surely for a suspension there has to be independent witnesses…”
It would appear that the person who ordered Bevan Brittan to compile this report
also has some difficulty with the definition of INDEPENDENT.

An online dictionary says: “Free from outside control … impartial.”
Is it impartial to get only one side of the story? Bevan Brittan have said that they
are not paid to talk to supporters of these three Councillors, nor had they spoken
to Cllrs Gale, Richardson and Wainwright.

So surely they cannot be said to be independent or impartial? Are Bevan Brittan
eminent QC’s. Why were Bevan Brittan chosen?

We are told in the report that criticism of this Council by a local blogger had been
difficult to tolerate. Bevan Brittan had already been consulted over that.

A citizen journalist has been subjected to false arrest, women’s clothing
delivered to his home, life threatening phone calls funeral literature posted to
him, libellous, untrue and malicious leaflets circulated about him at the Local
Elections. I have been hacked, Cllrs Richardson, Gale and Wainwright have
been hacked. Again and again the police have done nothing.

Yet Bevan Brittan have not ascertained why Cllrs Wainwright, Gale and
Richardson are so wary of this County’s internet system.

This Council refused to be held properly accountable. This Council does not
intend to tolerate questions from these three democratically elected Councillors.
This Council has become so irritated by a brave group of three Councillors they
have gone to a couple of provincial solicitors and have not asked those solicitors
to even talk to Cllrs Richardson, Gale and Wainwright.

Lawyers love legal disputes, they’re always glad of the money and he, or she,
who pays the piper call the tune. And we discover, by Bevan Brittan’s own
admission, that RCC has paid this piper before.

It would appear that Bevan Brittan have only been allowed to talk to officers of
this Council, who by their admission in the report, are finding it difficult to tolerate
questions being put by these courageous Councillors.

It is the duty of those in opposition, in any democracy, to ask questions. That
may be a shock to some members of this Council in the goldfish bowl of Rutland.
But democracy can only be said to work by holding those in power to account.
I won’t remind this meeting, since I blogged it some time ago, of the fight for Cllr
Richardson’s seat that continued in this room long after the ballot boxes closed.
Councillors Wainwright, Gale and Richardson are justifiably concerned about the
death of a senior officer of this Council. Yet questions refuse to be properly
answered. Why? When questions are not transparently answered and efforts
are made to duck them then surely we are all justified in asking: “What have you
got to hide?”

Smother these Councillors; bar them from asking question and Rutland will join
Syria and Egypt as examples of an anarchical tyranny. Bevan Brittan have not
been allowed to be impartial. They only have one side of this argument, but I
would bet that a bus load of lawyers will be delighted by the fees if this goes to
Court and we shall all be democratically and financially poorer if this out of
control autocracy continues.

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