Tuesday evening’s council meeting at RBWM was the white wash that was anticipated by the 100+ local people who attended.
The council voted to stand by its decision to not only award the £480,000 to Holyport College but to pay it quickly… “Shame on YOU!” was the cry from many in the gallery after the vote.
You can listen to the evening unfold here >>> It starts at around 20 minutes 30 seconds in and I recommend you download the mp3 file and play from your own machine as the council format tends to fall over if you try and go back and forth.
Cllr Simon Werner (Lib Dem, Pinkneys Green), Cllr Lynne Jones (Old Windsor Residents Association, Old Windsor) and Cllr Malcolm Beer (Old Windsor Residents Association, Old Windsor) all voted against awarding the funding.
Not a single Tory Councillor abstained even though it was clear for all to see that there was something not quite right with the process, elements of which can be seen in Lindsey’s full statement shown below.
There were 10 councillors who didn’t turn up on the night, perhaps some because they knew the outcome and preferred not to be associated with this decision?
@ @MaidenheadAds @fundingfair just wondering @davidburbage is there a timeframe on this manifesto pledge pic.twitter.com/9F8gtvWLVH
— Brian Millin (@brian_millin) July 29, 2015
After fleecing the Borough for his own “private-free” school, ironically Councillor Simon Dudley ended the meeting by pleading the case for poorer families, saying that the TV license fee was an unfair tax on the 4,500 poor in the RBWM… but obviously all the not so poor people would also not pay… order another bottle of Bollie!
Why would anyone in their right mind want to destroy the BBC? Oh, that’s right, Tory HQ want to destroy it so this will be yet another plea from Simon to play in the big house! From what I hear the big wigs have less time for you than most Windsor & Maidenhead residents and this will simply be seen as more brown nosing and really, what the feck does it have to do with an RBWM Council decision… absolutely nothing… why was it even on the agenda?
Please read the full statement read out on Tuesday evening by Lindsey Blake, on behalf of Catherine del Campo, lead petitioner for the Developer Funding Petition. She did a brilliant job and it sounded so much better live… read the key points and then ask your councillor why they voted to allow their decision to stand even though the process was not open and transparent…
FULL PETITION
On behalf of the Fair Funding team and all our supporters, thank you for inviting me to speak here this evening and agreeing to listen to our concerns.
In the sixteen days that our developer funding petition was open, it received over 1,600 signatures — an average of 100 a day — and we believe this may be the Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead’s most popular online petition ever.
It is fair to say that there is wide support for a review of the decision to award almost half a million pounds of developer funding to Holyport College, a brand new school two and a half miles away from the development in question.
Signatures have been received from residents throughout the borough and of all political viewpoints; even loyal Conservative voters have voiced their concerns to us. It stands to reason then that a good proportion of those who signed the petition will also have voted this council into power.
The council claims to have already answered our questions, but frankly, we’ve been left with more than we started with.
Take for example, the requirement for developer funds to be restricted to one or two schools. At the public meeting on 13th July, we were first told this requirement came from the planning team because of new pooling rules, then that the developer had made the stipulation and then, that the planning team and the developer had come up with the restriction together. It’s difficult to know what to believe, especially as the developer emailed us this week to say, “The level of contribution and nature of project to be funded was dictated by RBWM, as is normal practice.”
It’s easy to see why we feel misled.On the subject of fast tracking the money from council funds, something we’d like to see revoked, I quote from the Head of Children’s Services: “Why wait? The school is willing and able to accept more pupils for September 2015, allowing us to offer more children a place at a school they want to attend.”
This week, however, we discovered the minutes of the March 19th Governors’ meeting at Holyport College, which was chaired by Councillor Dudley in his capacity as Chair of Governors. It turns out that the changing rooms are not even adequate for the college’s original planned intake this September. Again, I quote word for word:
“Mr Stephenson noted in particular that lack of changing room space and it was noted that these may be addressed within the potential expansion of the College. The head master noted that this really needed to be addressed before the pupil population doubled in September 2015.”We have been told time and time again that this money is being awarded to aid additional expansion but it is now clearer than ever that the changing rooms are nowhere near fit for purpose and that this funding is being used to throw Holyport College a lifeline.
Why has this council, which is committed to openness and transparency, glossed over the real reasons for advancing the money?
As you can imagine, we have many more questions which have either not been fully answered or not answered at all. But in the time left, I’d like to address the way we have been dealt with by our elected representatives and their officers.
A freedom of information request to see Holyport College’s plans and submissions has gone unanswered, and follow up emails have not been acknowledged. A code of conduct complaint, which should have been responded to within two weeks has not been answered, more than six weeks later.
Why is the council neglecting its responsibilities to respond to information requests and complaints?
We have been told that our questions will only be answered face to face from now on. Given the number of outstanding questions at the last meeting, to which only a handful of people were invited and for which no follow-up meeting has been planned, this effectively denies us a voice.
Why is this council trying to shut down dialogue? It’s no wonder we’re “jumping up and down”.
When we have tried to engage with our councillors on social media, we have been named and shamed online, blocked on Twitter, labelled as ‘trolls’ and dismissed as ‘opposition’.
Should councillors who use social media to promote their political activities and interests be blocking and belittling the people they claim to serve?
Let me make it clear that this campaign has never been about politics or opposition to free schools. We are not your opposition, we are ordinary people looking at this decision and saying it’s not right, and we’re not happy with the way the council has acted. We are mums and dads, grannies and granddads; we are teachers, head teachers, governors and heads of governors; we support Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the Conservatives and none of the above; some of us even work for free schools because we are passionate about changing children’s lives. We know what outstanding looks like and quite frankly, we are looking at a council which needs a lot of improvement.
I hope that by now you have a sense of the strength of feeling amongst the borough’s residents; people who want a fair deal for all our children, including the ones who have no choice but to go to so called ‘coasting and failing schools’. Even where the borough’s schools have opted out of local authority control, your responsibility to those children did not end — instead, your job to provide them with a quality education just got a whole lot harder. You now have the opportunity to debate this petition. Please do the right thing. Revoke the April 28th decision, don’t rubber stamp it — you work for us, and we deserve better.
Thank you.
Will we have to wait 4 years for things to change? Will they ever change? Not if people don’t take the time to look at their candidates squarely in the eye and ask them what the actually stand for, rather than simply being given the job because they will do as they are told by their party leaders.
Stop voting these lilly livered wimps in to positions of power… please vote for people of substance next time you get the chance to vote or you’ll get what you deserve, self serving ego maniacs ruling the roost instead of solid, well balanced individuals which are much needed before any real skill base is completely eroded from the council employee team.
The RBWM has a massive churn rate… can you guess why?
Thank you.
Jon
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