At Wednesday’s full council meeting (more to follow later), the leader, David Cllr Pugh and Cabinet member responsible for Adult Social Care, Cllr Roger Mazillius were both questioned many times on the costs of the High Court action and who would be held responsible for the failings found by the Judge. Independent Councillors have sent through the following, in their own words. Ed
Since the recent judgment of the High Court declaring the illegality of the changes in Adult Social Care imposed by the current Conservative Council leadership in February, there have been a number of questions and statements as to who should be regarded as responsible for the illegal change in policy.
Despite assertions to the contrary it is clear that responsibility must lie with the current leader and cabinet members of the Isle of Wight Council who pushed through the provisions in question.
Alternative was offered
The group of Independent Councillors offered an alternative to the Conservative budget proposals in February and explicitly stated when referring to the proposed changes to the adult social care eligibility criteria that, while their proposals were “constrained by policies that they have imposed upon this Council during the last 5 years” by the Conservative group, “we do not support the raising of this threshold, we do support the provision of £6.5m for those with “substantial” needs to lessen risk of these people moving to a critical assessment – but reject the policy proposal”.
Further, other than by failing to query the actions and statements of their group leaders and voting through the changes in the usual ‘block vote’ manner of the Conservative Group on the Isle of Wight Council, it is also clear that non-Cabinet members of that group are also not responsible for the failings identified by the judgment. They were similarly misled by their party leadership.
Members not aware of adverse impact
In her judgment Lang J. stated that “it was not possible for Members to weigh in the balance the adverse impact on disabled users if they were not told in practical terms what the adverse impact was likely to be”.
Further references were made in the judgment to statements to Members being ‘potentially misleading’ and to members simply not being informed of changes to the criteria. (See paras 130, 135 and 137 of Lang J’s judgment).
Cabinet responsible
Responsibility therefore clearly rests with the small group of Cabinet members who pursued and instigated these changes.
The current leadership must therefore also take responsibility for wasting a sum in excess of £100,000 on legal costs in defending their inadequately considered plans. This all the more striking a waste when one notes that the changes in question would only have saved the Council the sum of £54,627.45 in a full year and not the figure of £1.6 milllion misleadingly claimed to be in issue by Councillors Pugh and Mazillius.
Leader’s replies disingenuous
Independent councillors said, “Councillor Pugh’s comments and replies to questions at the Full Council were at the least disingenuous and in places showed he had failed to appreciate the findings of the learned Judge in the case.
“The responsibility for the serious errors identified by the High Court plainly lies with the current members of the Isle of Wight Council Cabinet who have been shown by this judgment to have no adequate regard for proper procedure and decision making resulting in the Full Council and the public being seriously misled and the risk of serious prejudice to the care of seriously disabled individuals.”
Image: Foxy Moron under CC BY 2.0
