New Conservative Leader of the Isle of Wight council, Dave Stewart, has hit back at claims his alliance had “bulldozed through a vote to not appoint a new chairman of Scrutiny” at last week’s Full Council meeting.
The criticism was made by members of the Island Independent Group, Labour Group and Liberal Democrat, who have been successful in ensuring an extraordinary meeting of the full council is called to elect a new Chair of Scrutiny Committee. The meeting takes place at 5pm on Wednesday 1st February.
Stewart: “Disingenuous and unfounded” criticisms
Cllr Stewart said the criticisms were “disingenuous and unfounded”.
He went on to say,
“Scrutiny Committee would have been more than able to elect its own Chair for any meetings before the next Full Council meeting when this could have been debated properly, in a measured and considered fashion, rather than Cllr Baker-Smith seeking to score cheap political points on such an important issue.”
Cross-party working
Cllr Stewart added,
“At the recent Full Council I extended an offer to all Members to come forward to volunteer to serve on the cross-party administration I have assembled.
“Until those positions were finalised, it would have been impossible to choose a Chair of Scrutiny, or is Cllr Baker-Smith now saying that she and her colleagues would never have any intention of working cross-party with the new interim administration despite her previous protestations that she seeks such cross-party working?”
