The inboxes of Isle of Wight councillors have been been pinging frantically over the last 24 hours as a thread of emails have bounced back and forth between Cllr Chris Whitehouse and leader of the council, Jonathan Bacon.
The gist of the email ping pong (seen by OnTheWight) was Cllr Whitehouse accusing the leader of secrecy and withholding of correspondence in relation to the Solent Devolution (or Solent Deal as it’s now being referred to).
The Solent Deal is due for debate in the October full council meeting, when the results of the recent consultation will be collated and shared with members prior to the meeting.
Hampshire’s response to consultation
One of the documents Cllr Whitehouse was unhappy had not previously been shared with members, was the response to the IW Solent Deal consultation by leader of Hampshire County Council, Cllr Roy Perry.
In his formal response Cllr Perry criticised the IWC’s consultation, stating the content was “superficial, misrepresents key aspects of your proposal and avoids consulting upon specific matters that should be addressed in any lawful consultation”.
Although Cllr Whitehouse incorrectly referred to Hampshire CC as a major stakeholder (they have no part the Solent Deal), Cllr Bacon addresses the response by saying,
“Hampshire’s opposition to the Solent Deal and the consultation on the Governance Scheme is a matter of public record even though we are not part of Hampshire.
“One might question why Hampshire are involving themselves in matters in a way that could prejudice the Island.”
Attack on leadership
In the flow of emails – copied to all members – Cllr Whitehouse made several scathing attacks on the competency of the leadership.
He says,
“It’s time you stepped up and took responsibility for your own actions, and, in this instance, your colossal failures.
“My suggestion is very simple. We block your incompetent, self-serving, bungling and wait until the next elections.”
No attempt to take control
Despite these, and previous attacks on the council administration, there has still been no attempt by the Conservative group of councillors to take control of the council – even though they probably could with their alliance voting power.
In reply to Cllr Whitehouse, the leader said,
“As you are so determinedly against this process I wonder what suggestions you have in the alternative seeing as the Conservative Government has clearly told us that the Isle of Wight will get no funding to assist its situation other than through Devolution?
“The only suggestion I seem to recall is that from your Leader at budget Council where he proposed more cuts.”
Misrepresenting the £30m?
Cllr Whitehouse goes on to challenge the leader for what he describes as “continually to misrepresent the ‘£30 million'” adding, “It is certainly not “new” or “additional” money, and if you haven’t grasped that yet, resignation is the obvious option.”
The flow of emails finishes with Cllr Bacon replying,
“Obviously I will check with the Minister when I see him to confirm that the Conservative Government has in fact completely misled the Isle of Wight and is actually offering us nothing at all. That’s nice!
“It all rather undermines such promises as we have had, including those made by our Conservative MP when he voted for the financial settlement that has put us in our current position.
“Still it’s nice to have officially confirmed what has long appeared to be the case, that the Conservative Party really doesn’t care one jot about the Isle of Wight.”
Image: onepointfour under CC BY 2.0
