Parish council ballot on the footlights in Winchelsea

The result of the ballot that was held on Thursday, 30 August, on the proposal to turn off the footlights between midnight and 5:30am was 63 against and 50 for. The turnout was 28% of registered voters or about 21% of adult residents. But if one deducts the ballot papers which failed to confirm that the voter was a resident, the turnout was 26% of registered voters and about 19% of adult residents. The first ballot by the parish council was rejected because the turnout was 24% (no reason was given for rejecting the second vote) and one non-Winchelsea councillor suggested a 75% threshold before the vote could accepted. 
So, by re-running the vote, the council eventually got what it wanted. But two can play at that game. Is this the end of the story?

Emergency contact signs

An emergency contact sign has been put up outside the Church. It is intended to ensure that emergency services can contact a keyholder out of normal hours. This is important as the building was designated in the County emergency plan as a reception centre in the event of a major local emergency such as the flooding of Winchelsea Beach. The sign will also help passers-by get hold of a responsible person if they need to report something urgently.
Emergency contact signs have also been provided to the New Hall and Court Hall. The school did not want to be involved. Indeed it did not even bother to reply to the invitation.
The signs were designed and commissioned by the Winchelsea Emergency Group (WEG) and funded by a grant obtained by the local police team at Rye from the Police Property Fund. The PPF was approached after Icklesham Parish Council refused to buy the signs on the grounds that they did not think a parish emergency plan was anything to do with the parish!
Winchelsea was the first ward in the area to produce a local emergency plan and its plan has been used as a template for other villages in the District. WEG also pressed for a local emergency plan to implemented in Rye Harbour when a chemical spillage led to suggestions that appeared likely to reinvent the wheel. However, there is no emergency plan in Winchelsea Beach, the place most at risk from flooding, because of opposition from a ward councillor.

 

Parish council ballot on the footlights in Winchelsea on 30 August 2012

First, let's make it clear that the blogs on this blog site are "definitely not the views of other councillors or the official view of the council". It actually says this at the top of the blog site. However, one councillor thinks the blog site is misleading as to its authors.
The tagline at the top of the site also says that the blogs underneath represent the views of Cllr Chishick and Comotto, but this particular blog represents the views of Cllr Comotto only, although Cllr Chishick has made many of the following points independently.

The ballot

Tomorrow --- Thursday, 30 August 2012 --- Icklesham Parish Council will hold a ballot on whether the footlights in Winchelsea should be turned off at midnight until 5:30am. This will be the third vote that the council has taken on this question. They have ignored the previous two results for various (not good) reasons which have been examined in previous blogs. This blog is only about the conduct of the latest ballot.

The problem

Tomorrow's ballot will take place between 4:00pm and 9:00pm. There will be no postal votes. Only residents registered to vote in elections in the ward of Winchelsea will be eligible to vote in the ballot. The ballot was announced on 14-15 August, when leaflets were delivered to houses in Winchelsea.
Considerable disquiet has been voiced about the ballot, particularly its timing, by Cllr Chishick and other Winchelsea residents. To summarise the criticisms:

1. The notice period of two weeks and one day was very short and insufficient to allow every resident to make arrangements to ensure they are present in Winchelsea tomorrow. Moreover, limiting the vote to registered voters makes it incumbent upon the council to give residents sufficient time to register as an elector.
2. The ballot is being held on a weekday. This means that those owning weekend homes (almost one quarter of the households of Winchelsea) and those not returning from work until late will not be able to vote, even though they pay the taxes that fund the footlighting or may feel they will be affected by its suspension after midnight.
3. The ballot is being held in August, during the summer vacation period. Many residents are likely to be on holiday and would not have been able to change their holiday arrangements.
4. It is not possible to vote by post. This also disenfranchises those owning weekend homes and those not returning from work until late will not be able to vote, as well as the house-bound.
5. The parish council does not have access to the Electoral Register, so is not in a position to verify that those persons turning up to vote are registered.They cannot exclude under-age residents and may be unable to distinguish residents of neighbouring wards.

It would not have taken much to defer the ballot until September in order to extend the notice period and avoid the holidays. However, the council's instructions to the parish clerk did not allow this. The council's instructions also precluded the clerk from holding the ballot on a weekend and/or extend voting hours, and allowing all residents to vote, rather than just registered voters. This is not an election. It is supposed to be an attempt to measure the opinion of tax-payers. 

The result

The end result of all this is that whoever loses the ballot will have grounds for complaint. Another sorry day for democracy in Icklesham Parish.

Icklesham Parish Council meeting of 13 August 2012

Grant application for Winchelsea film

This was the main item of interest to Winchelsea. The community group Winchelsea Moving Pictures, who run Winchelsea Film Night, are producing a film (The Red Slipper) about an episode in the town’s relatively recent past. A grant of £1,000 has been made by Rother District Council from a grant it received under the Heritage Lottery Fund’s All Our Stories project . The remainder of the budget of about £2,500 is coming from funds raised by WMP itself. The parish council was asked for £200.

The proposal came under immediate attack from Cllr Bronsdon of Rye Harbour, who asserted, on the basis of no evidence whatsoever, that not many locals were involved. He was also unhappy that the money was “only for Winchelsea”.

Cllr Bronsdon tried to attack the grant on the grounds that Rother District Council was not putting any of its own money into the project, only part of a grant from HLF, presumably in order to argue that the parish council should only match-fund money from Rother’s own revenue. Cllr Comotto, on behalf of WMP, explained that the money from HLF was still part of Rother’s budgetary resources. But in fact, virtually all Rother’s revenues come from grants, not least, their central government grant.

Cllr Stanford of Rye Harbour was not happy with the copy of the bank statement showing all the WMP’s transactions since it was set up and demanded to see the accounts of the WMP. Cllr S Turner pointed out that these would not be available until the end of the WMP’s first year of operation. Cllr Stanford also confused the WMP’s film with the Diamond Jubilee film, and felt it was “rude” that the council had yet to see that film, despite providing a grant. Someone had to explain that the other film was about the Diamond Jubilee year in Winchelsea, so would not be available until after the end of the Diamond Jubilee year!

To be fair to the council, there was some confusion over the source of some of the funding, although this was hardly important. Unless money-laundering is suspected, money is money wherever it comes from. But Cllr Merricks felt that the council could not believe the application form.

Cllr P Turner questioned the historical accuracy of the memoirs on which the film is being based but the Chairman pointed out that this was not relevant.

In the end, it was probably the presence of a number of Winchelsea residents that forced a positive result. Proposed by the Chairman and seconded by Cllr P Turner, the application was approved unanimously.

New playground equipment for Icklesham Recreation Ground

Tenders for the proposed new playground facilities have come in and range from about £56,400 to some £71,700. Tenders for a permanent skatepark range from some £13,900 to just over £46,500. The wide range for the skatepark is apparently due to the fact that Cllr Warren, the principal architect of the project, allowed one quoting company to diverge from the specification agreed by the council.

The proposal before the council was that the tenders should go to the Sports and Recreation Working Group to recommend which was best value for money. However, despite months of previous discussion and in the absence of Cllr Warren, the proposal rapidly went back to square one, as some councillors, led by Cllr Bronsdon, questioned the whole idea of spending so much on one playground. The permanent skatepark was particularly unpopular with some councillors and was quickly deferred. Cllr Merricks revived her call for a multi-user games area, which she felt would encourage participation in sports in the spirit of the Olympics.

In the end, an amendment was proposed to the effect that the council review its strategy. There was some considerable procedural confusion about how an amendment is handled. Cllr P Turner argued that the amendment should be voted on and then the original resolution with the amendment added. No-one really knew what they were voting on. In the end, the motion was that the strategy go back to the Working Group (not the council), who will also assess the tenders for the playground equipment. It is clear that there is no consensus on the most fundamental issue of what (if anything) is required. The project is largely driven by the Working Group and not the council as a whole.

The Chairman expressed hopes that a grant of £30,000 may be available from the Weald and Rother Rural (WARR) Partnership but the deferral of the proposal could mean the council misses WARR’s deadline. Somebody also mentioned the landfill grants scheme but Icklesham falls outside the eligible area.

Parish Council-financed bus service

The second report from Rye Community Transport showed that, over the period from 1^st June to 3^rd August, there had been 110 users (counting each child as half an adult). Given that the council is paying RCT £7,500 per annum and assuming each adult user made a £1 donation, each journey has so far cost the council £11.88. Some 113 of the 165 journeys (68%) had no passengers. Only two Winchelsea residents have used the service, which translates into a tax contribution by the town of almost £170 per resident.

Controversy over third parish council consultation over footlights

Icklesham Parish Council decided, at its meeting in July, to go ahead with a third consultation on whether the footlights in Winchelsea should be turned off at midnight, having decided to ignore the results of both previous consultations. The council is proceeding despite the fact that Cllr Comotto has convened a Parish Meeting on 23^rd August which will see a Parish Poll called on the same issue.
Cllr Comotto is proposing a Parish Poll because of accusations of electoral impropriety against Cllr Comotto, and criticism of the competence of the parish clerk in the conduct of the first consultation, by a Winchelsea resident, Mr John Spencer. Cllr Comotto argues that Mr Spencer’s accusations are likely to have undermined public confidence in the ability of the council to conduct a fair poll, as have attempts by Mr Spencer to view and check the questionnaires from the original consultation so that he could confirm his allegations against Cllr Comotto. Despite the assurances from the parish clerk that these allegations were untrue, Mr Spencer served a Freedom of Information request on the parish council seeking access to the returned questionnaires. A Parish Poll, which will be conducted by the District Council, will ensure that no mud can be thrown at the conduct of the next consultation and that there will be no breach of voting confidentiality.
The parish council’s third attempt at consultation has been called for 30^th August, with a ballot box at the Court Hall between 4:00pm and 9:00pm (originally 5:00pm to 9:00pm).
However, Cllr Chishick of Winchelsea, who is an opponent of the proposal to turn off the footlights at midnight, has criticised the parish council’s new consultation for the very short notice, the shortness of the period for which the voting station will be open and for not allowing postal votes by absent residents.
It is also unclear whether the parish council will once again retrospectively impose a threshold for turnout. On the first consultation, they decided that a turnout of almost 30% was inadequate, even though it exceed the 9-13% turnouts accepted in most LAP consultations.
Cllr Comotto has asked that the Parish Poll be conducted at the same time as the election of the Police and Crime Commissioner, on 15^th November, in order to reduce costs.

Cllr Comotto