Removal Of Councillor Malcolm King As Lead Member
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@Interested 15439 wrote:
Also does anyone know how much was paid to carry out the INDEPENDENT investigation?
With you being interested you may well have already found the info on whatdotheyknow.com
19/09/11 – £4010.60
18/05/12 – £2711.50
18/05/13 – £5013.60Three different and separate investigations since 2011 ?
Are we allowed to ask why use this particular company repeatedly ?
Are there no other similar consultants to use ?
Do we need a report into the report ?A lot in media relating to child care services this last couple of weeks about people staying quiet rather than risk their careers. People not risking opprobrium for not following standard procedures, people averse to not adhering to established chain of command, large scale nepotism in local authorities etc.
No wonder many think Mr King’s actions were both correct and very brave and he shouldn’t have been removed as leader at all.
Different fish need frying now I guess but its still sad that good people can’t all work together.If you look at other investigations of this type with other LAs they tend to bring in a different firm of investigators on consecutive occasions to avoid any form of complacency. It is very strange however that the relevant standards authority in Welsh Government CSSIW do not appear to have been involved.
I for one will hold no truck with anyone who criticises Malcom King.He was the man who quite literally coaxed every victim of the Bryn Estyn Child Abuse scandal to come forward with their story.Of course he made himself unpopular with those with the funny hand shakes.Yes the same type of people who carried out the abuse.Wow,I could say a lot more but the powers that be are watching every word!
During the Executive Board Webcast today Cllr King asked questions that referenced the BBC report ” Concern Over Social Worker Caseloads In Wales “.
He said Wrexham Council by its own admission has the second highest level of child protection caseloads in Wales and twice the level of caseload that are recommended by the relevant national professional bodies.
The answer given to Mr King stated Wrexham caseload numbers are well within the recommendations – but then continued ….that there are no recommendations for an optimum number of caseloads for individual social workers its a matter of discretion and its a matter of judgement…So are there recommendations or not ?
It would have been interesting to hear Cllr King’s supplementary question, despite the busy agenda it would have been worth taking the ten minutes or so.
Will the December 17th discussions be webcast ?
As far as we are aware December’s Executive Board meeting will be webcast.
Interestingly the decision for funding of webcasting itself is expected to be on the agenda next month – so it could very well be the last meeting that is webcast!
Can someone please state how much a web cast costs– all the equipment is in place, the IT connection is part of the overall Council IT infrastructure so there is only an admin officer cost doing the controls and the input of info.
@darryl 16482 wrote:
As far as we are aware December’s Executive Board meeting will be webcast.
Interestingly the decision for funding of webcasting itself is expected to be on the agenda next month – so it could very well be the last meeting that is webcast!
Thanks Darryl.
Hopefully the webcasts will continue, I watch them all and find them interesting, not only in terms of council business discussed but also in seeing how people interface with each other.There are potentially a number of anomalies in the discussion that has taken place today.
Response by Clr Michael Williams
1. The response about the average number of cases — is the figure stated based on the total number of Social Workers who are employed or the actual number who are currently in work — the reason this is posed is that there are often a number of Social Workers who are on the sick. Based on their own staffing reports. This makes a significant difference between how the information has been stated.
2. There also needs to be a statement about the figures for children that have a Social Worker and those that have been moved onto the TAF – Team around the family. What are the staffing ratio in this team?
3. How many children that are in a family situation no longer have their own support as Adult Social Care are engaging with the parents- is this an acceptable practice.
4. Why did the Chairman allow Clr Williams to target Clr King personally rather than sticking to the issues that were being raised in the questions?
5. The issue over the refusal by the Leader to allow a supplementary question from Clr King is a disgrace and goes against Council precedence. All this actually does is create a greater level of public distrust in a system that is determined to block information getting into the public domain.
6. The issue over the same ‘Independent’ person being brought in on three occasions looking at similar issues is inappropriate as the consultant for part of the time on two occasions was only reviewing work she had previously reviewed. This clearly does not leave an independent track record.It is now plainly obvious that what I have to say is a quite open and personal campaign against Malcolm King is/was being carried out.Its a campaign of pure vindictiveness aided and abetted by members of the current executive board.
As I’ve posted on other threads my continuing opposition to the system per se of Executive Cabunet in Local Government,a position entirely vindicated by the present encumbents of these posts.
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