Councillors examine Ty Pawb “as matter of urgency” as lead member says it never left his portfolio

Wrexham councillors have examined Ty Pawb “as matter of urgency” as the lead member ‘clarifies’ it never left his portfolio, despite council reports and briefings saying otherwise.

A meeting held by the employment, business and investment scrutiny committee this week was held under somewhat different circumstances to normal after the regular long scheduled report on Ty Pawb itself was provided late to members of the committee.

This lead to several councillors expressing private concern to the legality of it appearing as statutory deadlines were missed.

After much discussion behind the scenes the dispute over the late report was resolved by the Vice Chair Cllr Bill Baldwin offering his discretion, he said the “chair can consider special circumstances to decide if the item is to be taken as a matter of urgency. In this instance I was happy to proceed.”

No more detail was given until Cllr Dana Davies asked for it be clear that the chair has “discretion to make that decision under the amendment to the local governments act 1972. I think that then will give the public reassurance that this meeting is constitutional and it can continue.”

Later Cllr Davies asked Lead Member Cllr Hugh Jones and officer why the report was late.

Cllr Jones did not give an answer, however the officer ‘took responsiblity’ and apologised five times saying it was down to ‘an officer admin error’.

Reassurance was given to the committee that it will not happen again.

The meeting itself was held to receive an update on the progress of Ty Pawb over the last few years, with the report citing covid as the reason why there had been a loss in the last financial year.

Introducing the report Cllr Jones said: “I am Hugh Jones, Lead Member with responsiblity for Ty Pawb.

“Just to make sure the record is correct, I have had that portfolio right the way through the changes of the administration and it never went anywhere else. So I think that was a misconception that appeared on Wrexham.com”.

Wrexham.com reported on the Lead Member portfolio roles, after asking for detail in a media brief for June’s Executive Board on each ‘gifted’ by Council Leader Mark Pritchard, and specifically querying the cultural leads at the council.

At that briefing, Chief Executive Ian Bancroft directly said the Lead Member for Ty Pawb was due to be Cllr Paul Roberts, a view backed by Cllr David A Bithell and Cllr Mark Pritchard – as also detailed in the reports before them, us and the public.

The report was later noted by the Executive Board that Cllr Hugh Jones attended. It was passed with a verbal mention that there could be some ‘tweaks’, however it did not appear there would such a substantive change.

On June 30 we reported that a new report had been circulated internally at the council, with Ty Pawb now showing as Cllr Hugh Jones’ responsiblity rather than Cllr Paul Roberts. It was the only change. No correspondence has been received on that article, nor the prior one.

During the meeting Wrexham.com emailed Cllr Hugh Jones asking him to clarify we had not got anything wrong in our reporting.

Cllr Robert Ian Williams also said during the meeting, “I was a bit taken aback when I read on Wrexham.com that my fellow Councillor Paul Roberts was in as the new (lead member) for Ty Pawb. So I wonder how that got into the press?

“I have to question that, as I didn’t know it was Councillor Hugh Jones”.

Almost an hour and a half into the meeting Cllr Jones said: “I will make it clear and clarify, as it seems the political thing to do these days, I will clarify my earlier statement.”

“The report that went to the Executive Board did show that Ty Pawb was with Cllr Paul Roberts. You are absolutely correct in that. But, in the discussions we had about allocations of responsibilty it was agreed that Ty Pawb and City of Culture would remain with me.

“The point I was making about the Wrexham.com comment, was that somebody had said he’d handed it back to me because it was too much of a potato to handle.

“The point I’m making is that as far as I am concerned, and as far as we are concerned, is that it always sat with me.”

Wrexham.com did not make such a comment, nor speculate in that manner.

The only speculation we can spot is someone commenting on the Wrexham.com Forums in this thread about the Lead Member change.

The process and clarifications aside – there was some examination of Ty Pawb as well – read that here…

We welcome Lead Members reading the Wrexham.com Forums and giving custom replies in public at the start of meetings to individual posters, long may it continue!