Criticism Over Information Sharing On Council’s Groves Decision

A local councillor has challenged the minutes of the last Executive Board meeting, saying they did not note a promise made to inform members about the Groves decision making over Christmas.

Speaking at this morning’s Executive Board, Cllr Alun Jenkins challenged a promise made in the December meeting where due to the Christmas and New Year period decision making was delegated to the Leader of Wrexham Council Mark Pritchard, with an assurance that councillors would be kept informed as we noted at the time:

“Assurances members will be kept informed were issued, with Cllr Pritchard reiterating the ‘desire and passion’ to put two 21st century schools on the site’”

It appears Cllr Jenkins and others first discovered the Council’s decision by reading our story on January 10, with Cllr Jenkins stating no details being had provided to him since the last meeting.

Due to the process of the meeting the issue was raised via a query on the minutes, with Cllr Jenkins saying: “I am not challenging the accuracy but the completeness of the minutes”. The challenge was slightly ad-hoc as the minutes had only been provided to Councillors immediately prior to the meeting due to delays in translation, with additional issues with Cllr Jenkins’ laptop.

Cllr Jenkins stated that he ‘despairs in a way they (the minutes) are so sparse’, adding that there was a complete record of the meeting via the webcast recording, however that was not overly accessible.

He continued onto say how he had asked that councillors be informed of ‘what is going on’ with the Groves: “I have not been informed of what is going on. I had to go on Wrexham.com to discover this. I have had no information circulated to me, or other members of the Council. You and the Lead Member are aware, but there are 52 members of this Council.”

Cllr Jenkins described the situation as ‘most unsatisfactory’, explaining how he had members of the public ask him for information however as he had no update he could not answer questions, adding he wanted the detail on why decisions were made as well as the outcomes.

At the time of writing the minutes are not yet public, but Cllr Jenkins appeared to imply that the minutes did not include a reference to the promise inform fellow councillors.

Cllr Jenkins referred to the non-challenge on the Groves as a ‘u-turn’, however Cllr Hugh Jones later pointed out that the two options to either legally challenge or not were on the table and therefore an option was followed rather than a change in position.

The Legal Officer pointed out the minutes are not meant to be a full meeting report, rather give a reasonable overview of the meeting.

Council Leader Mark Pritchard was not drawn into a debate on the Groves, but said: “I take on board what you have said, an update will be provided. We are where we are with the Groves.”