Leader's Monthly Report - August (Norfolk County Council Liberal Democrats)

Norfolk County Council Liberal Democrats <info@norfolkcclibdems.org.uk>

Leader's Monthly Report - August

September 1, 2011 11:51 AM

Our website is operational again after a few months down so I now have to be disciplined again about doing my monthly report.

The Incinerator issue rolls on. The Tories' attempts to gather support from the Parishes was a miserable failure whilst now the Environment Agency are very concerned about it being sited in a Flood Zone and Natural England are asking questions about the effect on the Wash. I have always believed that for political reasons the Government would find a way of denying the County Council the PFI credits.

We were geared up in July to put in a motion to Council jointly with the Greens calling for a Public Enquiry into the way the Cabinet had behaved in respect of the incinerator, but the Greens withdrew at literally the final hour which was very frustrating and made us more cautious about cross-party working. We just did not have time to re-draft the motion (which had been watered down from the original to keep the Greens on board) and get it in to meet the deadline.

The latest NEET figures do not make good reading. There is a real attack on services to young people both nationally and in Norfolk. Hopefully I don't need to remind people of what our approach would be in Norfolk. As I pointed out in a question to 8 August Cabinet the Tories actually have enough money in the projected underspends to fulfil our suggestion of saving £10M of costs annually by building sufficient accommodation for Looked After Children in Norfolk, but they won't even look at it. http://norfolkcclibdems.org.uk/en/article/2011/508669/norfolk-lib-dems-call-for-county-hall-to-tap-into-extra-14-2m

There was an interesting article in 'The Guardian' on 24 August about the cessation of the Youth Service in Norfolk. http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/aug/23/norfolk-axes-youth-services-effect My letter pointing out that the Conservative's claims that they just didn't have the funding was not the case, was not printed.

Whilst my experience of the areas affected by the awful rioting in August is very limited indeed, I do feel this 'attack on youth' was one of many contributory factors. The bankers and politicians who caused the financial crisis don't seem to be paying for the crisis at all, whereas young people certainly are.