How Desperate Can You Get?

An interesting little farce was played out at Monday night's Manorbier Community Council meeting whose main objective seemed to have been a desperate attempt to hamper the working of the Council. One wonders who might be behind this latest effort to obstruct normal council business. Whoever they are, they have now become desperate enough to involve members of the public in their destructive little games.

The only item on the agenda was discussion of the impending court case being brought by ICT Marketing.

Because of the confidential nature of the discussion the Council passed a resolution to exclude members of the public. The reason that the Council voted to exclude the public was to avoid putting any information into the public domain that would be of assistance to ICT in their case against the Council. It seems only sensible not to give your opponent ammunition to use against you and the Council's decision to exclude the public was a perfectly legal one. The Chairman also reported that ICT had obtained information from the website run by Clr Calver that they intended using in the court case.

The only two members of the public present at the meeting were Mr & Mrs Tew.

When the Chairman asked members of the public to leave, Mr Tew left the meeting but Mrs Tew decided she was not going to acceed to the Council's lawful decision and remained seated.

It is worth noting at this stage that Mr Tew left the meeting without bothering to ask his wife why she was staying. This leads us to ask the question, could Mrs Tew's refusal to leave have been pre-arranged attempt to disrupt council business and who, besides Mrs Tew, was involved in planning this little event?

When asked by the Chairman, Mrs Tew declined to give any reason for her refusal to leave.

The Chairman then told Mrs Tew that he had no alternative but to call the police. Mrs Tew still refused to leave.

When the police arrived the Chairman explain the situation. The police officer then requested that the Council adjourn the meeting and councillors leave the hall so that he could talk to Mrs Tew in private.

Councillors reluctantly agreed to leave and as they got up to go grins were exchanged between Mrs Tew and Clr Calver who, incidentally, was the only councillor to refuse the police request and who remained in the hall while the police officer questioned Mrs Tew.

Eventually Mrs Tew agreed to leave and the police officer then explained to members of the Council that Mrs Tew had refused to leave, when the resolution to exclude the public was passed, because she thought it was wrong for the Council to conduct its discussions of the ICT court case in private.

Perhaps I could suggest that she asks her husband if she can borrow his copy of 'Local Council Administration' by Charles Arnold-Baker and look at chapter 7 para E where Arnold-Baker discusses when it is appropriate for councils to exclude the public and press. I quote "As a rule,however, it is desirable to treat the discussions of the following types of business as confidential:- .... (c) preparation of cases in legal proceedings".

I await Mrs Tew's reply, if any, with considerable interest.