Why Redbridge Council should investigate if maladministration has taken place involving the use of the Labour Whip

 The Council are refusing to investigate whether Cllr Emmott has been involved with planning to the degree that maladministration has occurred. I go into detail as to why an investigation should take place in an email sent to the Council CE and another senior officer. If no agreement by the Council to commence an investigation is provided within two weeks today I will seek the opinion of the Local Government Ombudsman on the issue. It relates to the Tesco campaign as my view is the campaign should oppose the whip to sit on the application for the reasons set out below. 

Dear Both

Thank you for your reply. The grounds for the Council to investigate if maladministration has taken place involving the Labour Whip and planning are obvious. I quote from Probity in planning for councillors and officers dated 2013.

 

“Planning decisions cannot be made on a party political basis in response to

lobbying; the use of political whips to seek to influence the outcome of a planning application is likely to be regarded as maladministration.”

 

So it seems a clear breach for Cllr Emmott of probity (who appears to be

Labour Whip) to have been involved with planning in the past continually sits on planning as a last minute substitute (assuming Roy is Chief Whip). The Emmott report implies this breach was remedied at page 17.

 

“Councillor Choudhury told me that as a result of his complaint and Cllr Jones’ concerns regarding the procedure for arranging substitutes the Labour group policy has changed; the Chief Whip now has no involvement in arranging substitutes on ANY committees and it is up to the individual member to find a substitute and inform the Chair of the Committee of the arrangement.”

However, so far you have refused my request an investigation to take place

into whether Redbridge Labour Cllrs have been involved in maladministration. Despite me sending you evidence suggesting Cllr Emmott

(who may be the Labour whip, at time of writing the name of the Labour whip is not known to the public) attends planning pre-meetings.

So I draw your attention to the following comments published in the draft Emmott report which were published in the Recorder.

“Cllr Jones did...recount a meeting between himself, Cllr Athwal and Cllr Emmett on October 21, 2016, at which he was instructed to become more assertive as chair of the regulatory committee.

“Cllr Jones alleged that he was also told that the Labour leadership wanted him to start voting on all applications (previously he had only used his vote when required). “Cllr Jones said that he was told in no uncertain terms that if he did not start leading from the front he would lose his position as chair. “Cllr Jones said that he was also instructed to start providing the leadership direct feedback after meetings, which was not the norm and made him feel uncomfortable.” END OF QUOTE

So on the face of these comments in the press and which have not been disputed, Cllr Athwal was and maybe still has some degree of control of the planning committee. The extent of any such control needs to be determined by an investigation that this Council should conduct.”

For the avoidance of any doubt, I am not saying maladministration has taken place, merely that there is enough evidence for Redbridge Council to be duty bound to commence an investigation.

I also draw your attention to Cllr Athwal's reported comments at a meeting in January 2019 per the link http://conciliocomms.com/news-and-opinion/leader-of-redbridge-council-briefs-property-industry-at-breakfast-organised-by-concilio/

"Cllr Athwal was keen to emphasise that the borough wants quality designs. With this, and the other provisions met, the Council will look favourably upon new developments."

This should apparent commitment to developers to look favourably into applications when read in conjunction with Cllr Jones comments in the Emmott report bolded below must be a cause of concern. For the avoidance of doubt, I am not saying Cllr Athwal has instructed Cllr Emmott to remove Cllrs and choose substitutes to vote the way the Leader wants to ensure his possible commitment to favours for developers. I am saying that this whether this possible prior selection of Cllrs to vote in certain ways has happened and is happening requires investigation.

Councillor Jones said that after Councillor Emmett became Chief Whip the policy changed: “I can’t recall exactly when the policy changed, but it was decided that the Chief Whip would be responsible for finding substitutes. I have been chairing Planning Committee meetings for a long time and initially in principle, I didn’t have a problem with this change. I remember a thread of emails regarding whose responsibility it was to arrange substitutes and I was happy to allow Councillor Emmett to deal with it. It became a cause for concern when members were giving their apologies and not attending meetings for applications that were controversial in their own ward and yet they would publicly attend other events on the same evening. The motivation for this could be a mixture of two things; deliberately substituting people from the planning committee to protect them from emotive controversial applications within their own ward or carefully choosing councillors who you think will be most inclined to vote the way you want them to.”

I request you provide me with a transcript of this 2019 speech, and along with the transcript of a speech made to businesses at the Shard in 2017 and the guest list at this event. I have put on a freedom of information request for these in case you do not agree to my request.

Who the Labour Whip is has not been revealed it must be the duty of the Council to find out who the whip is now. If Cllr Emmott is has been the Whip then there is the real possibility of maladministration which needs to be investigated.

Labour Cllrs are likely to aware that the Leader that the Leader looks upon development “favourably” if Cllr Emmottt is a the Chef whip and expresses his opinion about how he is voting at a pre-meeting before an application is heard it is likely to sway members.

Especially when Labour has a panel system where if Cllrs are taken off it they will no longer be eligible to stand as Labour Candidates.

I understand Coronavirus is putting a tremendous strain on your resources, however, planning decisions are still being made. And so in view of Coronavirus I will offer a two week deadline from today at 5pm on the 6^th November 2020 for you to reconsider your decision. Should I not hear back form you after 6^th November I will write to the Ombudsman.

Regards

Andy