Report on County Council Matters to North Nibley Parish Council

13^th May 2019

I regret I must give my apologies for this meeting as I have a choice of four parish council meetings to attend on this evening of which two are also annual parish meetings!

County Council by-election

As reported to your Annual Parish Assembly, there was a vacancy caused by the untimely death of a young Lib Dem councillor representing Churchdown. The by-election was held on 2^nd May and the seat was retained by a Liberal Democrat.

Highways Development Management

County councillors have been concerned over the lack of county highways staff attending district council planning meetings through a shortage of staff and difficulty in recruiting new members.

At March’s Environment and Communities Scrutiny Committee we were told the issue of recruiting suitable officers with sufficient experience and expertise to fulfil the more senior roles was continuing and that it was intended to increase the salary offered for these roles to a comparable market rate to other local authorities. This could of course explain the current difficulty!

Fire and Rescue Service

On 8^th April the County Council responded to the Home Secretary on the Police and Crime Commissioner’s takeover bid for the service, pointing out that it would impact on public safety, reduce the level of funding available to the service, minimise public scrutiny of decisions and jeopardise the partnership between the service and the NHS, which currently helps protect some of the most vulnerable people in Gloucestershire

John Cordwell

(GDPR health warning:) If you no longer wish to receive this report please let me know.