CABINET MEETINGS

Derby City Council’s controversial cabinet of councillors – known as the gang of eight – has reversed its decision to meet in secret. Council leader Robert Jones has backed down over holding monthly cabinet meetings of eight top councillors in secret after pressure from the Derby Evening Telegraph. In future the meetings will be open to the public. The move came after Derby North MP Bob Laxton - a former city council leader - told the Telegraph he favoured an open cabinet system.

His views were backed by South Derbyshire MP Mark Todd and the Local Government Information Unit. In November, Mr Jones said Liberal Democrat calls for open cabinet meetings were "arrant nonsense". He told a policy committee meeting, "To prove that we do not have anything to hide, the executive will meet in public and will continue to do so." Earlier he said, "I think there is an anomaly in the fact that we are members of the Local Government Information Unit which is pressing for amendments to the Local Government Bill and I do not want to be publicly at odds with the Member of Parliament for Derby North and ex-leader of the city council."

Mr Laxton and Mr Todd have backed a Parliamentary motion by Labour MP Mark Fisher to change new Government legislation to give members of the public more access to council information. The Evening Telegraph has been calling for more openness since October. But Labour councillors have labelled its coverage "distorted, emotive and destructive" and "a load of bunkum". The paper was compared to Nazi propaganda minister Josef Goebbels.

The paper gave a page over to a head-to-head of the opposing views of Evening Telegraph Editor Keith Perch and council deputy chief executive Michael Foote. Mr Perch compared council leader Robert Jones to an embattled King Canute who had stood for four months fighting the waves of opposition to increasing secrecy at the Council House. He gave credit to the leader for having the courage to admit he got it wrong.

But he warned that there was still much to be wary of in the change to cabinet rule. "With more and more decisions being taken in private chats between cabinet members and council officers, an information protocol should be set up with one simple message - 'Release the information unless there is a very good reason not to'. The fact that a document is embarrassing to the council should not be a good enough reason to suppress it," said Mr Perch.

Derby City Council changed the way it is run in anticipation of the Local Government Bill, due to become law next year, in November. It scrapped the all-party committees which voted in public on schools, social services, highways, leisure, parks, libraries, refuse, economic development, adult education and youth services. They were replaced by a cabinet of eight Labour councillors meeting with top officers in secret every month and making recommendations to two committees which meet in public, but are likely to be scrapped next year.

Matters go to full council for final approval, but decisions on a range of issues including funding for schools, sales of council homes and increasing charges for leisure are taken in secret by officers and cabinet members. Backbench councillors sit on investigatory committees which meet in public and examine the council’s services. The Local Government Information Unit warned of the Local Government Bill - "Vital decisions about education, housing social services, the closure of facilities or the contracting out of services may be taken in far greater secrecy than at present."