by Soupdragon » 21 Jan 2017, 09:35
gullpower wrote: 21 Jan 2017, 08:27
The Save Plainmoor petition has now ended with 176 signatories. It will be presented at the Policy Development and Decision Group (Joint Operations Team) meeting on 6th Feb where the lease of Plainmoor is due to be discussed.
In the meantime I am confused as statements regarding GI, the Council and the Plainmoor lease seem to conflict.
On the one hand the notes from the TUST meeting with the Council on 17th Jan state:
“The Council has not met GI since the takeover and has not received any specific proposals about either Plainmoor or other potential relocation sites. The Council has met previous club owners and other third parties (including GI earlier last year).”
Whereas at the end of the Club Statement released yesterday it states:
“The Board of Directors has been engaged in discussions with Torbay Council regarding various matters relating to the Club, and sporting and leisure facilities in Torbay.
These include the potential purchase of the freehold interest in the Plainmoor Ground, and the discussions are ongoing.”
I noted that, too, gp. I guess it's because the council officers that Messrs Goulbourne etc met with don't actually know for certain who the elected members have been meeting with. TUST's note state that 'the council' (and we don't know whether the officers refer to themselves as that, to the elected members as that, or to a combination of the two. I suspect it's the first) has not met with GI since the takeover. The officers simply cannot know what the elected members are doing all the time. Plus, given the schisms in the local Tory party, it wouldn't surprise me at all if the anti-Oliver brigade has not sought to get involved with GI on the side.
It may also be that GI is prepared to play the long game and wait two years for the system at the town hall to change: there will then be a 'leader of the council' elected from among the majority party and we will go back to decisions being made in secret with no one for us to hold to account.
Still, the fact remains: it's currently a mayoral decision, and the mayor has already indicated that his decision will be made at a meeting held in public (eg: the PDDG on 6 Feb). If the mayor's decision is to send it to full council, then we need to make certain we have enough councillors for a simple majority. We can count on all the Lib Dems, as well as Julien Parrott of UKIP. What we need now is for people to contact their own ward councillors (mine are already covered by those voting to keep TUFC as a tenant of the council) and get a definitive answer from them and publish them here, in public, so they can be held to account. Remember, most of these Tories will want to be re-elected in just two years.
We have nine votes confirmed, and there are 37 up for grabs, including the mayor (although the chairman, a Tory, Hill, often votes twice if the vote is tied) so we need at least ten more Tories.
Ideally, though, we should aim for the mayor to make the right decision on 6 February, so we should also continue to write to him (and to Kevin Mowatt who is preparing the paper for the 6 Feb meeting) setting out a clear case for TUFC remaining as a tenant of the council.
Of course, even if the mayor makes the 'right' decision on 6 February, there's always the change of governance in 2017 for GI to try again. It won't end here, people.
[quote=gullpower post_id=199583 time=1484987278 user_id=23672]
The Save Plainmoor petition has now ended with 176 signatories. It will be presented at the Policy Development and Decision Group (Joint Operations Team) meeting on 6th Feb where the lease of Plainmoor is due to be discussed.
In the meantime I am confused as statements regarding GI, the Council and the Plainmoor lease seem to conflict.
On the one hand the notes from the TUST meeting with the Council on 17th Jan state:
“The Council has not met GI since the takeover and has not received any specific proposals about either Plainmoor or other potential relocation sites. The Council has met previous club owners and other third parties (including GI earlier last year).”
Whereas at the end of the Club Statement released yesterday it states:
“The Board of Directors has been engaged in discussions with Torbay Council regarding various matters relating to the Club, and sporting and leisure facilities in Torbay.[b] These include the potential purchase of the freehold interest in the Plainmoor Ground[/b], and the discussions are ongoing.”
[/quote]
I noted that, too, gp. I guess it's because the council officers that Messrs Goulbourne etc met with don't actually know for certain who the elected members have been meeting with. TUST's note state that 'the council' (and we don't know whether the officers refer to themselves as that, to the elected members as that, or to a combination of the two. I suspect it's the first) has not met with GI since the takeover. The officers simply cannot know what the elected members are doing all the time. Plus, given the schisms in the local Tory party, it wouldn't surprise me at all if the anti-Oliver brigade has not sought to get involved with GI on the side.
It may also be that GI is prepared to play the long game and wait two years for the system at the town hall to change: there will then be a 'leader of the council' elected from among the majority party and we will go back to decisions being made in secret with no one for us to hold to account.
Still, the fact remains: it's currently a mayoral decision, and the mayor has already indicated that his decision will be made at a meeting held in public (eg: the PDDG on 6 Feb). If the mayor's decision is to send it to full council, then we need to make certain we have enough councillors for a simple majority. We can count on all the Lib Dems, as well as Julien Parrott of UKIP. What we need now is for people to contact their own ward councillors (mine are already covered by those voting to keep TUFC as a tenant of the council) and get a definitive answer from them and publish them here, in public, so they can be held to account. Remember, most of these Tories will want to be re-elected in just two years.
We have nine votes confirmed, and there are 37 up for grabs, including the mayor (although the chairman, a Tory, Hill, often votes twice if the vote is tied) so we need at least ten more Tories.
Ideally, though, we should aim for the mayor to make the right decision on 6 February, so we should also continue to write to him (and to Kevin Mowatt who is preparing the paper for the 6 Feb meeting) setting out a clear case for TUFC remaining as a tenant of the council.
Of course, even if the mayor makes the 'right' decision on 6 February, there's always the change of governance in 2017 for GI to try again. It won't end here, people.
