What's news?

I had an interesting conversation yesterday with a local journalist. This arose from a press release I'd issued about my support for NSPCC's campaign to highlight child protection issues. It is a topical issue locally because, following a highly critical Ofsted report, Cornwall Council has an independently chaired Improvement Board reviewing and overseeing the service changes that are needed.

For personal reasons, the former portfolio holder Cllr Sally Bain resigned and has not yet been replaced.

While the Tories and Liberal Democrats argue about the minutiae of the Council business plan, balance sheets, and costs of the unitary authority, they hurl in fleeting references to 'failing services' as though these are just part of the everyday Council furniture - about which the only argument is how much it cost - or, like the weather, are something the Council has no control over.

I know I'm not the only person wondering when Councillors will start showing more concern for people and services. And when a new portfolio holder will be appointed. There are plenty of people in Cornwall who care whether our child protection services are working. The journalist asked me why a press release about this - and my positive support for the NSPCC's child protection campaign - was news. I said that I wanted to highlight the issue because it is one I know people are concerned about, and there has been little communication about when a new portfolio holder will be appointed.

Recently, Cornwall Council was found to have acted unlawfully in its approach to assessing some adult social care needs and charges. Today, I read this comment on serious case reviews by Cllr Chris Ridgers. Which to me reinforces the point that services for people are more important - and newsworthy - than political ping-pong and mudslinging that fails to say what practical impact the Council's recent financial decisions will have on people's lives.

Cornwall's democratic conundrum - you decide

The move to a new unitary authority had some vocal critics. The Liberal Democrats tried to counter these partly by suggesting it might lead to devolution of more powers to Cornwall. I would welcome that.

Enter the new chief executive, Kevin Lavery, who in January this year warned members that the former Cornwall County Council was on the brink of Government intervention. Calls for the then Liberal Democrat leader to resign were faced down.

This is Cornwall's democratic conundrum - would our elected representatives rather make decisions locally, with the accountability that brings? Or carry on collecting their allowances, while blaming 'Whitehall bureaucrats' and the 'London Parties' for local service decisions it is within the Council's powers to make.

Take three issues:
(1) Waste management - there will now be a completely unecessary, costly public enquiry to inform a decision which will be made by the Secretary of State. This stems from the failure of the Liberal Democrats to develop and implement a locally workable approach when they were elected in 2005.
(2)  Children's services - given the child protection concerns uncovered by Ofsted, I welcome the creation of the improvement Board overseen by Children's Minister Dawn Primarolo MP, but it should never have reached this point. The new Board was reported in a local newspaper on Thursday 12 November, and by the BBC twelve days later (yesterday). It is strange but true that a member of the children's scrutiny committee is now twittering in the blogosphere that nobody told him - he heard it first on BBC news this morning.
(3) Transfer of upper-GI cancer services to Derriford. Enter the not-so-independent Tory Chair of the Council's NHS and Adult Care scrutiny committee, who has called a special meeting and appears to be trying to steer the local service decision onto the Secretary of State.

People in Cornwall deserve better.