NEWS
Brent Lib Dems accuse council of “rifling
through rubbish”
Liberal Democrat councillors have expressed outrage at a plan by Brent’s Labour Council to rifle through residents’ rubbish with almost no prior notice.
The council have decided to siphon off residents’ rubbish, possibly containing personal information, from Monday, 4th October for a period of 2 weeks. Instead of disposing of it in the usual, expected way, they will be diverting both household waste and recycling rubbish to a separate unit in order to sift through what people are throwing away.
This latest revelation comes in the wake of the already scandalous news that the Council intends to scrap weekly bin collections – while trying not to let anyone know this from the deliberately uninformative “consultation” on the issue.
Residents are now being told they can “opt out” of having their waste rifled through by contacting the council. But news of the plans was kept secret until just days before the scheme was due to go ahead – meaning that by the time residents have heard about it, Labour will almost certainly have already gone ahead and done it.
Liberal Democrat environment spokesperson, Councillor Daniel Brown said:
“I have come to expect the worst from Brent’s Labour Council. But to announce on a Friday that they will be rifling through people’s rubbish from the following Monday really is quite unbelievable.”
“Labour must explain how on earth they think residents can opt out of a scheme they haven’t been told about beforehand. This has all the hallmarks of the Big Brother approach the Liberal Democrats in government are trying to end.”
8 pse
L More than sixty councils open
books to armchair auditors
ocal authorities that don’t put their spending detail online are
denying the public the right to hold their council to account, secretary of state for local government Eric Pickles has said.
All councils and Fire and Rescue Authorities are expected to publish details of all spending over £500 in full online by January. With just 64 working days till the start of the New Year the clock is ticking for councils to open their files so the public can see where their money is being spent.
As part of meeting the transparency target Mr Pickles has welcomed new guidance from the Local Government Association detailing best practice for putting council spending and senior salary information online.
They stress the importance of ensuring that the data is clear, comprehensible, machine readable, licensed to encourage reuse and so local people know it’s available.
Mr Pickles’ own department continues to lead the way. It has published all its spending data online for 2008-09 and for the first quarter of 2010-11.
Mr Pickles said: “I’ve called for a new era of transparency where all councils publish their spending over £500 online.
I commend those councils that have been brave enough to face public scrutiny so far. There are now only sixty or so working days for those lagging behind to catch up.
“This isn’t another central government box-ticking exercise. The public have a right to see
how their council tax is being spent so they know they are getting value for money and the best possible frontline services.
“I want to see an army of ‘armchair auditors’ pore over the information and hold their council to account if things are not done right.
“That means the data also has to be easily accessible: today advice has been published that will help councils yet to comply. There are hundreds of computer whizzes who’ll find creative new ways to make that raw data relevant to local life.”
Central government resources to assist citizens wanting to access national and local data for free re-use include the website
data.gov.uk. The CLG datasets published this week are available on this website.
Other websites like OpenlyLocal are also making it easier to access data and to interrogate or compare the published information.
Some councils have also found innovative ways of using their spending data. For example, Redbridge Council has created a truly innovative budgeting tool called You Choose which lets the public try to balance the council’s budget themselves.
This gives them a say on where every public penny goes in their area. It has been so successful that the Local Government Association has decided to sponsor it and make it available to all councils.
Professor Nigel Shadbolt of Southampton University, a member of the Public Sector Transparency Board said:
“The publication of all spends Sep/Oct 10
by local authorities over £500 is hugely important. Authorities spend millions and millions of pounds in our name, so why shouldn’t we know how that money is spent?
“It will be useful in a whole range of ways. We are going to be able to see what the pattern of spend is, what particular contractors are used and whether it represents value for money.
“Once it’s published councils can have a discourse with the citizen to find out how they want their money to be spent and where they would want to save.
“This is another important step in the drive for open data and transparency at all levels and across all of government.”
Chris Taggart, creator of
openlylocal.com added: “This is about a conversation with the people. Publishing information - which belongs to the public after all - allows them to look at local spending and say: wait a minute you could be saving money there.
“There are all sorts of benefits to be gained from understanding the data and using the skills of the community to understand it. Councils themselves can benchmark their data and spending against other councils.
“People can build applications which will allow everyone to ask questions and join the conversation.”
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