Councillor raises 28 concerns over council court case

Suffolk County Council’s scrutiny committee will be asked to examine 28 concerns raised by Councillor Martin Cook (pictured) over its legal challenge to Government <i>(Image: Simply C Photography)</i>
Suffolk County Council’s scrutiny committee will be asked to examine 28 concerns raised by Councillor Martin Cook (pictured) over its legal challenge to Government (Image: Simply C Photography)
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Suffolk County Council’s scrutiny committee will be asked to examine 28 concerns raised by Councillor Martin Cook over its legal challenge to Government plans to cut the county’s six councils to three.

Mr Cook alleges that council leader Michael Hadwen used delegated powers to approve the legal action on June 18, but the decision was not published until June 26, after another councillor requested it.

He said: "The Council has admitted it broke the law twice.

"That's the part it has answered. There are 28 questions about how one man decided to commit public money to a court case, and the Council wouldn't publish them. So I have.

"Tomorrow the Scrutiny Committee decides whether it wants the answers."

Cabinet agreed to continue the legal challenge at an extraordinary meeting on June 29.

Councillors were shown pre-action correspondence but, reportedly, not the legal claim itself.

Mr Cook referred 12 concerns to the scrutiny committee on June 29 and 16 more on September 22.

Endeavour House in IpswichThe scrutiny committee is due to meet at Endeavour House on Thursday. (Image: Newsquest)

The unanswered questions include what information the leader had, why the decision was not taken at a public cabinet meeting, how legal costs were approved and how challenges to the urgency declaration were handled.

Other concerns cover record-keeping, council communications and whether cabinet members properly considered a later report.

A September report confirmed the leader’s decision was not published as required and that a document request missed the deadline.

Cabinet decided to take no further action.

The scrutiny committee is due to meet at Endeavour House on Thursday.

Members will be asked to confirm the 28 matters, seek more documents and consider forming a cross-party group to investigate them.

A confidential monitoring officer’s report said the leader’s decision to start proceedings complied with council rules, while identifying two “relatively minor and inadvertent” breaches in providing information.

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