So, as an update to Liar, Liar, Townhall on fire (pt3), let me remind my one dear reader of where we were in the tumultuous turn of events of the first and second weeks of March [what feels like half a lifetime ago]. Jonathan Edwards (Plaid Cymru) had paid a gravely worrying visit to my office, which forced forward my business's orderly contingency plan into a scrabble to "get out of Dodge". Amidst that:
- On 9 March 2020 Ammanford Town Clerk (Duncan S Morgan) told the whole of the Council (including Members of the Public present - myself included) that all the "not so nice letters" from the ICO had been dealt with in February.
- On 13 March 2020 the Lead Case Officer at the ICO confirmed that she'd spoken with the Clerk on 9 March 2020 as they'd received information from the Council. She firmly explained that the information must be provided to the Requester and should have been provided via WhatDoTheyKnow - as it was an electronic request and Public Bodies must adhere to the "form & format" guidance.
- On 14 March 2020 I blogged about doubling down on the lies (pt3) and scheduled to publish on the 15 March 2020, outraged by the lies.
Monday 16th March 2020 was a bit of blur, trying to balance/close off the books for the year, accelerating the miserable task of stripping out the office, triple-checking every process could be carried out by at least four of us (in case one of us were incapacitated or didn't survive the sweeping pandemic) not to mention follow-up with new business opportunities from our (expensive) investment at a recent shadow-of-itself world-leading international tradeshow. So busy that I didn't hear the letter flap spring shut sometime that afternoon; I'd checked the mail at lunchtime (due to Royal Mail cutbacks/changes our delivery is invariably in the afternoon). But lo and behold I had a letter! Here's the envelope:
Note the franked stamp from the Sorting Office says "13/03/2020 20:04:35", confirming it wasn't posted until Friday - and clearly not in February.
Let's move on and take a poke at the letter:
- but that wasn't in February!
- conflicts with the report given the same-day at Council some hours before/after
- conflicts with the Draft Minutes (6.3 ICO letter of 18 Feb 2020)
Next, note that the reference says "Public Services Ombudsman for Wales Complaint" when this complaint was lodged with the Information Commissioner's Office - who'd already issued a Decision Notice against the Council, demanding a rapid resolution.
Might 'Compliant [sic] Reference FS50954938' be correct? Nope, it was/is FS50904938.
And then we turn to the guts of the letter, with good news and bad. Firstly the good news, the Council was able to find the dates of correspondence for Agenda points 6.5-6.8. Hurrah! In a well functioning Council it would seem that they'd be on-top of correspondence requiring a response that was sent in the two weeks immediately before summonsing Councillors to attend.
The bad news is quite sad. 6.1, 6.2, 6.3 & 6.4 were all missing, and the extensive search appears to have consumed a very non-PC "three man day hours per person" between the Clerk and Mayor. So was that six person days? Six person hours? Three man days and three woman hours or even some combination thereof? What's even more perplexing is: how was the new Clerk able to prepare the Agenda for 9 December 2019 without sight of the very same letters he (assisted by a she) has been unable to find since 19 December 2019?
Had the Council published the (redacted) letters, as required by Welsh law with the Agenda, then there'd have been no hunting; and no FOI request to begin with, then no escalation, no ICO resources consumed, and certainly no Decision Notice ordering it to comply within 35 calendar days.
Sadly there's really, really bad news to follow, as if the new Clerk had just asked I'd have been happy to help furnish him with copies of the letter referenced in 6.1, which was written and hand-delivered on 28 August 2019, 6.2 on 16 August 2019 and 6.3 also on 16 August 2019. Agenda point 6.4 was the persistent issue of the never-worked-properly £17K CCTV system. That stemmed from an FOI request of 11 March 2019 with the correspondence likely directly from the Information Commissioner's Office about 14 October 2019 (all in electronic form, with possible physical chasers).
It is apparent that the Clerk & Mayor of the Council have intentionally tried to keep their response from public view by posting a letter which was not delivered until 16 March 2020, in the hope that their tardiness, and direct disregard of the ICO's instructions, would not face scrutiny.
The quality of the response is shocking. Amateurish, inaccurate, confusing and self-conflicting. I'd be too ashamed to sign my name at the bottom of such a letter.
Circling-back, why did it take nearly four months for the Council to look at correspondence clearly marked as requiring a response? In extremis, the Council's own complaints policy requires it to formally acknowledge issues within five working days, resolving most in twenty working days and promising regular updates if protracted. Fifteen Councillors should have had their finger on the pulse of operations, stepped up to support interim/part-time efforts and latterly ensured their handsomely rewarded wonderboy could spell, count and discern between Regulator and Ombudsman. The reality was most Councillors were too busy playing party politics and ego-jousting.
Here's the Hopeful conclusion to that Ratified complaints policy:
If the Council really wants to learn then the elected and appointed Councillors need to step-up, require the Council's Clerk to put together a coherent Agenda with precision, publish necessary documents and follow-up meetings swiftly by promulgating Draft Minutes. Act transparently and keep short accounts! None of this is rocket science, just basic statutory duties.