From our Town Hall Rich List you’ll find a number of councils who didn’t comply fully with the Freedom of Information requests we sent them. You’ll see from the report here that on pages 135-137 we’ve listed the councils who obstructed our requests or just flatly refused to give the information plenty of other councils revealed. These councils don’t seem to realise that our Freedom of Information requests aren’t optional, they are a formal request for information under the Freedom of Information Act that they are legally obliged to answer.
Needless to say, we’ll be pursuing each of these cases formally, but we also intend to harness people power to get this rump of secretive authorities to reveal the facts about how taxpayers’ money is spent. You can find below a list of all the councils with the council leader’s (or directly elected Mayor) contact details. Email them to ask them to become more transparent and stop hiding from us information we have a legal and moral (seeing as we pay their wages) right to know. We’ve already had evidence today that this approach does work – the Leader of Torridge council was shocked by the fact we named and shamed his authority as one of those which had been opaque, and as a result he has got in touch and promised to investigate and release the information. He seems to share the TPA’s belief in transparency (and indeed he has frozen council tax this year) but his council’s officers have decided to be untransparent – perhaps there are others on this list in a similar situation, and your email can persuade them to intervene and make their authority more transparent. Even if some of these council leaders don’t believe in transparent public spending, your email will put them on the spot and remind them that they have a duty to answer to taxpayers.
Here are their contact details:
Bath and North East Somerset – Cllr Francine Haeberling ([email protected])
Bromley – Cllr Stephen Carr ([email protected])
Broxbourne – Cllr Ken Ayling ([email protected])
Camden – Cllr Keith Moffitt ([email protected])
Chelmsford – Cllr Roy Whitehead ([email protected])
Chester – Contact the leader of Cheshire West and Chester Cllr Mike Jones ([email protected])
Chester-le-Street – Contact the leader of Durham County Council Cllr Simon Henig ([email protected])
Enfield – Cllr Michael Rye ([email protected])
Essex – Cllr Lord Hanningfield ([email protected])
Hampshire – Cllr Ken Thornber ([email protected])
Kettering – Cllr James Hakewill ([email protected])
Lewisham – Mayor Sir Steve Bullock ([email protected])
Liverpool – Cllr Warren Bradley ([email protected])
Richmondshire – Cllr Melva Steckles ([email protected])
Runnymede - Cllr John Furey ([email protected])
Shepway – Cllr Robert Bliss (http://www.shepway.gov.uk/webapp/eforms/contact-us.php?to=robert.bliss&subject=Email-via-web-site&intro=contacting-Cllr-Bliss.)
Southwark – Cllr Nick Stanton ([email protected])
Sunderland – Cllr Paul Watson ([email protected])
Thanet – Cllr Sandy Ezekiel ([email protected])
The Vale of Glamorgan – Cllr Gordon Kemp ([email protected])
Torridge – Council leader is now ordering full disclosure
Wansbeck – Contact the leader of Northumberland Council Cllr Jeff Reid ([email protected])
Worcestershire – Cllr Dr. George Lord ([email protected])