Full Council Meetings are an opportunity for public questioning, debate and motions. Here Councillors and the public expect to get answers. Unfortunately we often seem to get lies and fobbed off. A recent answer about fly tipping said that cameras could be deployed to combat it, yet the council officer responsible had told me in the week previous that no such cameras exist in the council. Similarly questions about overflowing bins were answered by saying that nothing had changed and that everything was working fine. In the last twelve months however the whole system and schedule has been digitised and even new digital bins trialed and installed. Well that doesn’t sound like nothing to me but rather than admit teething problems, great expense or failure the answer was clear. No change here and no problem.
This however is just the tip of the iceberg. When a council votes by majority on a motion the public rightly expect that some action might result. At each of the last two Full Council Meetings however motions have been voted by majority and then filed under BIN by the cabinet. You see they are going trough the motions but very little democracy actually exists.