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| Councillor Alan Weeks - unwilling to be silenced |
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Liberal Democrat Totton North County Councillor Alan Weeks, is complaining about attempts to stop proper consultation on the Conservative run County Council plans to close Stocklands Residential Care Home in Calmore, with Council officers even censoring the mail going to the Home's residents.
A letter sent to residents of the Care Home by Cllr. Weeks urged them to send their views on the closure proposal to Cllr. Mrs Banks, the Conservative Executive member who will make the final decision. Letters were in sealed envelopes and individually addressed to each resident.
Within the letter he also made it clear that he objected to the closure and that he considered that it was because the Conservatives in control of the County Council have made a mess of the Adult Social Care budget and are looking for ways to save money.
Subsequently, the Head of Legal Services at the County Council has raised objections to Cllr. Weeks' letter claiming that it was political and should not have been on County headed notepaper nor distributed to the Home's residents by the staff. It was also made clear that once County staff were aware of the letters contents they didn't continue to deliver them to all addressed residents.
Cllr. Weeks says "I think it is entirely reasonable for somebody to arrive at a residential care home where rooms are not individually numbered and have no letter boxes and hand deliver a sealed individually addressed letter to a member of staff to give to a resident."
"As not all the letters were delivered once the contents were known this is clearly censoring. I have even offered to visit Stocklands myself and complete the task.
"I have also asked officers to explain the difference between making a political statement on paper headed with the HCC logo and one made on an email from an HCC email address or for that matter, one made verbally whilst wearing an HCC name badge.
"As the local County Councillor for Stocklands, I believe I have the right to communicate with the residents who are after all, my constituents.
"It seems that the County Council's consultation exercise on the proposed closure only allows consultation by the Tory administration, with no opportunity for the resident's views to be heard."
Cllr. Adrian Collett, Leader of the Liberal Democrat County Council Group says "The implications for free speech and democratic accountability appear to be very grave indeed.
"The Liberal Democrats cannot accept that sealed, personally addressed, mail is not delivered to the recipients. We cannot accept that Councillors can be censored in what they say to their constituents in this way and we cannot accept that only Conservative majority party views can be put on paper which includes the County logo."
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