Minority councillors were critical of Labour’s decision to fill every one of Greenwich Council’s committee chairs with its own members
Minority Greenwich councillors called for “common sense” after all of the council’s 22 committee chairs were handed to Labour members. The Labour majority argued at the annual meeting of Greenwich Council on May 27 that minority members could still participate on all committees and that the majority of Greenwich residents had voted for Labour to keep leading the borough.
Annual meetings of councils are typically more ceremonial affairs in which the mayor for the upcoming year is elected and the leader’s cabinet is decided. However, when it came to deciding the membership of Greenwich Council’s various committees for the upcoming year, Greenwich’s minority parties were vocal in their discontent.
The Labour-controlled council moved to have all of its 22 committees chaired by Labour council members. Opposition Green Party leader Tamasin Rhymes proposed an amendment —which was seconded by Conservative leader Matt Hartley—that sought four Green and two Conservative committee chairs.
Cllr Rhymes said: “We note the attempt to create balance across the council and that’s very much welcomed, but we do feel that it’s necessary to look at balance in the scrutiny panel chairs. The move across London, across councils of all varieties, is to appoint opposition chairs to the scrutiny panels in proportion so that that scrutiny function can be carried out across council business.”
Following this month’s election, Greenwich Council is made up of 35 Labour councillors (63.64 per cent), 13 Green councillors (23.64 per cent), six Conservative councillors (10.91 per cent) and one Reform councillor (1.82 per cent).
After the amendment failed, council leader Anthony Okereke said he was “surprised” it was proposed in the first place. He said: “Whilst I hear the points that the opposition have made, every single member of this council will sit on a scrutiny panel and have the opportunity to visit any scrutiny panel and participate.”
Cllr Okereke said the Labour group could have given a panel chair to another party as a “gift” but they decided not to because they were the party that had won the majority at the election.
He added: “The majority of residents in the Royal Borough of Greenwich voted for us to make Greenwich the place to be, and over the next four years that is exactly what we will be committed to doing, either be it serving in scrutiny roles, be it serving in the executive, be it serving at any function of this council, and I welcome everyone to participate in that process.
“The challenge of change in Greenwich and the challenge of change in the council doesn’t exist by only occupying the role of a chair. Every single member will have the opportunity to shape the scrutiny agenda and participate in that process in holding the executive accountable.”
Cllr Stewart Christie, the newly elected deputy Green leader for Plumstead Common ward, proposed an amendment from the floor calling for another Green member to be appointed to the council’s Overview and Scrutiny Committee for the sake of “political balance”.
On the nine-seat committee there are seven Labour members and then one member each from the Conservatives and Greens. The Greens make up nearly one quarter of the council’s total seats.
In response to Cllr Christie’s request, Cllr Jackie Smith, a member of the Labour executive, said the panel membership numbers were “very clear” and asked why the majority group would choose to fill a scrutiny panel chair with a minority member.
She said: “I can’t remember ever either Bromley Council nor Bexley Council allowing opposition members to take up positions in scrutiny panel chairs ever, ever since I’ve been active in politics, which has been a very long time.
“So we will oppose this motion, as you obviously expect us to do. And it’s not because we’re anti-democratic, it’s because we are following the advice of the monitoring officer, something that we believe that we need to do.”
Conservative group leader Matt Hartley said he had been “on the lookout for signs of a change in approach from this administration” ever since Labour’s vote share in Greenwich fell from 57.9 per cent to 32.6 per cent, but he said the Labour majority was not “listening” to the implications of the election result.
Cllr Hartley claimed that only one in four local authorities had only majority members as panel chairs. He said: “There aren’t just Labour voices in this borough. There are Green voices, there are Conservative voices and there are other voices as well.
“What we’re asking is for that common sense, reasonable, practical change to be made, as so many of the councils have, to make sure that there is proportionality in sharing the work of those panels.”
Cllr Hartley then asked the council leader to meet with him and Green leader Cllr Rhymes to discuss the matter further. After Cllr Christie’s amendment failed, Cllr Okereke said the Overview and Scrutiny Committee had been increased to nine members to “ensure functional balance given the role of scrutiny panel chairs”.
He said: “There is nothing that withholds anyone attending the overview and screening committee and participating in the debates. So this point about we need to chair, well, all of us are gonna be shaping the agenda on scrutiny, all us participating, all of attending, and I know previously, members who were not councillors before did attend these committees.”
Cllr Okereke also said he was happy to meet with Cllr Hartley and Cllr Rhymes if they wanted to further discuss panel membership and proportionality. The agenda item that set out the recommendations to have all committee chairs be Labour councillors was approved by the Labour majority.
Later on, Cllr Hartley was critical of the council for removing a June full council meeting from the calendar. He said this removed “the first opportunity that councillors have to discuss local issues in this borough” and accused the Labour administration of restricting democracy, referencing constitutional changes made by the council in March.
Cllr Okereke said the June meeting removal was “justified” because of mandatory children’s and legal training for new councillors that same week, as well as an Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting that was also mandatory. He said another meeting had been added in September to make up for the loss.
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