WTC: NO CONFIDENCE Time Again?

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[NB: This article is a lengthy, technical and highly-detailed examination of events behind the scenes at Whitby Town Council. It is rooted in carefully studied research into conduct which may have a profound effect, under North Yorkshire Council’s proposed “double devolution”, on what financial opportunities may become available to the town in terms of funding for services, maintenance and future development, going forward. Please read it with foresight and with care. You do need to know. Thank you: NW]

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Whitby Town Mayor Bob ‘The Nob’ DALRYMPLE would appear to be about to be having his feet held to the fire again. (In the argot of my youth, the expression “the nobs” referred to that class of people who, by birthright, considered themselves in some sense far above the hoi polloi; the rich, cultivated “ruling classes”. The privileged. I assume it is a truncation of “the nobles” – or those who would like to think they are).

The Enquirer has been provided with what is sometimes called a ‘leaked’ email trail, showing the inner chicaneries of some of the ‘old guard’ at Whitby Town Council, rumbled by a relatively new, diligent and deeply principled Councillor who is clearly too strong a character to accept bullying or intimidation.

Which is why I entertain no fears whatsoever of a defamation action (like the desperate and utterly futile attempt a year ago, on 30th October 2023, when the WTC Human Resources Committee misleadingly ‘instructed’ a London Solicitor to intimidate me with a SLAPP (the acronym for Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation – much frowned-upon by the Law Society)  – a ‘cease-and-desist’ letter (which held no validity whatsoever), over a rather childish misunderstanding. (Full story here).

As it turns out, the power of this most recent ‘leak’ has now been somewhat eclipsed by the Extraordinary Meeting of Whitby Town Council on Tuesday 26th November 2024 – an Agenda intended to include its potentially most important item of business since the beginning of Lockdown.

The scheduled formal Co-Option onto the Town Council of two townswomen (and it is difficult to find a townswoman who is an admirer of the Mayor – or of male intimidation of women generally) was to have been followed by a VOTE OF NO CONFIDENCE in Councillor DALRYMPLE, the present Chair of the Council – The Mayor. This Motion has been knocked back.

Incidentally, the would-be Co-Optees were both rejected (by 8:7), presumably because any fresh blood risks, in the minds of the stick-in-the-mud brigade, diluting their precious ‘power base’.

The facts of that story are recorded below.

It is the back-story that is so deeply disturbing.

The Back-Story

At the Annual Meeting of Full Council on 14th May 2024, despite (or perhaps because of) advice from (in my view – and many are now coming around to my way of thinking) the disastrous former-Clerk/RFO, Mr Michael Andrew KING, the Mayor, acting as Chair of the Council, unlawfully prohibited Councillor Jacqui LAYMAN (pictured below) from voting on a matter of vital importance to the town; i.e. what position should the Council adopt in relation to Approving or Objecting to the construction of the proposed Endeavour Wharf Maritime Training Hub (brain-child of the Whitby Town Deal Board, three of whose members sit on the Town Council).

With Councillor LAYMAN’s enforced exclusion, the vote carried 5:4 FOR the erection of the Hub. But the Mayor had allowed another Councillor to vote who, having failed to declare a disclosable interest in the Hub, nevertheless unlawfully voted FOR the Hub, whereas it should have been he who was excluded – NOT Councillor LAYMAN. Another tilting of the playing-field.

Significantly, two other Councillors (Councillors WILD and TURNER – sharing the same disclosable interest as the Councillor errroneously permitted to vote) did openly and honestly declare their interest – and all credit to them both; true stalwarts of Whitby.

Thus, the vote carried 5:4 FOR the erection of the Hub when, had the Mayor carried out his duties objectively (he himself has always favoured the Hub) and within the bounds of his office, then the vote would have carried 5:4 AGAINST – which would have been a true representation of the almost unanimous view of the people of Whitby. The two Councillors who did declare an interest are thus doubly praiseworthy on this issue. Yet Whitby has been hoodwinked again.

Feel free to check my work:

All of this this chicanery took place under the advice of the former-Clerk/RFO, Mr KING. I regard it as a very serious abuse of the public trust. Whitby people will only start to respect the Council when the Council merits some respect. Any public servant dishonestly abusing her/his position to achieve personal aims, preferences and ambitions – especially to the disadvantage of a targeted colleague and the wider Whitby public – is totally unacceptable to me. It is also unacceptable under the terms of Lord NOLAN’s Seven Principles of Public Life, which form the ethical framework of the Councillors’ Code of Conduct:

So. Is that a Full House you have there, then, Bob? (Asking for a friend…).

The Bone of Contention

Councillor LAYMAN, acting on advice, pursued a Councillors’ Code of Conduct Complaint against the Mayor with the NYC Monitoring Officer of North Yorkshire Council and an investigation was duly instigated. Standards Investigations are a quasi-judicial process conducted by a qualified solicitor who is duty-bound to consider the input of the Council’s nominated Independent Person for Standards. It has to be said, though, that their investigatory powers are not as great as those of the North Yorkshire Police (for example), so it is inevitably the case that, beyond examining the record (Minutes, email correspondence, recordings of meetings, etc), they are heavily reliant on the honesty of those complaining and those interrogated under investigation. This is where, in my view (and many will share it), Councillor Dalrymple behaved (shall we say?) more than a little injudiciously.

Councillor DALRYMPLE admitted to the Standards Investigation that he had (i) erroneously deemed Councillor LAYMAN ‘predetermined’ on the Hub proposal (not within his limited knowledge), but had also (ii) gone so far as to prohibit her from casting a lawful vote (not within his gift), but he formally assured them that he had since recognised the error of his ways and issued two appropriate apologies to Councillor LAYMAN.

This would appear to have been a bare-faced lie. Two, in fact. And the matter of the third WTDB-delegated Councillor failing to declare a conflict of interests seems to have been altogether lost in the shuffle.

Regular readers may recall that I covered this Mayoral cock-up in my article “Brand youself a fool (but never brand yourself a liar!)” in an NYE article published on 5th July 2024, which included video of the Mayor branding himself both. There are some creatures that one cannot educate . . .

Councillor LAYMAN assures me that, despite the video evidence, she has received no apologies from the Mayor and, having since written to him, politely pointing out his disingenuousness and offering him a second opportunity to render his belated apologies – thus setting the matter behind them in the interest of a more harmonious Council Chamber, rather than pursuing him once more to the NYC Standards Committee, this time over his double lie to the Standards Investigators and to the public at large – Socio-Bob seems to find “sorry” the hardest word.

Unfortunately, the Mayor – relying, I do not doubt, on his immense sense of personal entitlement, self-importance, and arrogant confidence in his own impunity to punitive sanction (no doubt further emboldened by having escaped his merited verdict last time around) – effectively told Councillor LAYMAN to ‘bog off’ and do her worst. He then threatened her with a Code of Conduct Complaint should she dare to take the matter of his lies further:

[My thanks to a reader dor this ‘leak’]

So here we have it. Caught ‘bang to rights’ – but still shooting from the hip with his “don’t mess with me” intimidation-pistol at the ready.

BIG MISTAKE!!!

And so we come next to the Extraordinary Meeting, when Councillors should have been summoned to consider whether or not they wish to raise their hands (on video, for us all to see) in support of the Mayor’s ineptitude, bullying and lies – or in support of the victim; by whom I mean not only Councillor LAYMAN, who has been treated disgracefully, but the people of Whitby, who have had their view on the Maritime Training Hub deflected by a typically DALRYMPLE slight of hand.

Unfortunately, this is where the skullduggery now kicks into overdrive.

The Council’s Constitution

The Whitby Town Council operates under the terms of a legally-binding Constitution. This ‘document’ is, in fact, spread over several volumes; the Standing Orders (the SOs – a sort of Highway Code on how the Council must conduct itself generally), the Financial Regulations (the FRs – how the Council must manage and account for its custody of the public purse) and the Terms of Reference (ToRs) of each of the many Committees (defining their internal rules, areas of responsibility and how they must relate to Full Council). There are also any number of Policies and Procedures. Each of these volumes must be Reviewed and Approved annually or,  in exceptional circumstances, even more frequently.

WTC’s Constitution has been a festering sore at least since I first examined it in 2009. Since the appointment of Mr KING, the former-Clerk/RFO – and certainly from the start of the 2020/21 financial year (just after the beginning of Lockdown) – the whole mess has gone to hell in a handcart. The Standing Orders have suffered so many incidental additions and amendments during the Michael KING era that they are no longer internally consistent; if one adheres to Item X, one finds oneself in conflict with Item Y or Item Z, or vice versa. In many cases, it is impossible to abide by one without serious risk of breaching another.

Worse, the Terms of Reference of the two most influential Committees (Finance, Policy & General Purposes and Human Resources) are also internally inconsistent and – worse still – in several vital instances, in direct conflict with the Standing Orders themseleves. Chaos.

I have been working closely with half a dozen of the more diligent Councillors in an attempt to at least make a start on sorting out that chaos. It is like trying to unpick a Brillo pad with magnetic knitting-needles. I have also raised it with the new Clerk/RFO, Mr Adam CHUGG – a fair, conscientious and reasonable man who may have found (presumably to his horror) that he has taken up an appointment riddled with pratfalls laid by his immediate predecessor. One cannot blame him for turning to the Council’s paid advisory organisation – the Yorkshire Local Councils Associations (YLCA) – for advice on this constitutional jar of worms.

Enter the YLCA

Following the resignation of the former-Clerk/RFO on 21st June 2024, and right up to his final departure on 15th August 2024, a great deal of contention arose within the Council because then-Councillor Glenn GOODBERRY, who had been elected Chairman of the Human Resources Committee just days previously, suddenly resigned from the Council – leaving the HR Chairship vacant, just when it urgently needed to recruit a new Clerk/RFO.

Councillor Steve SMITH – a Councillor of many years experience, a former-Chair/Mayor and a very capable man – was elected to fill the post but was immediately challenged by Councillor DALRYMPLE (the present Mayor) and others, who seemed desperate to muscle in on the decision over who to appoint as the new Clerk/RFO – even though, as an ex officio member of the Committee, he held no voting right. Astonishingly (to me, at least) some Councillors seemed vehemently opposed to Mr CHUGG (whose track-record is exemplary), favouring, instead, the appointment of the Whitby local applicant, NYC Councillor Phil TRUMPER [Con.], the well-known postie, who himself had previously sat on the Town Council. Better the devil you know, eh, Bob?

So, shortly before his departure, the former-Clerk/RFO, Mr KING, approached the YLCA for advice (actually, ‘opinion’ – the YLCA is no more than a back-up ‘patsy’ to fall back on as an excuse for the Council’s possible mistakes – “It wasn’t me, guv; I took advice from ‘the professionals'”).

Mr KING ‘raised a ticket’ with the YLCA (rather like one might ‘raise a ticket’ with Amazon over a missing parcel), seeking advice on the HR Chairship brouhaha, which was stalled in a quagmire of confusion between (i) the internally inconsistent SOs, (ii) the equally internally inconsistent HR ToRs and (iii) the further inconsistencies between the two.

” Your lives in their hands”

In response to Mr KING’s request for advice on the SOs/ToRs confusion, the Chief Officer of the YLCA, a Ms Sheena SPENCE (pictured above, far right) responded to Mr KING’s Ticket #5642 as follows (full document available here):

This advice makes sense; it entirely supports what I have been saying for years: Sort out the SOs and ToRs, etc.

But now, after the fact, Ms SPENCE denies ever having offered such advice . . .

However, having broached this with the new Clerk/RFO, Mr CHUGG (barely six weeks into his new job), who was unable to locate Ticket #5642 in Mr KING’s files (quelle surprise!), went back to Ms SPENCE on Saturday 16th November 2024, to clarify her advice on the latest freshly-arising confusion over the SOs, hoping to ascertain the correct procedure and appropriate form of words for Proposing and Seconding a Motion seeking to hold the Mayor to account.

Ms SPENCE’s response is utterly astonishing; I quote:

[1] – [2] – [3] downright bloopers in a single paragraph. Count them. What about that for a really professional ‘opinion’?

I would suggest that Ms SPENCE owes us all an apology.

[1] – “No reference to rationalising standing orders”? Further up this page, I have just quoted Ms SPENCE stating:

And – [2] – “something we would not use in our advice giving”. Wake up, Ms SPENCE; that is exactly the advice you did give!

And what about – [3] – “was not composed by me”? It was signed off  by Ms SPENCE, for heaven’s sake!

I hope I can be forgiven for observing that Ms SPENCE does not seem to know her backside from a Brighton beachball – just another local government ‘gatekeeper’ drawing a fat salary for defending incompetent Councils and helping them to avoid well-deserved censure for abominable behaviour. Power to the People? NOT!

I mean, seriously, would you buy even a used paper-clip from the YLCA?

Ms SPENCE and her little brood at the YLCA are paid an annual subscription by WTC (i.e. the people of Whitby) that is rapidly approaching three grand a year. VFM?

Now Back to the Mayor

As it turned out, Ms SPENCE, in her infinite wisdom, offered her ‘opinion’ that the form of words of the Motion was unsuitable (though I find nothing in statute or government guidance that would support her view) and suggested a minor revision in order to render the Motion (by her lights) valid. She suggested the following:

Conveniently for the Mayor, at least, the time lost in seeking the YLCA’s (in my view, worthless) ‘opinion’ prevented Councillor LAYMAN from submitting her revised version (dutifully incorporating Ms SPENCE’s ‘opinion’) of the Motion calling the Mayor to account. It was ‘timed out’ from being included in next Tuesday’s Agenda by the Clerk/RFO – in strict accordance with SO9(d) – though arguably still valid – under SO9(f).

I tell you – those Standing Orders. What a catastrophe.

I have no doubt the Motion will be back. And quite rightly so. The Mayor may run . . . but he cannot hide.

But let me make absolutely clear: I have no issue with MISTER DALRYMPLE – as a private citizen. He may be, for all I know, a very nice man, a caring husband and father, kind to dumb animals and all the rest of it. I cannot know. Hence, I am sorry that he has, from the very outset preferred not to engage with me.

Quite separately, on the subject of COUNCILLOR DALRYMPLE, the public official – as distinct from MISTER DALRYMPLE, the private citizen. I have published harsh but robustly-evidenced and (I believe) richly-deserved criticism of his conduct and performance as a Councillor. If he cannot discern the distinction, that is a problem for him.

Either way, I may scrutinise. That is my legal right under the NOLAN PRINCIPLES, as enshrined in the Localism Act 2011.

My opinion of the Mayor’s performance in Council is substantiated almost exclusively by the public record, plus my own recordings and videos and information ‘leaked’ to me from within the ‘powers that be’. If necessary, I am ready – eager – to present it in Court, from the Witness Box, under Oath. It really should not be necessary. DALRYMPLE should simply stand down. He may wish to blame his predicament on the co-operation (or collusion?) of the former-Clerk/RFO, who has escaped without censure – as rogue Clerks often do.

So I wrote to the Mayor, setting out the compelling evidence against him and calling upon him to (i) produce the apologies that he had assured the Monitoring Officer he had already made, and (ii) issue a public apology to Councillor LAYMAN, the Monitoring Officer, the Council and the Whitby public, for his falsehoods, in form of words to my satisfaction. I called for his resignation.

DALRYMPLE’s response (reproduced below) offered NO DENIAL of Councillor LAYMAN’s accusations, no APOLOGIES for the offences he cannot deny, NO INTENTION of complying with the NOLAN Principles or the legal duty to “submit himself to scrutiny”, and clearly NO MORAL BACKBONE to do the right thing and RESIGN.

Having expressed his THANKS for my opinions and advice, he has needlessly RELINQUISHED any credible claim against me. Thank you, Bozo.

The cowardly, contemptible little toe-rag has simply buried his head in the sand.

Compare and Contrast

Mayor/Councillor DALRYMPLE’s immediate predecessor was Councillor Linda WILD. Her task was far more demanding.

Firstly, Mayor/Councillor WILD ‘inherited’ the role at short notice (due to the unanticipated departure of her predecessor, who, of a sudden, fell foul of an unseemly financial irregularity of considerable potential embarrassment to the Council’s public image).

Secondly, this was followed by two unprecedented calamities; the whole Lockdown catastrophe (with its ‘remote’ Council  Zoom meetings) and the appointment of the unqualified Mr Michael KING to the position of Town Clerk/RFO. Double whammy!

It has to be said that while Councillor WILD carried out her civic role as Mayor (opening events and promoting Whitby at ceremonial functions from the River Mersey to the Falklands Islands), she was not note perfect in the Council Chamber. Like DALRYMPLE, she could be autocratic and not best informed on the legalities (which, with a good Clerk/RFO, would have been no insurmountable handicap, for the Chair/Mayor’s duties in Chamber are not burdensome.

So I would say that, by her lights, Councillor WILD gave a great deal to Whitby. Whereas, in DALRYMPLE’s case, the traffic has been very much in the other direction; he has attempted to use the Whitby Mayoralty as a crutch to serve his rather pathetic desire for self-aggrandisement. He has certainly achieved bugger-all else.

Only after chatting with Councillor WILD and her husband, a week or two ago, following my morning ‘surgery’, did I give thought to how thinly Councillor WILD has spread herself in service of the Council and the Whitby community and, thereby, how worthy she is of our gratitude.

Those who have criticised her for a tiresome busybody who can be relied upon to turn up for almost anything (“even the opening of a tin of beans” has been quoted to me) have overlooked her many, many hours of public service, for which she deserves every credit.

Keep in mind that Councillor WILD, in addition to sitting on Full Council (where Agenda Packs can amount to approaching 100 pages of densely-typed A4), she has also accepted Appointments/Delegations to 11 Committees and/or External Bodies, each with its own welter of paperwork – Agendas, Minutes and Reports.

The monumental extent of this workload is mind-numbing – especially when one recognises that scarcely any of this mumbo jumbo actually benefits the people of Whitby by one iota.

I share Councillor WILD’s disillusionment; so much time invested for so little tangible outcome must be deeply frustrating and saddening. It certainly is to me. And, as the House of Lords has established, Public Life is only for those with the thickest of skins:

Not every local Councillor is made of such stern stuff and Councillor WILD has her sensitivities.

Perhaps I should take a leaf out of Councillor WILD’s book and contemplate turning my attention, experience and love of Whitby to some other group or body that can achieve something worthwhile for the town. Any suggestions?

So all the best to you, Linda – give yourself a break. And if you think I may be of help at all, just ask.

The Crunch

If there really is a MAJORITY (i.e. TEN MEMBERS of Whitby Town Council, with names and faces and pictures readily-available all over social media) who are ready openly to support this execrable travesty of civic leadership in the full glare of the Court of Public Opinion, then I am ready to ensure that the people of Whitby know exactly who sits in that ivory tower and on what ethical basis they purport to serve the town. Come to Daddy!

I will be reporting on the outcome of that in due course – barring the Mayor evincing the common decency to resign.

Meanwhile . . .

Why Do I Bother?

I bother because, having worked and lived much of my life all over Europe, I came to Whitby – my all-time favourite town – in 2001, recognising it for the unique and deeply-beloved treasure of God’s Own County that it really, truly is.

It deserves the very best Town Council in that county – in this country, even. The truth is that, at present and for the past few years, it has one of the very worst (barring, perhaps, Potto).

But at last we now have a bunch of smart, determined and honourable Councillors who share my long aspiration. And a brand ne Town Clerk/RFO of great integrity and experience. They deserve my support – and (much more to the point) they deserve yours – the Electors.

Now, that really would be Power to the People.

COMING NEXT

OUTRAGE AFTER OUTRAGE – 31.6% Precept raise planned!

Following increases in the Precept (Local Council Tax) of 15% and 21% respectively over the past two tax years, Bungling Bob’s Floundering Circus will meet on Tuesday 3rd December 2024 attempting to push through a rise of a further 31.6% in the Precept for the 2024/25 financial year – after achieving nothing whatsoever other than managing to lose/mislay an estimated £53K revenue from the Council-run public conveniences when a malfunctioning credit-card reader returned just £13 over the year – and nobody even noticed! The lunatics really have taken over the asylum!