An officers report to the councils Housing and Adult Social Care in regards to the review the committee is carrying out into the 5 Committee District Management Committee's (DMC's)
HERE
History of the DMC's
Back in the days prior to part 2 of the Local Government Act 2000
HERE coming into force in July 2001, the dmc's where sub-committee's of the councils then Housing committee.
The housing committee and its sub-committees had council tenants as members - legislation allows them to do this.
In 1998, a DMC document
HERE reveals that cllrs on the Housing committee bestowed upon some council tenants rights they
weren't legally entitled to: voting rights on the councils housing committees (the dmc's).
"
RESOLVED
THAT the Tenants' Associations listed in Appendix A be formally registered with the Council and their nominated representatives be co-opted onto the DMC, with voting rights for the Municipal Year 1998/99"
HERE
Legislation
The Local Government Act 1972, states under section 101
HERE in regards to local governments discharge of their functions:
Subject to
any express provision contained in this Act or any Act passed after
this Act, a local authority may arrange for the discharge of any of
their functions—
(a) by a committee, a sub-committee or an officer of the authority; or
(b) by any other local authority.
In relation to committees section 102 says:
(1) (a)a local authority may appoint a committee of the authority; or
(b)two or more local authorities may appoint a joint committee of those authorities; or
(c)any such committee may appoint one or more sub-committees
(3)A
committee appointed under subsection (1) [F25or (1A)] above, other than
a committee for regulating and controlling the finance of the local
authority or of their area, may, subject to section 104 below, include
persons who are not members of the appointing authority or authorities
or, in the case of a sub-committee, the authority or authorities of whom
they are a sub-committee, F26. .
Section 13
HERE of the Local Government and Housing Act 1989 adds further to the above:
13 Voting rights of members of certain
committees: England and Wales.
(1)Subject to the following provisions of
this section, a person who—
(a)is a member of a committee appointed
under a power to which this section applies by a relevant authority and
is not a member of that authority;
(c)is a member of a sub-committee
appointed under such a power by such a committee as is mentioned in
paragraph (a) or (b) above and is not a member of the relevant
authority, or one of the relevant authorities, which appointed that
committee,
shall for all purposes be treated as a non-voting member of that committee (my emphasis), joint committee or, as the case may be, sub-committee.
Section 13 above came into force more or less around August 1990
HERE
By June of 1999 all 5 cllr lead dmc's (the 5 dmc's were aligned with the councils 5 district housing offices) had council tenant reps as chairs or vice chairs.
Each dmc was also given £100,000 pa to allocate on council housing capital works. This was on top of the existing but smaller revenue budgets (around £35,000 each pa ) dmc's had been allocating.
Council meeting of 17 May 2000
agenda item 6. STATUTORY REQUIREMENTS GOVERNING THE ESTABLISHMENT OF COMMITTEES AND THE APPOINTMENT OF MEMBERS TO COMMITTEES
The Mayor moved and Councillor Dermot Greene seconded, that the report be received and adopted.
RESOLVED
- THAT the standing committees of the Council be constituted as set out below (my emphasis)
(e) HOUSING COMMITTEE (16)
Majority Party (11)
Brian Weekes, Dave Horan, John Rolfe, Charlie Hedges, Heather Johnson, Roger Robinson, Sybil Shine, Anne Swain, Jim Turner Maggie Cosin and Penny Abraham.
Opposition
(C)(3)Peter Horne, Andrew Mennear Piers Wauchope
(LD) (2) Jane Schopflin, Sidney Malin
Plus named substitute
(C)(1) Stephen Hocking
(LD) (2) Flick Rea, Heather Thompson
Plus 10 non voting members (my emphasis), one from each DMC, one from the Camden Federation of Tenants Associations, one from the Camden Federation of Private Tenants and one from the Homelessness Liaison Group, one from Leaseholders forum and one from TMO Liaison Group
Note it says "Plus 10 non voting members "
Forward a couple of weeks from the above full Council meeting to the Gospel Oak DMC 30 May 2000 HERE
1.REGISTRATION OF TENANTS ASSOCIATION AND CO-OPTION OF TENANT REPRESENTATIVES
RESOLVED THAT all the Tenants Associations listed in Appendix A be formally registered with the Council and their nominated representatives be co-opted onto the DMC with voting rights (my emphasis) for the municipal year 2000/2001.
Within weeks of the full Council meeting and the agreed 10 tenant reps appointed onto the councils then Housing Committee with no voting rights, had transformed into the continuation of 5 Housing Committee sub-committees that had at least ten voting tenant reps each.
It was around this time that council tenant reps from the Camden Association of Street Properties (CASP) started attending dmc meetings.
By 2004 a few estate based council tenants reps (dmc and cftra members) had taken over CASP.
The council had given them housing transfers to street properties in order to do so.
A few years earlier, in January
2001, council tenant members of the dmc's who where also members of the Camden Federation of Tenants and
Residents Association (CFTRA) managed to get the following motion agreed
by 4 of the 5 dmc's:
“This
District Management Committee agrees that the budget of £456,000 be
withdrawn from the Community Involvement Team from April 1st 2001 and
that tenants decide where and how the money will be used"
The CFTRA then set themselves up as a private
company limited by guarantee in the same name, and took on the tenant
participation service from the councils in house team - to provide
services to other council tenants on behalf of the council.
From
what I can make of things, the cftra taking on the TP service has been a
disaster from start to finish resulting in the current situation where
the cftra has lost all its funding and support from the council.
The change of governance system brought in by the Local Government Act 2000 should have meant that the dmc's where shut down but cllrs allowed the dmc's to continue but as council tenant groups funded and serviced by the council.
The dmc's also continued to exercise council functions of allocating large sums of money to themselves. This progressed to dmc members actually being given direct access to council money to buy goods and services/works on behalf of the council - without an apparent formal legal management agreement/contract being in place. No annual accounts of spending required by the councils. No receipts required.
Councils officers agree with the tenant reps how much the cost of the works etc will be and the tenant rep is sent a cheque (or given a government procurement card) to transfer public money into the tra's bank account.
The dmc's don't produce annual accounts of where the money they have allocated to themselves has been spent. The council doesn't require the dmc's to account for the spending.
This set up continues to this day.
