Brighton Councillors sign Petition to Disclose Pubic Cost of Fighting Tribunal

A petition has been signed by a number of Brighton & Hove City Councillors,
demanding the City Council disclose the Public Interest question of how much
Public Money they spent fighting two un-winnable Employment Tribunal cases
against Natasha Thoday, a transgender teacher. Notably 2 other councillors
(North Devon & Edinburgh) and Carline Lucas MEP have also signed. A letter was
sent today asking the remaining City Councillors to also sign it.

Rest of post

please correct the typo --
please put the text of the petition on file --

Craig Turton, Labour councillor for East Brighton, is the latest local
politician to sign the cross party petition set up to have Brighton Council
disclose how much public money they spent fighting the two Employment Tribunal
cases: -
http://www.gscene.com/blog/2009/02/labour-councillor-signs-trans-petition.html

Thanks Roy for pointing out the typo, the correct link for latest news and
background information on the Council’s refusals to answer basic Public
Interest questions is: -
http://brighton-council-cover-up-transgender.blogspot.com/

The petition text is: -

"Background (Preamble): The General Teaching Council ruled in October 2008 that
a former education, training and employment manager at Brighton & Hove City
Council was guilty of discriminating against and victimising a teacher who is
transgender and was ordered to pay £35000 in compensation. The manager, Philip
Morgan, had secretly sent a fax to an employment agency that revealed the
teacher was transgender, which led to her being blacklisted. Brighton & Hove
Council spent over £100000 to fight the tribunal case. The public wants to know
how much the council spent of public money.

Petition: We are asking the Information Commissioner to disclose the amount of
public money spent to fight the tribunal case against the teacher Natasha
Thoday."
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/freedom-of-information-brighton-hove-council.html

Note: whilst the Commissioner does not keep such information to disclose, the
spirit of this petition is clear: the Council must keep proper account of its
internal spending of public money, and disclose the information on demand, or
risk accusations of either gross incompetence or deception or both. Andy
Baldwin, advocate, said "We’re disgusted that Councillors and senior staff have
been colluding since 2003, to defend and then cover-up discrimination with
public money... The people involved must account for their actions and reform,
or step down.”
http://www.gscene.com/blog/2008/10/education-chief-disciplined-for.html

The text of the General Teaching Council’s decision is no longer on the GTC's
web site (they do not keep their decisions online for very long and the link in
the above post is broken) so its been posted here:-
http://brighton-council-cover-up-extras.blogspot.com/2009/01/6-october-2008-philip-morgan-general.html

Natasha Thoday

Dear Andy,
thank you for that fantastic homepage brighton cover-up council.
I am of the opinion that the Commissioner can force the council to disclose the
information under Art. 10 ECHR.
kind regards

Rest of post

Jrg

________________________________
Von: Andy Baldwin <<email obscured>>
An: Brighton and Hove Issues Forum <bh@forums.e-democracy.org>
Gesendet: Montag, den 2. Februar 2009, 22:18:02 Uhr
Betreff: Re: [BH] Brighton Councillors sign Petition to Disclose Pubic Cost of
Fighting Tribunal

Craig Turton, Labour councillor for East Brighton, is the latest local
politician to sign the cross party petition set up to have Brighton Council
disclose how much public money they spent fighting the two Employment Tribunal
cases: -
http://www.gscene.com/blog/2009/02/labour-councillor-signs-trans-petition.html

Thanks Roy for pointing out the typo, the correct link for latest news and
background information on the Councils refusals to answer basic Public Interest
questions is: -
http://brighton-council-cover-up-transgender.blogspot.com/

The petition text is: -

"Background (Preamble): The General Teaching Council ruled in October 2008 that
a former education, training and employment manager at Brighton & Hove City
Council was guilty of discriminating against and victimising a teacher who is
transgender and was ordered to pay 35000 in compensation. The manager, Philip
Morgan, had secretly sent a fax to an employment agency that revealed the
teacher was transgender, which led to her being blacklisted. Brighton & Hove
Council spent over 100000 to fight the tribunal case. The public wants to know
how much the council spent of public money.

Petition: We are asking the Information Commissioner to disclose the amount of
public money spent to fight the tribunal case against the teacher Natasha
Thoday."
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/freedom-of-information-brighton-hove-council.html

Note: whilst the Commissioner does not keep such information to disclose, the
spirit of this petition is clear: the Council must keep proper account of its
internal spending of public money, and disclose the information on demand, or
risk accusations of either gross incompetence or deception or both. Andy
Baldwin, advocate, said "Were disgusted that Councillors and senior staff have
been colluding since 2003, to defend and then cover-up discrimination with
public money... The people involved must account for their actions and reform,
or step down.
http://www.gscene.com/blog/2008/10/education-chief-disciplined-for.html

The text of the General Teaching Councils decision is no longer on the GTC's
web site (they do not keep their decisions online for very long and the link in
the above post is broken) so its been posted here:-
http://brighton-council-cover-up-extras.blogspot..com/2009/01/6-october-2008-philip-morgan-general.html

Natasha Thoday

Andy Baldwin

Info about Andy Baldwin: http://forums.e-democracy.org/p/xvbrightoncouncil

View all messages on this topic at:
http://forums.e-democracy.org/r/topic/7ohn2ZpRZhqn1oh2PZ6UL4
-----------------------------------------
To post, e-mail: bh@forums.e-democracy.org
To leave or for daily digest, type "unsubscribe" or "digest on,"
in subject, then send to: bh@forums.e-democracy.org

More information about Brighton and Hove Issues Forum:
http://forums.e-democracy.org/groups/bh

E-Democracy.Org rules: http://e-democracy.org/rules
-----------------------------------------
Technical assistance thanks to our friends at http://OnlineGroups.Net

Thanks Joerg for setting up the petition.

I’d be very pleased if anyone has ideas how to ‘force the council to disclose
the information’ as I'm unclear how Art. 10 ECHR 'freedom of expression' helps
here? Perhaps Joerg means Art. 14 'freedom for discrimination'. If so, then its
not clear how one can show the council are acting differently compared to
disclosing how much they spent fighting any other specific legal case....?

Louise Hanrahan for the Council’s “Head of Law” responded to our request for
how much public money they spent fighting these cases. Is this normal? Surely
the council’s own Information Officer should deal with this? Instead the letter
was copied externally and only to the Information Commissioners Office.

Louise Hanrahan stated the information on costs “is not held by the council”.
This is ridiculous. Are we expected to believe that time sheets were not filled
in by staff working to fight the government’s equality champions (EHRC and the
EOC)? The council will have to trawl through those time sheets and wherever
else time spent is recorded since the FOI is aimed at disclosure of the
information itself, not the documents it is stored on.

Now that the petition has shown there is considerable support demanding the
disclosure of public costs, the next step is to write to the Council’s FOI
Appeals Officer and if not satisfied to go back to the Information
Commissioners Office.

Natasha Thoday

You cannot post because you are not logged in.

Brighton Councillors sign Petition to Disclose Pubic Cost of Fighting Tribunal

Already a member?

Not a member?

E-Democracy is 100% Donation Supported Contribute Today!