THE LEADER of the council took time to praise the officers who work for residents.
Cllr John Halsall said that despite losing the central Government funding grant and “a large proportion of our income there have been no services lost”.
He pointed out that this meant for residents that rubbish is still collected weekly, roads are “in better shape than our neighbours”, libraries and leisure centres are seeing increased footfalls, care homes are “excellent” and “our schools are the envy of our neighbours”.
He added: “The borough is where people want to live.
“This is due in the main to our officers, who are second to none. I hope all Councillors can join me in praising and supporting them.”
The decision to praise officers came, in part, from inaccurate reporting in other publications over plans to bring some services run by Optalis back under council control.
“It is really disappointing therefore to have members of the opposition criticising our staff and what they do. Worse still information is being given to the press which is incorrect, harmful to our staff and not checked with the Executive member as to its veracity,” he said.
Continuing his theme of praise, he said: “We have a magnificent team led by an impressive team of directors, who do great things with the sole objective of serving our residents as best they might at the optimal cost.
“They are ambitious and have in the main a can-do attitude willing to do new things and generate new thought processes.
“I believe in encouraging this positive attitude and experimenting with new ideas and technology, in the full knowledge that not everything works and maybe we have to backtrack – the only way of avoiding this is to do nothing.”
Cllr Lindsay Ferris, leader of the Liberal Democrat group, said: “We have an exceptional senior management team”.
