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A few weeks ago we praised Leisure Cabinet member Sonja Crisp for her forbearance in turning down hospitality offers. She had recorded only 4 events over a period of 4 years.
Seems we were wrong to do so.
In a frenetic attempt to avoid censure the Councillor has now made backdated amendments to her public record of the hospitality that she has received.
18 additional entries have now been recorded some going back as far as 2010. http://tinyurl.com/8janxm7
Apparently she is so much in demand, that she records that there are “numerous events I haven’t attended due to time constraints and I have had to decline as I have 3or 4 invites per week, some weeks it 2 or 3 per day. i cant record them all would be ridiculous and I would need administrative help to do so”.
The former van driver is clearly struggling with the burdens of office, although – fortunately for taxpayers – a diary secretary is not likely to be one of the perks of her “Cabinet” post.
Hospitality offered &/or taken in excess of a value of £50 has legally to be recorded on the public register. Councillors have to update their entries within a month of receiving a gift. Until recently the limit was £25 but this was increased by Labour when they took office. Nevertheless many Councillors continue to record all gifts and hospitality.
So when the register was updated on 1st August 2012 Cllr Crisp recorded only 5 entries.
In fairness perhaps an occasional event can slip the mind….. but 18??
It is not as though some of those forgotten were minor. We now learn that Cllr Crisp lunched with the Queen, spent around £100 on rail fares getting to the Britain in Bloom awards, was a regular in the complementary seats at the Theatre while keeping body and soul together at Visit York dinners to a total cost of about £100.
Not the kind of social life that most would readily forget.
But most surprising of all is perhaps the change made 24 hours later to the declaration she had made on 23rd August.
On the 24th August apparently Cllr Crisp remembered that she had been the guest of Blackpool Council on 11th November 2011, Strange this one, as the trip was to confirm a “Collaboration” between the two Councils. Stranger still as Cllr Crisp’s son is a senior official of the Blackpool Councils management team.
No doubt the Council’s Standards Committee will be moving quickly to reassure residents about the many governance issues which this series of events reveals?
