Nottinghamshire County Council's leader has denied claims of "silencing" Labour over the recommissioning of a safeguarding service for new-born children and mothers. The authority said in a report last month that the current contract for the Nottinghamshire Healthy Families Programme was due to expire next March.
The council says beyond March 2024, it wants to enter into a 'co-operation' arrangement with NHFT to deliver the service. This means that a competitive tendering process is not required.But concerns were then raised that this decision "may not have been made in accordance with the law", given the non-public "informal meetings" about the matter that had taken place.
This request was denied by council leader Ben Bradley, with Councillor Foale saying: "The decision by Conservative Leader Ben Bradley to refuse the leader of another group to speak and raise concerns at cabinet is very worrying, and certainly feels undemocratic. Although I have been silenced by Ben Bradley, I will still attend as I want to hear clear reassurance from cabinet that they are aware of the concerns we have regarding the safeguarding of new-born babies and mothers.
"I didn't allow Councillor Foale's question on the Healthy Families Programme because we were not discussing it at cabinet today. We were simply noting the report asking us to reconsider the decision, which we will now go away and have a think about.