Epic Wolverhampton Council meeting stretches on for over six hours and finishes at 2.30am
One of the longest council meetings in history has been held in Wolverhampton and did not finish until around 2.30am after councillors clashed on a string of issues.
Labour and Conservative members clashed at the full council meeting on Wednesday evening, primarily over the budget for 2022-2023 which was eventually approved - including a tax rise of 2.99 per cent.
A string of amendments were proposed by the opposition Tory group who called for the city's garden waste charge to be scrapped amid other policies.
The move was opposed by the Labour members who called the amendments a "bag of a fag packet gimmicks" which were not viable for the city.
It led to the meeting, due to start at 6.15pm and already delayed by a special event to honour city hero Lisa Potts, finishing at 2.35am on Thursday.
A motion was passed at the meeting to allow councillors to continue debating after the meeting ran over the three-hour-and-a-half time limit.
Councillor Wendy Thompson, leader of the opposition Conservative group, said: "I got home just after 3am. There was the presentation to Lisa Potts, an emergency resolution with regards to Ukraine, the budget and various amendments and other agenda items.
"The last three items were dealt with very quickly indeed (after the budget debate). There were amendments put forward and some people spoke at length as well – it's one of the latest (I've been to) I must admit.
"It took an extremely long time, even over the council plan, there was one item we could get any agreement on (over special educational needs and disabilities).
"There was a complete difference of opinion on everything."
The meeting was adjourned temporarily after Councillor Paul Appleby, who represents Bushbury North, was taken ill.
Councillor Stephen Simkins, deputy leader of the authority, said: "We had a budget and they (the Conservatives) proposed what they said was an alternative budget. They agreed with 98 per cent of ours and then they just kept on going with amendment after amendment, after amendment. And I think if you add all the amendments and the stuff in the budget together, it probably wouldn't have been a legal budget.
"Some of the things would have relied on using general reserves, but if you use them they're gone. With reserves, you've got some flexibility to tackle anything – including Covid. We spent our reserves and that was reimbursed by the Government, but that allowed us do do what we needed to do straight away."
The meeting started at around 8pm after Lisa Potts, the former nursery nurse who saved the lives of schoolchildren from a machete-wielding attacker in 1996, received the Freedom of the City of Wolverhampton.
Councillor Greg Brackenridge, mayor of Wolverhampton, thanked councillors and officers for staying at the end of the meeting.
He said: "Can I just thank members for their patience. It has been a difficult evening and also (I'd like to thank) officers for their time, we very much appreciate it."
