Dudley rent vote row: Councillors denied votes as leaders 'knew they would lose'

A report on the Housing Revenue Account (HRA) which included a rent hike of 4.8 percent was pulled from the agenda of a meeting of the full council on January 29.

The decision was rescheduled to be made instead by the cabinet of the Conservative controlled authority at a meeting on February 11, prompting concerns from Labour opposition councillor Jackie Cowell.

At an extraordinary meeting of the council’s Housing and Assets Scrutiny Committee on February 10, Cllr Cowell said: “I am disappointed we are here tonight, I don’t quite know how we got into this mess, we normally would have dealt with rent setting at full council.

“I hope we don’t get into this situation again because tenants of this borough do deserve to actually witness their rents being set and seem to have been denied that on this occasion.”

The council is run by a minority Conservative administration which requires the support of councillors from other groups to win votes in the council chamber.

After further complaints at the scrutiny meeting from Dudley Labour’s deputy leader, Cllr Shaukat Ali, Tory cabinet member for housing and homelessness, Cllr Ian Bevan, hit back.

Cllr Bevan said: “We were not going to get the HRA through on that night without your group’s support, you made it clear it wasn’t available and the report was pulled on the basis that we would come to the process that we have now.

“To complain about it now is completely out of order.”

Cllr Bevan added the authority’s monitoring officer, who gives advice on procedure and compliance with legal requirements, concluded pulling the report from the full council meeting was allowed.

Dudley’s monitoring officer, Aftab Razzaq, told the meeting: “In terms of the point made on the right of tenants witnessing the process being taken away – that isn’t the case.

“That will still take place within the meeting tomorrow, the decision is an executive function so it will be discharged by the cabinet correctly.”

The cabinet meeting scheduled for February 11 is open to the public and opposition councillors are allowed to speak but have no voting rights.

After the scrutiny meeting on February 10, Dudley Council’s leader, Cllr Patrick Harley, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “Labour tonight basically asked the questions they should have asked at two previous scrutiny meetings.

“The cost of this additional meeting has been a waste of taxpayers money and this woeful opposition should be held accountable for that.

“The only manipulation of the system is Labour failing to act like a responsible opposition.

“If you oppose a policy then fail to offer any alternative ideas then you are failing. Labour as an opposition are simply failing.”

Labour say they were planning alternative housing budget proposals but did not receive necessary information in time to finalise their plans.