Below is an email from council leader Kevin Madge dated 4th November 2013 addressed to all councillors. It confirms that, despite promising a 'full debate', there will actually be no debate at all over the 'unlawful' payments scandal at next Wednesday's meeting;
To all elected members of Carmarthenshire County Council
Dear Colleague,
Wales Audit Office Review of Indemnity for Libel and Senior Officers Pay and Pensions
I promised to keep members up to date with developments on the above matter, as reported recently to the Audit Committee.
It had been my intention to arrange for a full report on both matters at next week’s meeting of Full Council. In the meantime I along with my colleagues on the Executive Board, and a number of senior officers who have been involved in advising and presenting reports on the two matters, have received correspondence on both matters from the Wales Audit Office which makes it necessary to postpone this report.
We have been asked to respond to two separate detailed ‘consideration documents’, to comment on the factual accuracy of the contents and to offer any observations thereon. We are required to respond on or before Friday 22 November.
Specifically the letter relating to each report states that:
The consideration document is confidential and has been provided to you to enable me to confirm the factual accuracy of it’s content. Under Section 54 of the Public Audit (Wales) Act 2004 (The Act) you are not permitted to share this document, or extracts from it, with any third party. Unauthorised disclosure is an offence under the Act and could prejudice the audit process.
It would be impossible to report on these matters at the present time without dealing with the same detailed information contained in the documents and for this reason, having taken advice on the issue, I will need to postpone reporting the matter to full council for the time being. I have made the Wales Audit Office aware of this decision and they concur that this advice is sound. To do otherwise would present the danger that it might ‘prejudice the audit process’ as suggested in the warning from the Auditor’s letter quoted above.
I would assure you, however, that a report will be made to Council as soon as it is permissible to do so and, as promised, I will inform you of any significant developments in the meantime.
Yours faithfully
Cllr Kevin Madge
Leader
To all elected members of Carmarthenshire County Council
Dear Colleague,
Wales Audit Office Review of Indemnity for Libel and Senior Officers Pay and Pensions
I promised to keep members up to date with developments on the above matter, as reported recently to the Audit Committee.
It had been my intention to arrange for a full report on both matters at next week’s meeting of Full Council. In the meantime I along with my colleagues on the Executive Board, and a number of senior officers who have been involved in advising and presenting reports on the two matters, have received correspondence on both matters from the Wales Audit Office which makes it necessary to postpone this report.
We have been asked to respond to two separate detailed ‘consideration documents’, to comment on the factual accuracy of the contents and to offer any observations thereon. We are required to respond on or before Friday 22 November.
Specifically the letter relating to each report states that:
The consideration document is confidential and has been provided to you to enable me to confirm the factual accuracy of it’s content. Under Section 54 of the Public Audit (Wales) Act 2004 (The Act) you are not permitted to share this document, or extracts from it, with any third party. Unauthorised disclosure is an offence under the Act and could prejudice the audit process.
It would be impossible to report on these matters at the present time without dealing with the same detailed information contained in the documents and for this reason, having taken advice on the issue, I will need to postpone reporting the matter to full council for the time being. I have made the Wales Audit Office aware of this decision and they concur that this advice is sound. To do otherwise would present the danger that it might ‘prejudice the audit process’ as suggested in the warning from the Auditor’s letter quoted above.
I would assure you, however, that a report will be made to Council as soon as it is permissible to do so and, as promised, I will inform you of any significant developments in the meantime.
Yours faithfully
Cllr Kevin Madge
Leader
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The ongoing cost to both Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire Councils of the jointly commissioned external legal advice to defend the pension payments are not known.
It is not known either if Carmarthenshire County Council have retained a different legal expert for advice regarding the libel indemnity.
However, at the last meeting of Pembrokeshire Council questions were asked regarding the legal advisor and associated costs over the pension payments, the draft minutes record the response;
"The Leader responded that the Head of Legal Services at Carmarthenshire County Council had retained Mr Timothy Kerr QC to give advice on the matter. This Authority’s Head of Legal and Committee Services had then joined with his colleague in submitting joint instructions to Mr Kerr.
Mr Kerr's costs had not been settled as he continued to be retained.
The relevant legal and financial officers of this Authority did not time record their various activities and internal Officers were at Director or Head of Service level.
In response to a supplementary question by Councillor Miller, the Leader stated that as discussions were still ongoing with the WAO, it was not possible to make any assumption on the length of time for the outcome of those discussions."