Indies and MK play musical chairs

One of the agenda items not reached at the last Cornwall Council meeting, and therefore held over until the 11th January "mopping up" meeting, is the allocation of committee seats to reflect accurately the political balance of the council. The defection of former Independent councillor Neil Plummer to Mebyon Kernow on 4th August should have resulted in MK gaining two additional committee seats and the Independent group losing two. But it hasn't worked out like that - MK has declined the Indies' offer of places on the Pensions and Sea Fisheries committees in the hope of gaining something more eye-catching. The dispute now looks set to be resolved by a meeting of the full council. As the council's lawyers have observed:

"If the determination of seats is held over until the February Council meeting the Mebyon Kernow Group will have been deprived of seats for more than six months. It is respectfully suggested that not allocating seats for such a long period is neither rational nor reasonable and it will expose the Council to the risk of challenge for failure to properly comply with its duty to review and determine the allocation of seats. The allocation of seats within the current number of seats available is achievable and should not take several months to resolve."