THE casting vote of a council’s chairman was required to avoid a defeat for its ruling Labour group on a plan setting out its priorities. 

The Labour group took over the running of Monmouthshire County Council, which had been controlled by the Conservatives since 2004, at May’s local government elections. 

Leader Mary Ann Brocklesby presented her Labour administration’s Community and Corporate Plan at a meeting of the full council on Thursday, October 27, but opposition groups said it lacked detail and couldn’t be used to hold the ruling cabinet to account. 

Conservative group leader Richard John, who had led the previous Conservative cabinet, said he was disappointed by what his successors had produced. 

He said his administration had produced a 40 page “detailed corporate plan” with “100 clearly evidenced specific actions to take” that detailed who was responsible for them.

“You can imagine our disappointment at this six and a bit pages,” he said. “It feels like a wasted opportunity.” 

He said the plan fails to say how the council would “stand up” to the Welsh Government on funding for public transport and that its ambition to “reduce hospital admissions” lacked detail and there was no mention of potential traffic links between Chepstow and Sedbury in the Forest of Dean. 

He said the Labour administration was seeking to replace the Conservative produced corporate plan “with something inferior” and said if the council approved it members would struggle to hold the executive to account. 

Independent Group leader Frances Taylor put forward an amendment that it be agreed a revised and a detailed plan with measures and targets be brought back to the council at its next meeting, in December. 

But Cllr Brocklesby said that would place too much work on officers and that she had already told councillors she hadn’t wanted to produce a detailed plan without knowing the council’s financial position and had promised a second “itineration” of the plan in March. 

Monmouthshire is already facing an expected £8 million overspend this year and Cllr Brocklesby said the plan would be used to guide the budget for the 2023/24 council year. 

Welsh councils are due to learn their funding allocations, from the Welsh Government, for next year in December but it was stressed uncertainty over UK public spending means it is unknown how much money may be made available to Wales. 

Following debate in the chamber deputy leader Paul Griffiths suggested the administration could produce a more detailed plan, with targets, in January. 

The bid, by Cllr Taylor, to force the Labour cabinet to produce a more detailed plan by December was defeated on the casting vote of chair, Cllr Laura Wright and the council then accepted the corporate plan and Cllr Griffiths’ amendment that it be updated in January.