COUNCILLORS have been accused of blocking the public from hearing how badly and why watercourses were being polluted across Somerset.

The county’s unitary council was due to hold a scrutiny committee meeting in County Hall, Taunton, on Wednesday afternoon (October 18) to ‘consider the issues around water quality in Somerset’.

Committee members would have been given the data and information on the roles and responsibilities of the organisations involved in the pollution and ‘the measures and steps’ available to the authority.

But the meeting was cancelled and instead the council plans to give a private briefing on the issue to councillors who will meet in the same place and hear the same information from the same presenters as would have been said in public.

Local government transparency campaigner David Orr accused the council of a ‘sleight of hand’ to exclude the public and press.

Mr Orr said there appeared to have been ‘pressure brought to bear on’ a Green Party councillor not to object to the change, which he felt undermined the independence and effectiveness of the scrutiny committee.

He said: “There appears to be a prejudice against attendees from the council tax-paying public being allowed to engage in this vital matter of high public interest.

“Exclusion of the press and broadcast media from this meeting is not something I would expect from a Lib Dem administration.

“The ‘shenanigans’ effectively excluding the public and press are, I strongly feel, immoral and damaging to public engagement and trust.

“Anecdotally, my trust in the council being open and honest today is low.

“I am told that the publicly accountable bodies of Natural England and the Environment Agency will not be questioned or held to account by our elected councillors in a public session. Why not?

“So, the national Covid inquiry is open, but this vital Somerset water quality meeting is not.”

A council spokesperson said the cancellation was because the various agencies involved were currently awaiting further information from the Government, and there was a possibility of the King making an announcement on the subject when he opened Parliament next month.

The spokesperson said: A new date will be set early in the New Year for the committee to publicly scrutinise the subject of water quality.

“In the meantime, an informal briefing has been arranged to keep members up to date.”

But Mr Orr said the council recently disclosed in a planning strategy committee report it expected the Government to bring forward legislation to prevent the current nutrient neutrality regulations from continuing to stop new house building. 

He said: “The issues around the nutrient neutrality policy changes are already in the public domain, so why hold this meeting without press and public?

“I do not believe the council’s actions conform with the Nolan Principles around accountability, transparency, and openness.”

West Somerset MP Ian Liddell-Grainger, who will be the Conservative candidate at the next General Election for a new constituency taking in large areas around Wellington, said: “It is vital that we have the greatest possible transparency on the subject of water quality in Somerset, particularly on how the various agencies have allowed water quality on the Levels to become so degraded that they are at risk of losing their international status as a wildlife site, and why Wessex Water has been responsible so, so, many illegal sewage discharges along the coast.

“It may well be that the Government is bringing forward measures to correct the obvious deficiencies.

“But the public has a perfect right to question why things have gone so badly wrong and I trust the council will afford them an appropriate opportunity to do so with the minimum of delay.”