A meeting to scrutinise Durham Constabulary's response to child protection failings was postponed for a second time on Monday, November 2, after not enough members attended for it to proceed legally.
Police and Crime Panel chairman Cllr Robert Potts confirmed the postponement as councillors reacted with disbelief. Eight panel members were present, including County Durham councillors and independent representatives, with one County Durham councillor having submitted apologies. A minimum of nine members was required for the meeting to go ahead.
Darlington representatives absent
The panel draws members from both areas of Durham Constabulary's patch. Darlington is represented by Conservative group leader Cllr Jonathan Dulston, Labour's Cllr James McGill and independent Cllr Kevin Nicholson, none of whom attended.
The meeting had been scheduled to examine Police and Crime Commissioner Joy Allen's response to May's inspection report, which concluded the force requires improvement in its approach to investigating abuse, neglect and exploitation.
Safety concerns raised
Cllr Potts said: "This isn't only the children of County Durham as in Durham itself, this is the children of Darlington as well, and unless we have these meetings then we can't ensure the safety of the children in Darlington or Durham."
A report prepared ahead of the meeting revealed the inspection had highlighted four areas requiring improvement, which Durham Constabulary accepted and subsequently addressed with changes.
Ms Allen had originally been scheduled to update councillors in September, but that meeting was also postponed for the same reason, with no representatives from Darlington attending. She had been expected to outline progress since the inquiry, including enhanced oversight, targeting of offenders and the strengthening of specialist safeguarding services.
Importance of the inspection
Cllr Potts said: "If this was something minor that we were looking at, you could sit there and think, you know what, we'll have a look at the agenda, maybe agree at the end of the agenda to turn around and say, 'look, we all agree with this', but this isn't something minor.
"We're talking about His Majesty's Inspector of Constabulary's National Child Protection inspection. Durham Constabulary were heavily criticised in this report.
"We're talking about children being sexually abused and for us not to be able to progress this a second time in a row is obviously very, very disappointing to say the least."
Cllr Potts added he was reluctant to criticise the absent members without first understanding the circumstances surrounding their absence.
"I don't know why they haven't turned up and I don't want to be critical if something's happened and they're in an accident on a road or whatever, but to me this is a very, very important issue that we're looking at and to miss it twice in a row is disappointing. I'd like to hope that the next time we call this meeting those people are in attendance."
The following meeting is scheduled to take place in Darlington in December. The three Darlington members who failed to attend were approached for comment.
