'Rigorous' review of Travellers policies - Swansea

From the south Wales Evening Post

GYPSY Traveller policy will be reviewed by Swansea Council and an external officer to make sure there are no allegations of bias.

Council leader David Phillips told members of the authority how a shortlist for a second permanent site in the county was chosen would go through a rigorous process which would be clear and open to the public.

Across Swansea, 1,006 possible sites have been whittled down to 19, and then to five.

Mr Phillips said working group procedures on the policy were correct, but in order to remove "any potential for bias against officers, i.e, pushing one site over another" it would be reviewed internally and externally.

The public will also be able to have its say.

A Swansea Council head of service will review the process. If he or she says the process was okay, it will then be reviewed externally, most likely by a neighbouring authority

If the external reviewer says the process for the shortlist — put together by a council task and finish group — was correct, Swansea Council will put the matter out for consultation.

During that period, which is likely to last three months, all the information will be made available on the council's website — from the long-list to the short-list and the reasons sites were accepted or rejected and how those decisions were made.

Members of the public will then be invited to give their opinion.

A consultation report — including the view of the public — will then go before the council to make a decision.

However, if the external reviewer finds a problem, the process could start again from scratch.

The need to identify a second permanent site in the City and County of Swansea followed a housing needs assessment as part of the council's statutory requirement to adopt a housing strategy.

Mr Phillips said at a full council meeting at the Civic Centre: "It will be judged entirely on a professional assessment. I hope that this review once and for all shows that there has been nothing underhand by this council or this administration."