23rd   I attended the “Health and Safety for Members” session at the Civic Centre delivered by the SHE Manager, Arup Majhi, it was a very interesting presentation and was very useful for me as being on the Health and Safety/Building Committee at the local Junior School at Scotby, and about to carry out a Health and Safety Audit there, it acted as a “Aide Memoire”.

24th   The first of three meetings today was held in the Wetheral Playing Field Club House where a representative of each of the five wards of the Parish Council discussed the merits of each Community Assets that had been put forward, with those agreed to be put on the agenda of the next Parish Council Meeting for ratification.   Those nominated with then be sent to the City Council for approval.   The next meeting was held at the Civic Centre where we had a training session on “28 Community Engagement Strategies”.   This was facilitated by David McGrath who told use how to communicate with residents and the ways to do so also to act as a Community Advocate.   We were given scenarios and had to work out the best way of determinating the truth and then communicating the facts to the relevant parties.    Finally, I had a meeting of the Community Grants Panel with my County Councillor, Nick Marriner, together with my fellow District Councillor, Steve Higgs and my fellow Parish Councillor Marguerite Murray.   We met with the County Council Engagement Officer, Niall McNulty, to determine whether to give grants and how much to applications put forward by Community Groups in Wetheral Ward of the County Council.   This is sometimes not an easy decision, especially due the cuts in funding available.

26th   Today I was at the new date for the cancelled Member  Learning and Development Working Group that was initially on the 16th.   We welcomed a new member to the group Councillor Barrie Osgood.   The meeting discussed our decision not to continue with retaining our level 1 Northwest Employers Members Charter and it will now be sent to the Executive for ratification.   Member and Staff training were decided for the current Municipal Year and topics for Informal Council Meetings.   In conclusion the provisional dates for forthcoming meetings were approved.