An update on the attendance numbers for LFEPA’s public consultation meetings.
To recap, these sessions are being held on the direct instruction of Authority members who insisted was to last “at least 2 hours”.
Non-Tory LFEPA members boasted that their meetings would be superior to the “sham” consultations organised by the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) for the (then) draft crime plan.
MOPAC’s meetings attracted a total of 2,600 attendees. They also had 500 online and written responses to their consultation.
By comparison here’s how LFEPA are measuring up so far:
As already reported, 11 people attended the first meeting in Barking and Dagenham. Four are commonly accepted to have been ordinary members of the public, the rest being politicians or firefighters.
The Hammersmith meeting fared less well, drawing an audience of 8 of which five are understood to have been members of the public.
A meeting in Hillingdon, were one fire engine is due to be axed, drew a record crowd of around 30 including local politicians, fire fighters and even some Londoners.
The most recent meeting, held last night in Wandsworth, attracted around 24 attendees including local councillors, politicians, firefighters, and residents.
That gives us a total of 73 attendees at a series of meetings each costing around £1,000.
For LEFPA to match MOPAC’s attendance numbers it would need an average turn out of 126 at each of its remaining 20 meetings.
Far from showing the MOPAC how it’s done, LFEPA members are in danger of looking pretty red faced.
Unsurprisingly I hear some within MOPAC are savouring the rare experience of being the better performing of the Mayor’s functional bodies.
