Agenda item

To give consideration to amendments to the allocation of committee seats and appointments to committees following changes to proportionality.

The report to Council proposed an amendment to the membership of the Council’s Committees and Advisory Groups. This amendment was required under Section 85 of the Local Government Act 1972, which had automatically resulted in a Member vacating their office as Councillor.

Members were informed that in order to comply with the legal requirement for the Council’s Committees and Advisory Groups to be politically proportional, the positions allocated to the Labour Group at Annual Council, in May 2020 would have to be reduced by one place. The report proposed that this be achieved by removing the Labour Group position on the Standards Committee. This revised allocation of places would continue until the vacancy on the Council had been filled at an election. The allocation of positions on Committee and Advisory Groups would then be reviewed, to ensure that they were politically proportional. 

The report proposed no additional changes to the membership of the Council’s Committees and Advisory Groups. No other changes were suggested at the meeting.

Councillor A Dale and W Armitage moved and seconded the recommendations, as set out in the report.

Members discussed extensively the reasons why the former Councillor had vacated his seat. In particular, they questioned whether there had been scope to prevent this, what action had been taken to enable the Member to remain as a Councillor, by formally extending the time limits established under the Local Government Act 1972 and on how the matter had been communicated to both the Councillor and his political colleagues. Concern was raised that this communication had not been clear nor effective in explaining the position.

At the conclusion of the discussion, Some Members felt that a range of questions and concerns about the circumstances leading to the vacancy required further investigation and clarification. They stressed that the results of this further investigation should then be reported back to Council for consideration.

Councillor R Shipman and Councillor T Reader asked that the motion be amended to include a provision for the Monitoring Officer to carry out a review and investigation into the matter and the specific actions taken prior to the member vacating their office as Councillor. They also asked that this review and its findings be reported back to Council.

Councillor A Dale and Councillor W Armitage made clear that they accepted the amendment to the motion.

The motion, as amended, was put to the vote and was carried.

RESOLVED –

(Amendment to the motion underlined)

(1)       That Council agreed the allocation of seats of to its Committees and Advisory Groups, in accordance with the political balance rules as set out in Appendix 1 to the report.

(2)       That Council agreed the appointment to Committees and Advisory Groups, as set out in Appendix 2 to the report.

(3)       That Council noted that a vacancy had automatically arisen on the Authority and the Notice of Vacancy would now be made, with elections held at the earliest in May 2021.

(4)       That the Monitoring Officer be required to carry out an investigation into the circumstances and actions leading to the recent Local Government Act 1972 Section 85 vacancy which had occurred and report her findings to Council.