Issue - meetings

To consider the attached report of the Director of Governance.

The Director of Governance presented the report on the proposal that the Council no longer appointed a separate Standards Committee and that its functions be transferred to the Governance Committee instead.

Members were advised that the report had been considered and endorsed by the Governance Committee at its meeting held on 6 April 2017.

It was moved by Councillor P G Heath, duly seconded and

RESOLVED:       (a) That, as from the 2017 Annual Meeting of the Council, the Council no longer appoints a separate Standards Committee.

                            (b)   That, with effect from the 2017 Annual Meeting of the Council, the functions of the Standards Committee be transferred to the Governance Committee and the revised functions as described at Appendix 1 be adopted and incorporated into the Council’s Constitution.

(c)   That, with effect from the 2017 Annual Meeting of the Council, the membership of the Governance Committee be increased from 6 to 7 members.

(d)   That the Director of Governance be authorised to make consequential textual changes to the Council’s Constitution to remove references to the Standards Committee and where appropriate replace with reference to the Governance Committee.

To consider the attached report of the Director of Governance.

The Director of Governance presented the report on proposals to cease appointing a Standards Committee and the transfer of its functions relating to corporate service complaints and member conduct to the Governance Committee.

Members were advised that since the introduction of the new Code of Conduct in 2012 which transferred many of the functions of the previous statutory Standards Committee to the Monitoring Officer in respect of member complaints, the business for the Standards Committee had significantly reduced. As a result, a third of the scheduled meetings of the Standards Committee had been cancelled over the 5 year period and for those meetings that had been held the average length of meeting had reduced from 59 minutes to 14.5 minutes.

The residual functions of the Standards Committee, particularly around corporate service complaints, had a significant synergy with the work of the Governance Committee and it was proposed that the Committees functions and responsibilities be amended to include them. It was also proposed that the membership of the Governance Committee be increased by one as a result of its new responsibilities.

If Council approved the changes then a training session would be held for the members of the Governance Committee to reflect the new functions and responsibilities.

RESOLVED: That it be recommended to Council:

(a)       That, as from the 2017 Annual Meeting of the Council, the Council no longer appoints a separate Standards Committee.

(b)       That, with effect from the 2017 Annual Meeting of the Council, the functions of the Standards Committee are transferred to the Governance Committee and the revised functions as described at Appendix 1 are adopted and incorporated into the Council’s Constitution.

(c)       That, with effect from the 2017 Annual Meeting of the Council, the membership of the Governance Committee is increased from 6 to 7 members.

(d)       That the Director of Governance is authorised to make consequential textual changes to the Council’s Constitution to remove references to the Standards Committee and where appropriate replace with reference to the Governance Committee.

(d)