Meeting documents

To receive PowerPoint presentation and verbal update

Public Participation – for information and reference, please see attached relevant extracts from: -

a)    Somerset County Council (2 documents) – pages 17 – 21;

b)    Buckinghamshire Council  - pages 23 – 37; and

c)    Wiltshire Council (2 documents) – pages 39 – 56.

The Committee considered a presentation from the Council’s Monitoring Officer and Strategic Manager – Governance and Democratic Services, Scott Wooldridge, which outlined the approach and options to developing the section on Public Participation within the new Constitution for the new Somerset Council.

The following points were highlighted:

·         Timings of meetings:

·         Concern was raised on working age councillors and whether they would be able to attend council meetings during the day, due to work commitments.  Councillors further queried whether any comparison work had been carried out with other unitary councils.

The Monitoring Officer advised that a comparison had been carried out, the results of which had been included in the presentation.

·         Councillors suggested that some meetings could be held in the local areas, such as Planning Committee and the Local Community Networks (LCNs) and should be held in the evening to encourage public attendance.

·         Councillors queried what Public Participation was like in other unitary councils.

The Monitoring Officer advised that the participation was varied across the other councils.  He also advised that the title was deliberately named ‘Participation’, as engagement should happen at an earlier stage of the democratic process.

·         Councillors queried the use of hybrid meetings.

The Monitoring Officer advised that the current legislation did not allow for hybrid meetings, so committee members (voting members) were required to attend in person.  Councils had been lobbying Central Government to request a change to the legislation.

·         Concern was raised that women were under-represented within the council and if meetings were held between 2pm and 6pm, this could be difficult for parents to attend if they had to fit it around the ‘school run’.

·         Councillors agreed that it was a difficult issue and that they wanted to be fair for all but that a pragmatic approach was needed.  The proposed timings were a good starting place.

·         Councillors agreed that locations needed to be considered as well as timings of meetings.

·         Concern was raised on the timings of the LCNs, as councillors wanted to ensure that those meetings did not clash with the parish council meetings or with any of the unitary council meetings.

·         Councillors urged officers to ensure that the computer systems used in the New Council were improved to ensure proper public engagement could be carried out at meetings.

The Monitoring Officer advised that the systems currently used did allow for public to take part in the meetings from home.

·         Councillors suggested a template could be drawn up for public statements and that the language used should enable public engagement.

·         Public questions:

·         Councillors supported the addition of a supplementary question for clarification only purposes.

The Monitoring Officer confirmed that the supplementary question would not allow for another 3 minutes of questions and that he would recommend a time limit of 1 minute.  The total time permitted to Public Question Time was 20 minutes in total but was at the Chair’s discretion to allow for extra time.

·         Councillors requested assurance that answers would be given at the meetings and not via a written answer.

The Monitoring Officer advised that answers should be given at the meetings, as the deadline for public questions was sufficient to allow officers to compile answers in time for the meeting.

·         Councillors supported the change to 2 days’ notice for public questions.

·         Councillors queried whether the agendas could be published 6 days prior to the meetings.

The Monitoring Officer advised that he could request that agendas were published earlier, however, that would impact on officers’ timeframes for producing reports and the legislation stated that agendas had to be published 5 working days prior to the meetings.

·         Councillors queried whether there was a time limit for producing minutes of meetings.

The Monitoring Officer advised that the standard timeframe was to ensure the minutes were produced in time for inclusion in the following agenda.  Decision notices were produced soon after the meeting.

·         Councillors queried whether hard copies of the agendas were available in local offices.

The Monitoring Officer advised that hard copies were available at the principal council offices.

·         Petitions:

·         Councillors suggested that parish councillors should be recognised when they had submitted a statement for Public Question Time.

·         Some councillors liked the use of the term ‘citizen’ and others liked the use of the term ‘people’.

·         Councillors agreed that the language used in the new constitution needed to be legal, but it should also be clear and ‘user friendly’.