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City of York Council |
Minutes |
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Meeting |
Joint Standards Committee |
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Date |
17 November 2022 |
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Present |
Councillors Rowley (Chair), D'Agorne (present for Agenda Items 2-9), Fisher and Kilbane (CYC Members) Councillors Chambers and Waudby (Parish Council Members)
Mr Gadd (attended remotely) and Mr Leigh (Independent Persons) |
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Apologies |
Councillor Galvin (CYC Member) Councillor Rawlings (Parish Council Member) |
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Officer in Attendance |
Frances Harrison – Deputy Monitoring Officer |
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Chair's Remarks
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The Chair welcomed the Independent Persons, Mr Gadd and Mr Leigh, to their first meeting of the Joint Standards Committee. |
13. Declarations of Interest (16:01)
Members were asked to declare any personal interests not included on the Register of Interests, or any prejudicial interests or disclosable pecuniary interests which they might have in respect of business on the agenda.
Cllr Fisher declared a prejudicial interest in respect of two of the cases on the list appended to the report at Agenda Item 8 (Monitoring Report on Complaints Received), due to his involvement in those cases. He left the room during consideration of that item and took no part in the discussion or decision thereon.
The Deputy Monitoring Officer advised, in general terms, that there was no need for Members to declare an interest in respect of cases that had been closed.
14. Appointment of Vice-Chair (16:03)
Cllr Kilbane nominated Cllr Rawlings to be appointed as Vice-Chair of the committee. The nomination was seconded by Cllr Waudby.
Having noted that Cllr Rawlings had previously indicated his willingness to accept this position, it was unanimously
Resolved: That Cllr Rawlings be appointed as Vice-Chair of the committee for the remainder of the 2022/23 Municipal Year.
[The meeting was adjourned briefly at this point for the Chair to take advice from the Deputy Monitoring Officer.]
15. Exclusion of Press and Public (16:08)
Resolved: That the press and public be excluded from the meeting during consideration of the exempt versions of Annexes A and B to Agenda Item 8 (Monitoring Report in Respect of Complaints Received), on the grounds that they contain information likely to reveal the identity of individuals, which is classed as exempt under Paragraph 2 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972 (as amended by the Local Government (Access to Information) (Variation) Order 2006.
16. Minutes (16:09)
Resolved: That the minutes of the meeting of the Joint Standards Committee held on 30 June 2022 be approved, and signed by the Chair as a correct record.
17. Minutes of Sub-Committees (16:10)
Resolved: That the minutes of the meetings of the Joint Standards Assessments Sub-Committee held on 19 May 2022, 9 August 2022 and 19 October 2022 be approved, and signed by the Chair as a correct record in each case.
18. Public Participation (16:12)
It was reported that there had been no registrations to speak at the meeting under the Council’s Public Participation Scheme.
19. Monitoring Report on Complaints Received (16:28)
Members considered a report which provided an update on current business regarding complaints.
An anonymised list of live complaints was attached at Annex A to the report, and an anonymised list of closed complaints at Annex B. Full details were provided in an exempt version of each annex. Discussion of the exempt lists took place in private session, in accordance with the resolution in Minute 15 above.
Resolved: That the report be noted.
Reason: To ensure that the committee is aware of current levels of activity.
20. Review of Work Plan (16:13)
Members considered the committee’s work plan for the current municipal year.
During their discussion, Members raised issues regarding the presentation of complaints in the regular monitoring report. It was agreed that, once a case had been reported to the committee as closed and the reason for closure provided, it need not come before the committee again. The Deputy Monitoring Officer also agreed to consider how the structure of the annexes might be simplified for the sake of clarity.
Resolved: That the work plan be approved subject to the following amendments / additions:
Meeting on 19 January 2023:
a) Sheena Spence of YLCA confirmed as attending the meeting.
b) Add the following items:
· Update from Audit & Governance Committee on the Member Training Programme
· Review of Standards policies and procedures.
Reason: To ensure that the committee has a planned programme of work in place.
Cllr M Rowley BEM, Chair
The meeting started at 4.00 pm and finished at 4.52 pm.