Agenda item

To receive a report from the Director of Governance & Monitoring Officer which invites Council to approve and adopt revisions to the Constitution, in accordance with recommendations from the Audit & Governance Committee, and to agree the dates for implementation.

Note: Annex 1 to the above item (the Constitution) has not been included in the agenda pack due to its size, but is available to view online with this agenda.

Council received a report from the Monitoring Officer regarding approval and adoption of revisions to the Constitution, in accordance with the recommendations of the Audit & Governance Committee.

Cllr Pavolvic then moved, and Cllr Fisher seconded, the recommendations contained in paragraphs 3 and 4 of the report, as altered by the amended advice of the Monitoring Officer in respect of the recommended implementation date, as follows:

“3. Full Council is invited to determine the wording of the following for inclusion within the approved Constitution:

a)       Appointment of Substitutes to Committees (article 7 Decision Making, subsection 14 – substitutes)

                       i.    Paragraph 14.1 (a) - the inclusion or not of the following sentence:

“Substitutes shall be appointed from within the same political group”

If included, the paragraph would read (the disputed sentence is highlighted in bold type for ease of reference):

“For the Planning Committee A and Planning Committee B up to four named substitutes shall be allowed for each of the political Groups.  For other Member bodies up to three named substitutes shall be allowed for each political Group.  Substitutes shall be appointed from within the same political group.  Independent Councillors may also be appointed to act as named substitutes for other Independent Councillors within this rule”.

b)       Role of Executive Members on Planning Committee A and Planning Committee B

Full Council is invited to determine the position of Executive Members and their involvement or not in the Council’s Planning Committee functions.  Therefore Full Council is asked to approve one of the following options for inclusion in the Constitution:

Appendix 30 – Option 1 – maintains the current position in that Executive Members can sit on the Executive and Planning Committee A and Planning Committee B but do need to be mindful of a potential conflict of interest.

Appendix 30 – Option 2 – the Leader of the Council, the Deputy Leader of the Council and all other Executive Members cannot sit on either Planning Committee A or Planning Committee B.

Appendix 30 – Option 3  – where necessary Executive Members must choose whether to sit on the Executive or take up their seat on Planning Committee A or Planning Committee B so as to avoid a conflict of interest

c)   Upon confirmation of the role of the Executive Members on the Planning Committee function, the Director of Governance and Monitoring Officer is requested to make the necessary changes to accurately reflect the position in Article 13 and Appendix 17.

d)   The Council’s Scrutiny Function

i.         Article 8: Policy, Overview and Scrutiny

Paragraph 10.2 (b), Full Council is asked to determine if this paragraph should make reference to the Vice Chair or not (disputed wording is highlighted in bold type for ease of reference).  The paragraph currently reads:

“Allocating, in consultation with the relevant Chair and Vice-Chair, urgent issues to be considered by an appropriate committee (including ad-hoc scrutiny committee), as may be necessary”.

ii.            Appendix 5: Scrutiny Procedure Rules

Paragraph 16.3 – Full Council is invited to determine if the time anticipated as a guide to aid the length of the meetings in this paragraph should be 20 minutes or 30 minutes:

The paragraph currently states:

“After all signatories have made their contributions, members of the Committee will be invited to put questions to the signatories and receive responses to those questions. As a guide it is anticipated that this should not exceed 20 minutes in total”.

Paragraph 18.3 – Full Council is invited to determine the procedure for voting where there are a number of alleged breaches detailed in a call in request.  The disputed sentence is highlighted in bold type for ease of reference.

The paragraph states:

“The vote to be taken will be by a show of hands.Where multiple breaches are alleged, a vote shall take place in respect of each potential breach”.

4. Adopt the revised Constitution and approve its implementation in full on 26 May 2022,to coincide with Annual Council.

The Audit & Governance Committee is invited to undertake an annual fitness for purpose review of the Constitution as part of its work programme.

Full Council notes that the review of the Constitution also contributes significantly towards the progress against the Action Plan prepared in response to the Report in the Public Interest accepted by Full Council on 4 May 2021.”

A named vote was taken on each element of the recommendations, with the following results:

Vote 1 – on inclusion of the sentence ‘Substitutes shall be appointed from within the same political group’ in Paragraph 14.1 (a) of Article 7

The option to include that sentence was declared LOST.

Vote 2 – on Options for the role of Executive Members on Planning Committee A and Planning Committee B (Appendix 30)

Option 1 (to maintain the current position) was declared CARRIED.

c) Council indicated its agreement to request the Director of Governance & Monitoring Officer to make the necessary changes to accurately reflect the position in Article 13 and Appendix 17 of the Constitution following the result of the above two votes.

Vote 3 – Article 8, Policy, Overview and Scrutiny – on whether paragraph 10.2(b) should include reference to the Vice Chair.

The inclusion of the reference to the Vice-Chair was declared CARRIED.

Vote 4 – Appendix 5, Scrutiny Procedure Rules – on whether to amend the time in Paragraph 16.3 from 20 minutes to 30 minutes

The option to amend the time to 30 minutes was declared LOST.

Vote 5 – Appendix 5, Scrutiny Procedure Rules – on whether to include in paragraph 18.3 the sentence ‘Where multiple breaches are alleged, a vote should take place in respect of each potential breach’:

The option to include that sentence was declared LOST.

A named vote was then taken on the motion to adopt the revised Constitution in its entirety on 26 May 2022.  The result was as follows:

The motion was therefore declared CARRIED and it was

Resolved:  That the revised Constitution (incorporating the amendments agreed above) be adopted, and implemented in full on 26 May 2022 to coincide with Annual Council.