Constitution Working Party
Please Contact: Emma Denny
Please email: emma.denny@north-norfolk.gov.uk
Please Direct Dial on: 01263 516010
06 July 2015
A meeting of the Constitution Working Party will be held in the Committee Room at the
Council Offices, Holt Road, Cromer on Monday 13 July at 1.00 pm in the Committee
Room.
Sheila Oxtoby
Chief Executive
To: Mrs H Cox, Mrs A M Fitch-Tillett, Ms V R Gay, Mrs A M Moore and Miss B Palmer, Mr T
FitzPatrick, Mr A Wells
If you have any special requirements in order to attend this meeting, please let us
know in advance
If you would like any document in large print, audio, Braille, alternative format or in a
different language please contact us
Chief Executive: Sheila Oxtoby
Strategic Directors: Nick Baker and Steve Blatch
Tel 01263 513811 Fax 01263 515042 Minicom 01263 516005
Email districtcouncil@north-norfolk.gov.uk Web site northnorfolk.org
AGENDA
1.
TO RECEIVE APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE
2.
MINUTES
(page 3)
To approve as a correct record the minutes of the meeting of the Constitution
Working Party held on 16 March 2015.
3.
ITEMS OF URGENT BUSINESS
To determine any items of business which the Chairman decides should be
considered as a matter of urgency pursuant to Section 100B(4)(b) of the Local
Government Act 1972.
4.
DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST
Members are asked at this stage to declare any interests that they may have in any
of the following items on the agenda. The Code of Conduct for Members requires
that declarations include the nature of the interest and whether it is a disclosable
pecuniary interest.
5.
UPDATES TO THE CONSTITUTION
To consider any recent changes to the Constitution, as advised by the Monitoring
Officer.
The changes could reflect:


6.
Changes in the law
Changes in the internal structure of the Council, titles of postholders etc.
Improvements to the existing constitution suggested by the Monitoring Officer
REVIEW OF OFFICER / MEMBER PROTOCOL
(page 7)
At the request of the Chief Executive, the Monitoring Officer has reviewed the current
protocol for Member / Officer Relations (Chapter 7) and drafted a new protocol aimed
at improving communication with local members and ensuring that they are notified in
good time of any policy changes or projects with a key impact on local areas or
communities.
7.
DELEGATION TO CABINET MEMBERS
At the request of the Leader, the Monitoring Officer has prepared a short report on
delegating some decisions to individual Cabinet members. This report will follow
shortly.
8.
FUTURE MEETINGS
To be confirmed
CONSTITUTION WORKING PARTY
Minutes of a meeting of the Constitution Working Party held on 16 March in the
Committee Room, Council Offices, Holt Road, Cromer at 10.00 am.
Working Party:
Officers in
Attendance:
1
Mrs H Cox, Mrs A Moore, Miss B Palmer
Mr T FitzPatrick
The Monitoring Officer, the Head of Finance and the Democratic
Services Team Leader
TO RECEIVE APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE
Mr M Baker, Mrs A Fitch-Tillett, Ms V Gay, Mr G Williams
2
MINUTES
The Minutes of the meeting held on 23 February 2015 were approved as a correct
record and signed by the Chairman, subject to the following amendment on page 5:
‘The Chairman (herself a member of the County Council) said that she thought it was
mixed and said it may well have been different if the Council had waited for the new
administration to bed-in before introducing a change in governance. She added that
there had been some concerns that the Committees were not able to elect their own
chairman as these appointments had been made by the Leader of the County
Council’.
3
ITEMS OF URGENT BUSINESS
None
4
DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST
None
5
UPDATES TO THE CONSTITUTION
The Monitoring Officer informed Members that the only update to the Constitution
concerned delegations to the Head of Paid Service regarding elections. He advised
them that there had been no feedback yet on the outcome of the consultation on
Proposed Local Authorities (Functions and Responsibilities) (England) Regulations
2015, which had put forward a set of draft regulations to update the rules for
decision-making in councils. The consultation had closed on 6th March 2015 and the
Monitoring Officer said that he would find out when the DCLG were likely to report on
the outcome and notify members.
Mr T FitzPatrick asked the Monitoring Officer to clarify the view that local authorities
could do anything they liked as long as it was not against the law. The Monitoring
Officer replied that essentially this was correct. He said that the approach was the
Constitution Working Party
16 March 2015
3
‘power of ‘first resort’ and as long as something was not specifically prohibited – such
as lending and borrowing then it could be done.
6
REVIEW OF FINANCIAL REGULATIONS
The Chairman invited the Monitoring Officer to introduce this item. He explained that
in view of the tight timescales a ‘light touch’ approach had been taken to reflect any
changes in the law, figures and changes in delegations.
Mr FitzPatrick queried previous advice given by the Monitoring Officer regarding
decisions delegated to a Head of Service ‘in consultation with the Portfolio Holder’.
The Monitoring Officer explained that there were two reasons why he was concerned
about this approach:
Firstly, every decision maker whether it was council, cabinet, council or cabinet
committee or sub-committee or individual member or officer exercised the power of
the authority when they made that decision and it was (particularly in the case of
individuals) their decision and theirs alone. There could not be a decision making
team of an officer and a member. Also, it was not clear on what exactly the officer
consulted the member and what response was given by the member. There was now
a considerable body of case law on consultation and it had to conform with the
principles of fairness and openness and it was also important that the decision maker
had not already made up their mind on the decision being considered.
Secondly, the Openness Regulations 2014 now imposed a duty upon decision
makers to record that decision together with various other matters. So, the decision
making officer was now required to record the contribution of the councillor. The
Monitoring Officer concluded that in his view the retention of the delegated officer
consulting with the portfolio holder was potentially problematic both legally and in
accountability terms.
Mr FitzPatrick said that for some decisions there was approval with several different
options and the Cabinet member made the final decision as to which option to go
with. The Monitoring Officer replied that some local authorities gave individual
cabinet members delegated authority to make decisions. Mr FitzPatrick
acknowledged this and said that it could be something that could be considered
following the election.
The Monitoring Officer confirmed that if this route was taken, then the Cabinet
member would have to record how the decision was reached – for transparency
reasons. Mr FitzPatrick added that in future where a range of options were put
forward as part of the decision that it might be preferable to delegate that decision to
the portfolio holder.
The Chairman thanked the Monitoring Officer for his advice and asked whether
further information could be circulated to members. The Monitoring Officer agreed.
The Chairman then asked whether the Head of Finance could respond to some
specific queries regarding the changes to the financial regulations. She referred to
page 12, s4.6f which suggested the removal of the wording ‘and to Cabinet’. The
Head of Finance said that the wording could be left in if members preferred.
The Chairman then referred to page 23, s7.13 and sought clarification on behalf of
members regarding the proposed increase from £10k to £20k for the writing off of
debts. The Head of Finance confirmed that this referred to larger bad debts up to
£20k. In response to a further question from Mr T FitzPatrick regarding the proposed
removal of section 7.10 - ‘Where a debt is proven to be irrecoverable or uneconomic
to recover, to agree the write-off of bad debts up to £10,000 in each case and to refer
Constitution Working Party
16 March 2015
4
larger sums to the Cabinet for its approval’ the Head of Finance said that it was
intended to bring the financial regulations in line with the scheme of delegation and
that Cabinet received the Debt Management report on an annual basis. Mr
FitzPatrick said that he was concerned that Cabinet could lose sight of some
situations such as where a property owner owed the council money for various
reasons. The Monitoring Officer advised that even if the debts were written off they
could still be pursued by the Council.
The Chairman queried proposed changes to the virement levels as outlined on page
9 of the report. The Head of Finance replied that the changes had been
recommended a while ago but had not been reflected in the Constitution and this was
simply to ensure that the Constitution was up to date.
The Head of Finance said that the procurement thresholds had already been
amended but that further work could be forthcoming. The Monitoring Officer agreed
and advised that when the new procurement regulations came into force the
Constitution would need to be updated again to reflect the changes.
RESOLVED to recommend to Council:
To approve amendments to the Financial Regulations (Chapter 9 of the Constitution)
to reflect changes in legislation, postholder titles and to ensure consistency with
internal financial procedures.
7.
REVIEW OF PLANNING MATTERS AND DELEGATIONS
Mrs A Moore queried the proposed changes to the Terms of Reference for the
Development Committee and whether that level of detail was required. The
Monitoring Officer replied that the Head of Planning wanted to take a different, more
robust approach. Mrs Moore then sought clarification on the wording for section 5 of
the terms of reference as it did not seem clear. She suggested that it was along the
lines of ‘a resolution is made that the committee is minded to’. It was agreed that this
was clearer. The inclusion of a list of relevant legislation was also queried. Members
felt that it would need to be updated regularly and that it would be preferable to keep
it as high-level as possible.
Mrs Moore also queried the proposed removal of the wording that the Monitoring
Officer and the s151 needed to be consulted. The Monitoring Officer replied that
legally s151 officers should not be consulted in such cases and that as Monitoring
Officer he had only been consulted once and it was not a success.
The Democratic Services Team Leader agreed to ascertain whether the example
code of practice appended to the report was being considered in its entirety.
RESOLVED to recommend to Council:
To approve the changes to the Constitution in relation to the terms of reference of
Development Committee and conditional and default delegation to the Head of
Planning.
8.
COASTAL CONCORDAT
The Democratic Services Team Leader advised Members that this item was for
information and that the Development Committee had made a recommendation to
Council to update the Constitution to reflect the impact of the Coastal Concordat.
Constitution Working Party
16 March 2015
5
RESOLVED
To support the following recommendation to Council:
To amend the Constitution and Scheme of Delegation to enable Development
Committee to determine controversial applications for Coastal Protection Consent, in
circumstances where the Council as Local Planning Authority is acting as the lead
authority under the Coastal Concordat and the Head of Service declines to use their
delegated authority.
REVIEW OF THE CONSTITUTION
The Democratic Services Team Leader had circulated examples of an
Officer/Member Protocol and a Media Protocol as requested. The Monitoring Officer
suggested that any revision to the Council’s current protocols should be deferred until
the new administration was in place. The Democratic Services Team Leader agreed
to ascertain whether the Council had a media protocol and if so, whether it should be
included within the Constitution.
AGREED
To defer the revision of the Member/Officer protocol and the Media Protocol until
after May 2015.
REVIEW OF GOVERNANCE ARRANGEMENTS
The Chairman said that the Constitution Working Party was not in a position to make
a recommendation on governance arrangements yet. She suggested that further
consideration was given to the matter after the district council elections in May 2015.
Members agreed.
The Monitoring Officer clarified that delegation to portfolio holders was not possible
under a committee system of governance.
The meeting closed at 11.25am.
Chairman
Constitution Working Party
16 March 2015
6
Agenda Item 6
OFFICERS AND LOCAL MEMBERS
CURRENT NNDC CONSTITUTION
“11. Local Members
11.1 It is essential for the proper running of the Council that Members should be
fully informed about matters on which they may be required to make decisions
or which affect their electoral wards.
11.2 It is the duty of each Director to ensure that all relevant staff are aware of the
requirement to keep Local Members informed and that the timing of such
information allows Members to contribute to those decisions. Local Members
shall also be kept informed about matters affecting their Wards during the
formative stages of policy development.
11.3 Issues may affect a single Ward but others may have a wider - even districtwide
impact, in which case numerous Members will need to be kept informed.
11.4 Local Members have an important role to play in representing the Council in
their constituencies; responding to the concerns of their constituents; in
meetings with partners and serving on outside organisations.
11.5 Whenever a public meeting is organised by the Council to consider a local
issue, all the Members representing the Ward(s) affected should as a matter
of course be invited to attend the meeting.
11.6 Similarly, whenever the Council undertakes any form of consultative exercise,
the Local Member(s) should be notified at the outset of the exercise.”
7
DRAFT LOCAL MEMBER PROTOCOL
1. The council will keep local members fully informed about matters on which
they may be required to make decisions or which affect their electoral wards
and about significant operational matters within the ward.
2. Each chief officer will ensure that all relevant staff are aware of the
requirement to keep local members informed and that, subject to paragraph 3
below, the timing of such information allows local where possible members to
respond appropriately and contribute to relevant decisions.
3. Any notification under this protocol should include sufficient detail to enable
the local member(s) to have a broad understanding of the issue including a
summary of advantages and disadvantages of any proposal and any financial
implications.
4. Where possible and / or lawful, communication of such information to local
members will be made seven days before publication by the council of that
same information. During those seven days the local member shall keep
confidential the information imparted and not disclose it further without the
agreement of the Chief Executive.
5. Also local members must be informed of the formative stages of policy
development as it affects their ward. This includes any consideration of the
matter by working parties or committees of the Council
8
6. Issues may affect a single electoral ward but others may have a wider impact
in which case a wider number of members will need to be kept informed.
7. Whenever a public meeting is organised by the Council to consider a local
issue all the members representing the electoral wards affected should as a
matter of course be invited to attend the meeting.
8. Similarly whenever the Council undertakes any form of consultative exercise
the local members must be consulted.
9. Where a news release specifically relates to an issue affecting a particular
ward or geographical area, the local Member(s) will be advised by email, or
telephone as appropriate and sent a copy of the proposed release prior to
distribution to the local media.
10. The local member’s name will always be added to the contacts list and the
Communications Team will offer advice and guidance in the usual way,
seeking a quote from the local member if appropriate.
David Johnson
Monitoring Officer
19 June 2015
9