58.
Councillor Harris (by reason of being a Member of the Member Development Group) declared a non-pecuniary interest in the following item pursuant to the provision of Meetings General Procedure Rule 7 (5)
Matthew Sterling, Assistant Director (Policy and Corporate) and Richard Clifford, Democratic Services Officer, introduced the Review of Meetings and Ways of Working report. The report concerns the work completed to date on the review of meetings and ways of working and includes recommendations for the next steps of the review.
Matthew Sterling informed the Committee that the review had been taking place over the last municipal year. The original aims of the review were to improve public participation and make meetings more accessible. As part of the review Councillors were invited to an informal meeting, three drop-in sessions were held for members of the public and an online survey was created. This report followed on from the previous update provided to the Committee in March 2017 and included a number of recommendations.
Matthew Sterling provided the Committee with a summary of the recommendations that were included within the report. Matthew Sterling suggested that the Governance and Audit Committee may wish to consider what criteria should be used to assess whether the sixth month trial of meetings had been successful.
Councillor Barlow thanked the former Chair of the Governance and Audit Committee, Councillor Pearson, for his work on the Review of Meetings and Ways of Working. Councillor Barlow also thanked the work of officers in arranging the review and attending the drop-in sessions.
Councillor Barlow proceeded through the recommendations provided within the report. The Committee agreed with the recommendations regarding provision of equipment for Councillors and trialling digital agendas. Councillor Willetts questioned whether a contingency plan was in place if a device fails or runs out of power during a meeting, and whether if devices did fail a Committee meeting would need to be adjourned. Matthew Sterling informed Committee members that a contingency plan would be devised during the trial of digital agendas. Safeguards could include the provision of small portable charger packs for devices. Committee members were also informed that the digital agenda application, MyCMIS, did not require an active Wi-fi connection as agendas are automatically downloaded.
The Committee agreed the recommendation to Council that all meetings be audio streamed. Councillor Maclean questioned whether statistics on the number of listeners would be available. In response Richard Clifford confirmed that statistics for the number of listeners were available and could be reported to the Committee if requested.
Committee members agreed with the introduction of report templates and agenda templates, and agreed the recommendation to Council to allow for the public speaker to speak for an additional minute in order to ask a supplementary question. Councillor Graham questioned whether there were deadlines for responses to those questions that cannot be answered at the meeting. Richard Clifford informed the Committee that it is common practice that a response is provided as soon as possible and that a report was provided to Cabinet that report on the progress of responses to members of public.
The proposal to trial the Governance and Audit Committee start time at 7pm was agreed by the Committee. Committee members discussed different methods of measuring the success of later start time. This included noting the attendance by members of the public and Councillors at the Committee meeting, as well as conducting a survey with Committee members. It was also suggested that later start times may require shorter speeches from Councillors and greater work programme management to ensure meetings do not last too long.
Councillor Lilley
Councillor Lilley attended the meeting to speak about the issue of improving the members’ room. Councillor Lilley stated that he could not agree to the Council spending money on upgrading the members’ room when there are residents in Colchester who are struggling financially.
Councillor Lilley did suggest that Councillor mailboxes in the Town Hall could be removed or relocated to political group rooms. However, it would not be the right time to invest in furniture or painting the members room. Councillor Lilley also highlighted that there may be scope for ceasing the delivery service with the move to using digital agendas.
Committee Discussion
The Committee discussed the members’ room improvements as costed within the report. Whilst there was acknowledgement that having a space for members to meet and discuss agendas informally would be beneficial, the cost of the improvements were deemed too high, particularly in the current financial climate. It was suggested that there could be improvements without the significant cost, such as removal of Councillor Mailboxes and installation of charging points. The Committee agreed that the issue be referred to the Group Leaders for further consideration by the political groups.
The Committee discussed the methods of increasing social media activity and agreed with the proposals included in the report. With regard to member training, Committee members were supportive of the aim to increase the level of training for Councillors, and also raised questions about whether sanctions should be considered for those Councillors who don’t attend training events and what other local authorities do.
RESOLVED;
- that the Committee note that Officers will continue to loan IT equipment to Councillors who do not currently have a suitable device to enable the digital agenda trial to proceed.
- To RECOMMEND to Council that all meetings be audio streamed and to facilitate this the Council enter into a contract with Audiominutes
- That the contents of the report templates and agenda templates be implemented across all Committees.
- To RECOMMEND to Council that the Meetings General Procedure Rules be amended to allow a public speaker to speak for an additional minute in order to ask a supplementary question or make a further comment during Have Your Say! Arrangements.
- That the Governance and Audit Committee review implications of later start times following a six month trial.
- That Group Leaders further consider options for improving the members’ room.
- That a more proactive approach be taken to the promotion of Council meetings via Social Media
- To RECOMMEND to the Member Development Group that it consider the issue of mandatory training for Councillors and report to Cabinet by December 2017.