Agenda item

To consider a report by the Democratic Services Manager, Steve Price (copy attached), about the Council’s arrangements for holding its member-level meetings.

The Democratic Services Manager, Steve Price, introduced the report (previously circulated).

The previous Council administration took decisions on how Council meetings would be held. This had been in response to changes during 2020 and 2021, a period of pandemic lock-downs which temporarily halted traditional face-to-face meetings. Changes in the law governing certain Council and committee meetings, and the technical advancements made during that period, had allowed business to be conducted using virtual or hybrid meetings.

In December 2021 full Council considered a report on “Proposals for Members to adopt New Ways of Working”. The report outlined recommendations agreed at a members’ Task and Finish Group and by the Democratic Services Committee that looked at the New Ways of Working agenda, primarily focusing on how members’ meetings should be conducted, and the ICT equipment required for Members.

In favour of virtual meetings

·         Council had declared a Climate Change and Ecological Emergency. Virtual meetings did not have the carbon emissions generated from member and officer journeys to meeting venues.

·         Reduction in travel expenses.

·         Reduction in time spent travelling to meetings.

·         Virtual meetings could be more accessible (participants could attend from any location, and the time commitment was limited to the meeting time itself) and likely to promote participation in local democracy.

In favour of face-to-face meetings

·         Some members felt that face to face meetings enabled them to engage better in debate and able to interpret the atmosphere of a meeting, or the body language of participants.

·         Some members missed the social benefits of interacting directly with their peers in the same location.

·         Any technical problems could affect the business being undertaken or the participation of those experiencing a technical problem.

The Democratic Services Manager reported that the current group leaders had appointed members to a working group (the “How Meetings are Held Working Group”).  This working group had designed a survey for all elected members, lay-members and the Council’s Senior Leadership Team.  The survey had been opened on the 17 November 2023.  He advised that the survey also passed questions about the Council’s hybrid meetings protocol.

During discussions, the following points were raised –

·         The voting process during hybrid meetings had been queried as for some meetings a roll call was taken for members attending remotely but the electronic voting took place for those members attending in person in the Chamber.  It was requested that this could be addressed so that voting was the same whether attending in person or online.  Technical issues had caused the issue regarding voting but this was currently being tested which would then mean a consistent voting process.

·         The Chair asked whether support staff had been included in the survey.  It was confirmed that all members and SLT were included in the survey but not support staff.

·         It was confirmed that it was a legal requirement to allow members to attend  public facing formal committees remotely, which meant that those meetings could only be held either entirely online or as hybrid meetings.  Council had chosen to hold those meetings as hybrid meetings.

·         The Council’s informal, internal elected member meetings did not fall under the statutory provisions of the formal public committees so the Council could choose how they should be held. In 2021 Council decided that the internal meetings would be held as virtual meetings unless there were over-riding reasons for a different method of conducting a meeting.

·         The ‘How Meetings are Held Working Group would meet again to review the responses from the 2023 survey.

RESOLVED that the Democratic Services Committee accepted the report and the How Meetings are Held Working Group would report at a future Democratic Services Committee.