Agenda item

Presentation and question and answer session with :

Ian Marks - Senior Lawyer ,  Governance Team

Ian Millichap - Constitutional Manager

4.1  The Constitutional Manager presented this item concerning background information on the council assembly’s role and scope for change. The Senior Lawyer was also present to address any legal issues which may arise from members’ questions.

4.2  The officer pointed out that the key aspects of council assembly were contained  under paragraph 5 of the report, which included budget setting and the policy framework.

• Council assembly sets policy framework i.e. (planning and licensing) and has added community councils to the framework.council assembly has delegated some matters to cabinet, which in turn can delegate down to community councils such as the cleaner greener fund.

4.3  It was pointed out to members that over the last few years the number of meetings have been reduced, but this year one extra meeting has been called for October 2010 so there are now currently a total of 7 meetings scheduled for this year.

4.4  It should be noted that if changes were made to council assembly, it should also recognise that for each meeting there is only a limited amount of time (3 hours).

4.5  The current forms of public participation include:

• Petitions: new rules from central government set out where and when a petition is heard by the council i.e. depending on the number of signatories it will have to be heard either by a community council, the council assembly or the cabinet. In general the new rules are quite prescriptive but there are some changeable elements e.g. thresholds set for the number of signatures.

• Deputations: (1) only allowed if there is a relevant report on the agenda to be decided on at that session (otherwise the deputation would be advised to submit a request to a community council or cabinet). (2) Strict time rules : 5 minutes speaking, 5 minutes for questions.

• Public Questions

4.6    Members then heard from the Senior Lawyer (Governance Team) who explained decisions were in fact driven by the council’s executive. This had replaced the previous style under the local government act 1972, where members carried out council business through committees and sub-committees.

4.7    The  local government act 2000 has allowed the executive/cabinet decision making powers. Part of the idea had been to reduce the number of meetings. The system was made to be more efficient, and more clear to the public, with a small number of members making decisions.

4.8  Scrutiny was set up to monitor and check executive decisions. Any item decision made by the executive/cabinet can be called in under the call-in process.

4.9   Members were informed that council assembly was not the only decision making body. The others were:

·  Individual member decision

·  Cabinet

·  Planning committee

·  Licensing committee

·  Community council

4.10  In response to questions regarding empowering community councils, the officer   reported that central government wants to give more decision making powers to community councils and would allow councils to go back to the old committees if they wish or retain cabinet arrangements. The authority has to operate legally  and essentially council assembly and cabinet can devolve some decisions down to community councils or another body.

4.11  The officer reported that with regards to petitions and deputations’. What used to happen was that a deputation would be submitted, this would provide a motion to council assembly where it would be heard and debated, which would impact on the rest of the agenda. The motion would then be referred to the cabinet for decision, so members would indeed need more meetings which would impact on the budget.

4.12  Members were informed that council assembly cannot override cabinet decisions, but overview and scrutiny committee can call-in any decisions.

4.13  Les Alden stated that questions and answers to cabinet members should be published on the Southwark website.

4.14  Councillor Glover stated that decisions were not taken at council assembly.meetings where public concerns were raised. More people would attend meetings if they could be heard and the council could make decisions which were binding.

  RESOLVED: That officers provide to members a list of things that council assembly can and cannot do. A report would be provided that would detail what powers could be delegated to Council Assembly from Cabinet etc and what decision making powers could be moved to other bodies , such as Community Councils.