Meetings

Meeting Details

Meeting Summary
Governance Committee
2 Mar 2016 - 14:00 to 15:50
Scheduled
  • Documents
  • Attendance
  • Visitors
  • Declarations of Interests

Documents

Agenda

Standard Items
1 APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE
To receive any apologies for absence. 


1

An apology for absence was received from Councillor Annison.

2 DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

You have a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest in a matter to be discussed if it relates to something on your Register of Interests form. You must declare the interest and leave the room while the matter is dealt with.

You have a Personal Interest in a matter to be discussed if it affects
•    your well being or financial position
•    that of your family or close friends
•    that of a club or society in which you have a management role
•    that of another public body of which you are a member to a greater extent than others in your ward.
You must declare a personal interest but can speak and vote on the matter.

Whenever you declare an interest you must say why the interest arises, so that it can be included in the minutes. 

2

There were no Declarations of Interest.


3 pdf MINUTES (90Kb)
To approve the minutes of the meeting held 2 February 2016.

3

The minutes of the meeting held on the 2 February 2016 were confirmed.

Details Attached.

4

The Committee considered the Deputy Monitoring Officer's report on the proposals for a Committee structure following discussions at the last meeting. In discussing the proposals, Members gave consideration to the proposal to have separate Housing and Neighbourhoods Committee and Members agreed that the functions of the Committee should be combined and that the Committee should be known as the Housing and Neighbourhoods Committee. The Committee confirmed that the Committee Structure would be as follows :-

Council
Policy and Resources Committee
Economic Development Committee
Environment Committee
Housing and Neighbourhoods Committee

Members also agreed to the following regulatory Committees :-

Appeals Committee
Licensing Committee
Development Control Committee
Audit and Risk Committee
Standards Committee

Members were reminded that under the present Constitution there was a Housing Appeals Committee and Members agreed that the functions of that Committee could be incorporated within the Housing and Neighbourhoods Committees role.

The Committee then considered in detail the proposed Terms of Reference for each of the main Committees detailed above as follows :-

a) Council

Agree proposed Terms of reference with the deletion of the Crime and Disorder Reduction Strategy and to the amendment of the receiving of minutes of Committees acting under delegated powers for question and comments and add after being signed off by the Committee. The Committee also agreed that a decision list of all decisions taken by Committees and Officers should be published on a monthly basis and circulated to all Members.

b) Policy and Resources Committee

Agree to proposed Terms of Reference subject to :-
  • The need to have a write off policy
  • The need to tidy up the strategy wording in order to fitin with the corporate plan
  • The need for a commissioning framework
  • Agree to the establishment of a Joint Consultative Committee 5 Members (politically balanced)
  • Outside Bodies preparation of a proforma for circulation to Members in order that the Outside Bodies can be reviewed at the next meeting to determine which outside bodies can be retained or deleted. Also acknowledge that appointments should be subject to the political balance rules in the Local Government and Housing Act 1989 and regulations made under that act. The Interim Chief Executive Officer suggested that appointments to outside bodies could be deferred to Group Leaders for determination.
c) Economic Development Committee

Agree to proposed Terms of Reference subject to the following :-
  • Add in responsibility for Arts and Cultural Strategy and Sport and Leisure Strategy.
  • Reference should be made to Economic Growth
d) Environment Committee

Agree Terms of Reference subject to the following :- 
  • Include Health and Safety under Environmental Protection and Improvement 
  • Removal of permitted development rights through Article 4 Direction should be a Development Control Committee responsibility.
  • Functions of the Council relating to complaints regarding high hedges contained in part 8 of the Anti Social Behaviour Act 2003 should be a Development Control Committee responsibility.
  • Developing and adopting policies and procedures in accordance with the Councils Health and Wellbeing Strategies should be moved to the Housing and Neighbourhoods Committee.
  • Add duties of the local authority under the Coastal Protection Legislation.
  • Members agreed that Health and Safety generally should be a Policy and Resources Committee function.
e) Housing and Neighbourhoods Committee

Agree Terms of Reference subject to :- 
  • External relations and public relations should be moved to the Policy and Resources Committee
  • Add Community Assets to this Committees responsibilities
  • Delete Safeguarding Children and Young Persons
f) Committee Cycle and Size of Committees

The Cabinet Secretary asked the Committee to confirm their wishes in respect of the frequency of Committee meetings and also the number of Members to sit on each of the Committees.

Members agreed the following :-

1) That the Committees should meet on a six weekly cycle and that this be reviewed after six months 

2) That Council meetings will meet every 8 weeks and that this be reviewed after six months.

3) The numbers of Members to sit on the Main Committees will be 13 Members (politically balanced)

4) The Area Committees for Yarmouth and Gorleston will be retained

5) The timings of meeting will be a 6:30pm start and Council will commence at 7pm (Members agreed that they would give further consideration to the possibility of the Policy and Resources Committee meeting during the day and also whether the timings of the main Committees could commence at 6pm rather than 6:30pm.)


An early draft copy of the Constitution for members consideration is attached  

5

The Deputy Monitoring Officer reported on the changes required to the Constitution under the introduction of the Committee System. He advised that all references to Executive and Cabinet had been removed from the Constitution and that the Constitution had been tailored to meet the requirements of the proposed new Committees as far as possible. Members were advised that the Contract Standing Orders amendments had been referred to the Section 151 Officer for review.

Members noted that proposed Delegation to Officers should be tailored to meet the requirements of the new Committee structure.

The Committee agreed that if any Member had any comments with regard to the proposed changes and amendments to the Constitution then they should refer these direct to the Cabinet Secretary for consideration and inclusion in the revised Constitution.

The Governance Committee also agreed that the Chairs of the main Committees should also be Members of the Policy and Resources Committee.

Details Attached from current Constitution.

6

The Committee reviewed the current Scheme of Delegation as detailed in the current Constitution.

The Committee agreed that further detailed discussion on the Scheme of Delegation would be considered at the next meeting.

7 OUTSIDE BODIES
To be tabled

7

The Interim Chief Executive Officer reported that a proforma in respect of all outside bodies would be prepared for circulation to all Members to assess Members views as to whether certain outside bodies should continue or should be deleted from the outside bodies list. Further detailed consideration on appointments to outside bodies would be considered at the Governance Committee's next meeting.

8 ANY OTHER BUSINESS
To consider any other business as may be determined by the Chairman of the meeting as being of sufficient urgency to warrant consideration.

Attendance

Attended - Other Members
Name
No other member attendance information has been recorded for the meeting.
Apologies
NameReason for Sending Apology
Carl Annison 
Absent
NameReason for Absence
No absentee information has been recorded for the meeting.

Declarations of Interests

Member NameItem Ref.DetailsNature of DeclarationAction
No declarations of interest have been entered for this meeting.

Visitors

PRESENT ;

Councillor Plant (in the Chair); Councillors Carpenter, Grey, Myers, Thirtle, T Wainwright, Walker and Williamson.

Councillor Andrews attended as a substitute for Councillor Annison.

Also present :-

Mrs S Oxtoby (Interim Chief Executive Officer), Mr D Johnson (nplaw), Mr R Hodds (Cabinet Secretary), Mr G Jones (Information Manager) and Mr J Cade (Consultant).


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