Decision Maker: Chief Executive Officer
Decision status: Recommendations Approved
Is Key decision?: No
Is subject to call in?: No
To invoke the emergency decision making
process that is identified in the Council’s Constitution to
allow the Chief Executive to make all appropriate decisions and to
allow for appropriate consultation.
To note and endorse that the Assistant Chief Executive (Legal and
Democratic Services) will review legislative changes and revised
guidance to Local Government Decision making and will implement
appropriate decision making processes including virtual meetings if
and when the legislation allows for this and it is considered
appropriate to do so.
*PLEASE NOTE This decision was originally
published on or near the date of the decision and so call in no
longer applies. It has been re-published as part of the change in
committee management system that we use.*
PLEASE NOTE that this decision has been taken under the Special
Urgency and Call-in Exemption procedures and as such is not open to
call-in.
To allow appropriate decision making to take place whilst the
Country is following a policy of Social Distancing in light of the
Coronavirus pandemic.
The Government is constantly updating its guidance in ensuring that
the Country can appropriately react to the public health threats
caused by the Coronavirus pandemic. In order for the County Council
to be flexible enough to make the appropriate decisions to provide
services to the public, the Council needs to consider revising the
operation of its Governance arrangements for the immediate future.
It is necessary to put in place arrangements that will allow good
decision making to continue, provide public accountability but,
just as importantly, to react to changing circumstances so that the
Council, the public and Councillors can follow the
Government’s guidance on self-isolation, household isolation
and social distancing. The Government has stated that the guidance
seeks to help reduce the spread of the virus and reduce the
mounting pressure on the National Health Service. The public have
already been asked to make a number of changes to everyday life to
avoid unnecessary social contact.
The County Council therefore needs to reduce the number of public
meetings and committee meetings over the next few months. The
Government is considering making a number of changes to legislation
and guidance which will, amongst other things, remove the
requirement for annual council meetings to take place in person and
allow council committee meetings to be held virtually for a
temporary period.
In the circumstances, the Council will cancel the majority of
physical committee meetings until government guidance is issued to
allow public meetings. The Council’s Constitution enables the
Chief Executive “In cases of emergency to take any decision
which could be taken by the Council, the Executive of a
committee.” The Coronavirus pandemic is considered to be an
emergency and therefore it is proposed to invoke these powers to
enable the reduction of public meetings to take place. Where the
Chief Executive (or his delegated nominee) considers it
appropriate, consultation will take place with the relevant
available members and officers before the Chief Executive makes a
decision.
No other viable options at this time. The
position with regard to formal virtual meetings will be considered
if the legislation is enacted to allow this to take place and the
Council can meet the conditions that are imposed on this.
Publication date: 28/04/2021
Date of decision: 24/03/2020