Archived decisions

                      ITEM 2

AT A MEETING of the STANDARDS COMMITTEE of the HAMPSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL held at The Castle, Winchester on 22 April 2003.

PRESENT:

Councillors: P.A. Pierce (Chairman); Mrs. S.E. Allbright; Mrs. S.M. Glasspool, DL

Independent Members: Mr. J. Chester; Dr. B. Spender

44 DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

 Members were mindful that, where they believed they had a personal or personal prejudicial interest in any matter to be considered at the meeting, they should, normally at the time of the debate, declare their interest and, having regard to the circumstances described in paragraphs 9, 10, 11 and 12 of the County Council's Code of Conduct, consider whether to leave the meeting whilst the matter was discussed. No such interests were declared by Members on this occasion.

45 MINUTES

The Minutes of the meeting of the Committee held on 28 January 2003 were confirmed as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

46 CHAIRMAN'S COMMUNICATIONS

The Chairman reported that he had no communications of significance.

47 DEPUTATIONS

No deputations had been notified.

48 MEMBER TRAINING

The Committee considered the report of the Head of Corporate and Legal Services and Monitoring Officer (Item 5 in the Minute Book) on possible training requirements for Members. The Chairman expressed his disappointment that only half of the elected Members of the Committee had been able to attend, and proposed that this item should be repeated at the July meeting to enable their views on training to be taken into account. In the meantime those Members presented expressed the view that training on standards should take the form of:

      · help and advice for elected Members generally in carrying out their role with due probity

      · specific training for Standards Committee Members on how they should deal with any complaints received

      · integration of training on standards with other, more general, Member training events, such as induction

      · development of the role of the independent Members on Standards Committee to give them a greater appreciation of the tasks carried out by County Councillors in such areas as Cabinet; Policy Review, Executive Member decision making; and the Regulatory Committee.

    In the latter connection, the Chief Executive had given to the Independent Members the programme of County Council Committee meetings to enable them to select which meetings they might like to attend in order to see the County Council's processes in action.

    RESOLVED:

        (a) That the report on Members' Training be brought forward again to the July meeting of the Committee, to enable all Members to have an input on the Training Programme which they would consider to be appropriate for elected and co-opted members generally and Standards Committee Members in particular, such programme to be integrated as far as possible with other training events provided for Members.

49 SUGGESTED AMENDMENTS TO THE CONSTITUTION

The Committee considered the report of the Head of Corporate and Legal Services and Monitoring Officer (Item 6 in the Minute Book) on a proposed procedure for questions at Council on decisions made by Cabinet and Cabinet Members, and on minor alterations to the Constitution.

RESOLVED:

That it be a RECOMMENDATION to the County Council:

      (i) That, for the May and July meetings of the Council, on completion of Part II of the Agenda, 30 minutes be set aside for questions of Cabinet Members as authorised in paragraph 2.6 of the submitted report without notice on any decision taken by the Cabinet or an Executive Member acting individually since the preceding meeting of the Council; but that these arrangements shall not include questions on items already dealt with in Part II of the Agenda and schemes estimated to cost over £0.5m.

      (ii) That the Constitution be revised as follows:

      Part 3:C - Executive Procedures

      Paragraph 3.4 - the words "three working" should be deleted and replaced by the words "five clear"

      Paragraph 3.5 - the reference to "Policy Review Panels" should be deleted and replaced by a reference to "Policy Review Committees".

      Part 3: B - Access to Information Protocol

      Paragraph 1.2 should be deleted and replaced by the following:
      "The County Council makes copies of Executive Member decision papers and the summons and agenda for all meetings available to the public at least five clear days beforehand i.e. excluding weekends and Bank Holidays.

      Paragraph 2.2. - the reference to" three days" should be deleted and replaced by the words "five clear days".

      Paragraph 2.4 - the reference to "six clear days" should be deleted and replaced by the words "five clear days".

      Paragraph 2.7 - those words which follow the words "exempt information" in the 2nd sentence should be deleted.

50 MEMBERS' ALLOWANCES - UPDATE

The Committee considered the report of the County Treasurer (Item 7 in the Minute Book) on matters relating to Members' allowances and new Regulations. It was reported that new Regulations had just been published and their implications would be the subject of detailed consideration by the Independent Remuneration Panel. The main areas where changes were likely were pensions for Councillors and changes to travel allowances.

RESOLVED:

That the report be noted, and that a meeting of the Independent Remuneration Panel be convened as soon as possible to respond to the new Members' allowances Regulations.

51 CORPORATE GOVERNANCE

The Committee received a presentation by the County Treasurer (Summary set out as Item 8 in the Minute Book) on various issues arising from the item on corporate governance which had been considered by the Committee at its January meeting. The County Treasurer drew attention to the fact that Local Authorities were already subject to extensive regulation and audit. The aim of good corporate governance was to provide an effective system to direct and control the organisation and to meet public expectations for openness, accountability and integrity. This would involve significant changes to the role of Members, who would need to acquire generalist rather than specialist skills in assessing the framework of controls operating within the County Council. The Standards Committee would have an increasingly important function in updating, amending and improving the code of corporate governance and in monitoring performance. To this end the Committee agreed that training should include a future presentation on the audit arrangements which would be included at the end of the agenda for a future meeting, and to which other elected Members would be invited.

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