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Audit and Governance Committee
Tuesday, 7th July 2026 at 6:00pm

 

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  1. Cllr Rich Holgate
  2. FHDC Officer
  3. Cllr Rich Holgate
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  1. Ms Jemma West
  2. Mr Alan Mitchell
  3. Ms Jemma West
  4. Llywelyn Lloyd
  5. Ms Jemma West
  6. Cllr Rich Holgate
  7. Cllr Rich Holgate
  8. Cllr Paul Thomas
  9. Mr Ewan Green
  10. Cllr Rich Holgate
  11. Cllr Paul Thomas
  12. Cllr Rich Holgate
  13. Cllr Tim Prater
  14. Cllr Rich Holgate
  15. Cllr Belinda Walker
  16. Cllr Rich Holgate
  17. Ms Jemma West
  18. Cllr Rich Holgate
  19. Cllr David Godfrey
  20. Cllr Rich Holgate
  21. Cllr John Wing
  22. Cllr Rich Holgate
  23. Cllr Rich Holgate
  24. Cllr Belinda Walker
  25. Cllr Rich Holgate
  26. Cllr Paul Thomas
  27. Cllr Rich Holgate
  28. Llywelyn Lloyd
  29. Cllr Rich Holgate
  30. Ms Jemma West
  31. Cllr Rich Holgate
  32. Cllr Paul Thomas
  33. Llywelyn Lloyd
  34. Cllr Paul Thomas
  35. Llywelyn Lloyd
  36. Cllr Rich Holgate
  37. Cllr Belinda Walker
  38. Cllr Rich Holgate
  39. Cllr Belinda Walker
  40. Cllr Rich Holgate
  41. Cllr Tim Prater
  42. Cllr Rich Holgate
  43. Ms Jemma West
  44. Cllr Belinda Walker
  45. Cllr Rich Holgate
  46. Cllr Paul Thomas
  47. Ms Jemma West
  48. Cllr Paul Thomas
  49. Cllr Rich Holgate
  50. Cllr John Wing
  51. Cllr Rich Holgate
  52. Llywelyn Lloyd
  53. Cllr Rich Holgate
  54. Cllr Paul Thomas
  55. Cllr Rich Holgate
  56. Llywelyn Lloyd
  57. Cllr Rich Holgate
  58. Mr Ewan Green
  59. Cllr Rich Holgate
  60. Cllr Paul Thomas
  61. Cllr Rich Holgate
  62. Mr Ritchie Bennett
  63. Cllr Rich Holgate
  64. Cllr Tim Prater
  65. Cllr Rich Holgate
  66. Ms Jemma West
  67. Cllr Rich Holgate
  68. Ms Jemma West
  69. Cllr Rich Holgate
  70. Mr Ewan Green
  71. Cllr Rich Holgate
  72. Cllr Rich Holgate
  73. Cllr Rich Holgate
  74. Mr Ewan Green
  75. Mr Ewan Green
  76. Mr Ewan Green
  77. Cllr Rich Holgate
  78. Ms Jemma West
  79. Cllr Rich Holgate
  80. Cllr Paul Thomas
  81. Cllr Rich Holgate
  82. Webcast Finished

1 Apologies for Absence

Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:00:04
Good evening, everyone. Good evening, councillors. Thanks so much for turning up on this warm
evening. Welcome to the meeting of the Audit and Governance Committee, if I get those words
in the right order. This meeting will be webcast live to the internet. For those who do not
wish to be recorded or filmed, you will need to leave the chamber. For members, officers,
and others speaking at the meeting, it is important that microphones are used so viewers
on the webcast and others in the room may hear you. Would anyone with a mobile phone
please switch to silent mode as they can be distracting. I would like to remind members
that although we all have strong opinions on matter under consideration, it is important
to treat members, officers and public speakers with respect. Thank you so much. So item number
FHDC Officer - 0:00:53
one, apologies for absence. I believe we have one in Councillor McShane. Sorry, apologies.
Thank you, Chair. We've had apologies to Councillor McShane and the independent member, Andy Van Buren.

2 Declarations of Interest

Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:01:01
Thank you so much. Item 2, Declarations of Interest. None noted.

3 Update to the council's constitution

Which brings us on nice and neatly to Item 3, an update to the Council's constitution.
Ms Jemma West - 0:01:21
I believe introducing this will be a short presentation from Gemma. Thank you, Gemma.
Thank you, Chair.
Good evening, members, and apologies for dragging you out
on such a lovely evening to consider something
that isn't the most exciting topic.
So you've got the report in front of you.
It sets out a number of proposed minor changes
to the constitution following a review
that's been carried out over the last year.
The changes are predominantly tidying up
and reflecting legislative changes, good practise,
and aligning with neighbours in preparation for LGR.
So I'm gonna go through a very short presentation
and it just reviews all of the changes.
So in terms of the timeline,
your role this evening is gonna be
to make recommendations to full council
for their meeting on the 22nd of July.
So I'll start with officer code of conduct
and I've got Richie here this evening
who's also assisted with writing that
so he'll be able to help answer any questions.
So you'll notice that the appendix included
as appendix one in your packs,
it is a complete rewrite of the officer code of conduct.
So there is no track changes in it.
However, the content is broadly similar
to what was already in the existing code
of conduct for officers.
Probably the main changes are that it's written
in a more user -friendly way.
It does expand on the annual staff declaration,
which has been in place for a few years now.
And it includes whistleblowing and safeguarding provisions,
which were missing previously.
It also, following audit recommendations,
it references the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023,
quite a mouthful, and failure to prevent as well.
So moving on to the member code of conduct and the complaints process,
we actually haven't looked at the code of conduct since 2013.
At the time that was adopted, it was the Kent model.
So basically a group of monitoring officers in Kent got together
and created a Kent -wide model for all authorities in Kent.
So, subsequently in 2020, the LGA created a model code of conduct and the guidance for
that came out in 2021.
So again, the Morison offices in Kent got together and worked through the recommendations
set out in that.
They adopted some principles in that model code, but not everything.
So many authorities in Kent have already adopted their code of conduct and there are advantages
in doing so, especially when you've got dual -hatted members,
if they're sitting on county and district councils,
they're obviously subject to the same code of conduct,
which makes life easier all round, really.
So in fact, the changes aren't huge in that.
It is just written in a slightly different way.
It's a little bit more modernised.
It talks about social media and the use of that,
which wasn't really mentioned in the previous version.
And it's not quite so reliant on the independent person.
At the moment, it is you must consult the independent
person, the monitoring officer must,
but now it's may consult.
So moving on, a really minor tidying up on the joint staff
consultative panel.
So each year, the personnel committee appoints members
to the JSCP and the constitution, it does say that
the membership must include a member from each
political group.
However, in practise, what is actually meant by that
is it should be each political group represented
on the personnel committee,
and not just widely across the council.
So we've just added that word in
just to make that completely clear
when we're appointing each year.
The disciplinary appeals committee.
Now this is basically good practise change really.
So there was a circular issued
by the joint negotiating committee
for chief executives of local authorities.
And it was basically recommending that we create a panel
that has different membership to the personnel committee
so that should ever there be an appeal
against a disciplinary sanction,
it wouldn't be the same members considering it.
So this aligns with practise that is carried out
at Ashford and Canterbury as well.
So moving on to the financial procedure rules,
I'm gonna hand over to Alan,
but just to note that there is gonna be a further change,
which is really minor, on page 92 of your packs,
under the environment authorization limits,
below paragraph 11 .2 .1,
the word revenue should actually read revenue in capital.
So that's quite minor.
I'm just gonna hand over to Alan to work through this slide.
Thanks, Gemma.
Evening, members.
Mr Alan Mitchell - 0:05:57
So as Gemma said, we haven't looked at our code of practise
for a while, and that includes our financial regulations.
So what we're looking to do here is update them for a couple of reasons really.
First of all, allow for operationally how we now function as a council and how we're
looking to make decisions and part of that will be about operationally that we can react
to situations in a quicker time rather than necessarily having to wait three months to
take four members.
And then secondly, we've also looked at what our neighbouring authorities are doing and
looking to align our practises and levels with them as well.
So we're trying to get ourselves in a very similar position.
But you can see there in terms of what our current levels are and proposed levels are.
So the biggest one is probably in terms of the change transfer in between budget headings,
but you still see there it still requires director section 106, which is obviously myself,
in consultation with CLT so there's still a good level of governance there.
But also a really important point to note is that these are just environments between budget,
this doesn't increase the level of budget, it doesn't change the budget itself, it's just a
movement it would be in the budget headings. So you can see there and then anything above
100 ,000 were still coming to Cabinet. It's also important to know that any changes that
do happen to any violence that do happen will still be reported over -expectantly to Cabinet.
So it would be for transparency on any decisions that do happen under the environment process.
I think the final thing I'd like to reference also, in the same paragraph that Gemma just
referenced that we changed from the Capital and Revenue, it's not particularly clear
one of the track changes looks like we're changing it from 25 ,000 to 250 ,000.
It's not, it's striking through the zero and placing that with a five, so it's 25 ,000.
So just on the track changes is a little bit unclear, just because of the numbers,
so just a bit of clarification on that, but you'll see that in the full version,
that is quite clearly 25 ,000. Thank you.
the policy framework.
Ms Jemma West - 0:08:20
At the moment, we notice in the current constitution, there is quite a list of policies set out
in the policy framework.
What that means is that each of those policies, if we make any changes to them, they need
to be reported to full Council for approval.
Best practise suggests that it should only include items required by law to be approved
for council.
So that's usually, if you look at what other authorities do,
it's usually four or five items.
So what we're proposing is to remove the bulk
of what's in the policy framework
and just stick with those items
that are listed in the report,
keeping it, well, keeping council agendas free
for what they're intended for, really.
We then move on to the council questions deadline.
So you'll be familiar that council questions
are presently due at 10 a .m. the Monday before our meeting.
It can be quite tricky to have 48 hours to turn
around, especially given the complexity of the
questions now.
Quite often we are drawing on external
people to include in our responses.
We are proposing to move that to 10 AM the
Wednesday before.
It does align with what our neighbours do.
The David District Council requires eight
days notice of questions.
We are still being generous.
I would like to point out that the urgency
provision that's in the constitution remains.
So this allows members to submit questions up to midday
on the Wednesday, the same day as the meeting,
subject to the chair's approval.
We'll then move on to the planning code
and chief planning officer delegations.
And I'm going to hand over to Llewellyn to present that.
Thank you, Jemma.
Good evening, councillors.
Llywelyn Lloyd - 0:10:05
Following the review of the constitution,
and we've made a couple of changes
which follow some feedback from the constitutional review
but also some operational matters that have come up
during the processing of planning applications
over the years.
A number of matters in the planning code,
we're trying to strengthen the relationship
between officers and members in the preparation
prior to planning committee, raising questions,
and so that we can come briefed and prepped,
so we can give you the fullest feedback
and make sure that we're covering the points.
We're trying to ensure that in doing so that officers are there to provide advice as opposed
to debates the matter with members in the committee chamber.
It's quite clear that with members are to debates the matter, officers there just to
make clarification points.
We have also made some changes around how decisions are made and members involvement
to appeal. That's mainly around changes at national level to how planning appeals now
processed. In some cases, appeals will no longer have the ability for the council to
submit supplementary reports or delegated reports to the planning inspectorates. We'll
have to rely on minutes and all the officer's reports and some changes around that. We've
also got some other matters around how matters of deferral are happening. So in the past
we have had members can defer committee matters, but we need to make sure that it's clear that
only those who are party to the original deferral can then take part in the follow -up debates
and that the debate has to happen around the matters that were deferred in the first instance.
And we've also introduced in the Code the ability for officers to recommend deferral
which we don't currently have.
That would only be used in an instance
where we thought the decision,
which may be contrary to officer recommendation,
may need further explanations
to the financial risks to the council,
and to then allow officers to recommend deferral.
It's not about taking away
the decision -making powers of the committee,
it's just that they're fully aware
of the whole gamut of changes that are available to them.
The other bits we've made changes to
as the officer delegations, largely is unchanged.
We have inserted some new delegations around nationally significant infrastructure projects.
I believe that was discussed at full council a week or so ago.
That is not there so officers can take these decisions themselves, far from it, but there
will be typed timetables as NSIP projects move through the process and we will have
to respond a fleet of foot.
There will be times when we simply can't get to a planning committee.
Any recommendation that then goes forward would obviously be run past the chair of planning
and the leader of the council who is also the portfolio holder for planning before it
is sent off so it is at least seen by elected representatives.
And there are some additional bits in there around enforcement and the ability to make
and deal with applications around tree preservation orders.
Those are already powers currently delegated to the chief planning officer and any delegates
thereafter, but they're covered in a line which simply says all other matters related
to town and country planning, which seemed a bit sort of broad.
So we're introducing those, so it's quite clear as to those are the bits that are currently
delegated to us, just for clarity, mainly around the follow -up legal process that will
sometimes happen around those things.
I hope that's all right.
Ms Jemma West - 0:13:40
We're on to the final slide now, you'll be pleased to know.
Two minor changes here.
The local government pension scheme, as you know,
on the 11th of May, members were able to join
the local government pension scheme.
So we're just proposing a slight additional word
to the members of our scheme, allowing members to join.
In terms of the CSIRO and DPO role,
so Senior Information Risk Officer
and Data Protection Officer,
you remember that at the annual meeting,
we agreed to implement a change,
which was basically delegating that role to Susan.
However, what we're proposing is a slight clarification
on that to make clear that Susan won't carry out
those roles, it's simply that she'll be delegating
those down.
And that was it, but we also have Councillor Prater
here this evening as the cabinet member for governance.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:14:33
Councillor Prater, no, anything to make?
No?
Wonderful.
In which case, then, we're happy to take any comments,
questions or thoughts.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:14:49
Councillor Thomas.
Yeah, thank you, Chair.
Cllr Paul Thomas - 0:14:53
Just a couple of clarifications really and just a comment on a couple of points.
So under policy framework 2 .5 .3, it talks in there about minor changes will be made
with the agreement of the relevant cabinet member.
So my question is, what would constitute a minor change?
Are we talking about a typo
or would it be something more significant than that?
I'm just trying to understand
what would constitute a minor change.
Thank you.
Yeah, thank you, Councillor Thomas.
I don't think we've got a definition as such,
Mr Ewan Green - 0:15:30
but clearly something like a typo, yes.
I think it's more in there around
if there's legislative changes that we have to make
to reflect updates to government policies, for example, that philtre down. It is more
from that perspective. In doing so, what we would always do is engage with the cabinet
member. You will see it quite often in our reports on policies where we are going out
to consultation as well and allowing the director in consultation of the portfolio holder to
and minor changes arising from that.
Please.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:16:08
Thank you very much.
Cllr Paul Thomas - 0:16:12
So, under 2 .8, questions from councillors,
we allow 45 minutes in meeting for councillors' questions.
And sometimes we find that we'll have one councillor
who will submit three, four, five questions,
and the questions are taken as a block
depending on who came first, if that sort of makes sense.
I just wondered whether we could actually structure
the order of the questions slightly differently
so that each of the councillors who submit a question
have their questions asked in turn,
and then we go back.
So if somebody asks four questions,
you've got two counts.
So you take the first question from this councillor,
then the first question from this councillor,
first question there.
And then I think it gives a more equal distribution
of questions from across the chamber.
And I think if there's a point at which we have to cut
the meeting off because we overrun the time,
then we're not going to exclude one counsellor
from asking the questions that he or she decided
that they would want to ask.
So I'm just wondering whether we could include something
in there which said, let's have a look at the structure
of the order of the questions and make it, in my opinion, something which is fairer
because you allow people across the chamber to have their say
and then they're not excluded.
Thank you, Chair.
I think that's a totally fair observation.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:17:43
I don't know whether there's a comment for it now or we didn't,
what would the process be in terms of taking it away?
Oh, Tim, I'm so sorry.
I can offer some commentary on that from the perspective of Kent County Council for instance.
Cllr Tim Prater - 0:17:56
You're only allowed one question as a councillor there. The order that they are on the paper
is the order that they've come in. So the first one in at the moment is the first one
that they've run and it keeps going through. So essentially what you would be doing, and
that's present in Kent County as well, so you are more, if the earlier you get your
the more likely you are to have it listened to,
or have it read out, you'll always get a written reply,
obviously.
Now, yay, of course, you could have your first question
comes in in the order that the first question comes in,
and then second questions from any councillors
feeding after that.
It is more difficult to internalise at that stage,
and at this moment, the answer is,
if you happen to leave the meeting and send five questions
in for the next meeting immediately,
then you're likely to have the first five questions,
and that's just the system at the beginning.
I could absolutely take it either way.
I have, I've got no strong skin in that game.
I could see it either way, but I could also see that
people would, at this stage, feel more,
feel disadvantaged about the fact that they thought,
put the thought in early,
and they got their questions in early,
and yet those questions haven't actually got
the priority that they had before.
But absolutely open to offers on that
and other people's opinions.
So it's absolutely not a done deal.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:19:18
Councillor Walker.
For the following question for Paul
Cllr Belinda Walker - 0:19:28
and for everybody here really,
if there was any change,
who would decide, would that be members for council?
Would that be an item to debate there
or would it be done another way?
Slipping out of my pay grade here,
so I'm going to throw it to you and Gemma.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:19:41
Ms Jemma West - 0:19:45
Thank you. So if you were minded to make a recommendation to that effect this evening,
we would include it in the report to full council to consider. At the moment, the constitution
is quite explicit that it says questions must be taken in the order they are received. So
obviously we would include that as a proviso in the revised papers, if you were minded
to.
Councillor Godfrey.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:20:07
I think there are three points of clarification.
Cllr David Godfrey - 0:20:11
I think it is a good idea to have it actually.
Aligning it with our neighbours might be a good thing for the future.
However, in the Code of Conduct, I just wonder whether we need to remove the code we are talking about.
Sorry, I got the wrong page open.
It's the places and policy where we remove the traveller sites.
We're suggesting moving it out.
Gypsy and traveller applications.
Councillor Godfrey, just for the benefit of the room, sorry,
which section are you looking at, which document?
Yeah, I'm looking at 2 .5 .2.
Okay, thank you.
It is suggested that these are removed from the policy framework to streamline the agendas
of the council.
I don't think that is a wise thing to do, but I am just questioning whether it is wise
to take out the Egyptian traveller allocation because it is such a sensitive issue across
the district.
The reason we have opted to remove that is because it is at the moment a cabinet function.
If you are minded to include it, you could absolutely make a recommendation that Council
retain that within the policy framework.
I've got another one with Karen, John.
As you're mindful of her, Councillor Thomas's thoughts.
Did you want to continue?
Yes, that's something I would probably be mindful to do, but I'll take advice.
and on the delegation of the chief of planning's powers to include the infrastructure responses,
I'm just wondering whether in the group that's put together to look at those with him,
we should include ward members, because in my opinion it's likely to be a lot of talk,
a lot to do with the solar power farms.
I am just wondering whether in that group that discusses those responses whether we
should include the board members.
I will put it out there.
decision making, we'd engage with board members anyway.
I think the issue of the change here is ensuring
that we do it in consultation with the chair of planning
and the leader, so that covers the two leads,
one for the committee and one for policy.
Do you mind if we take that one away?
And give it a bit more thought.
Oh, of course, if you would, please.
Because I take the point completely that you're making.
Yeah. I understand it.
And I'm not necessarily against it.
I just think I'd like to think through the decision -making processes and how to...
Okay, thank you.
That's okay.
My final comment to your question, the vehemence going, there's a big jump from 15 ,000 to 100 ,000,
to 35 ,000 to 100 ,000.
Have you had some examples of those causes, problems, slow down progress?
I mean, I understand why you might want to do it,
but I just wondered whether this causes problems by not having that facility in the past.
Well, I've only been here a year, so my experience is limited.
I don't think it particularly causes significant problems when we're trying to veer across
budgets.
But in terms of, because we were tidying up the entirety of the financial regulations,
it made sense to look at what we were currently doing, what our neighbours were doing, operationally
sort of levels of expenditure and just realign things
to bring them up to date effectively.
But to answer your question, I'm not aware of any,
Jonathan's not even part of the experience,
so I'm not aware of any issues,
but it was not necessarily done to correct a problem,
but more just to bring things up to date
so we're more relevant to how we operate
and also like I say, how we compare to our neighbours.
I thought the question was worth asking,
sorry I didn't take that off.
I bow to the financial experts on this one.
If they feel it is going to improve matters and make things easier, then fine.
I just wanted to raise the issue.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:25:15
Thank you, Councillor Godfrey.
I think there are a couple of things you need to go back on, maybe just close the loop on.
In the meantime, any other questions?
Councillor Way.
Cllr John Wing - 0:25:27
Yes, first of all, going back to Councillor Godfrey's point, as well as that one, I would
I also worry about the housing prevention strategies.
That's the third one down on that list.
I mean, most of them, I absolutely agree.
I mean, the street name in a number in policy,
I can't remember that coming back to us anyway.
But I am concerned about the homeless prevention strategy.
Those whose busses sit on ordinance and governance
and finance and performance know how back,
well, we are, we're not achieving now
I'll put our numbers at the moment.
And I'm just, I think I should be highlighted the public.
I think this is something that's concerned the public.
So as well as David's rules,
so like the housing prevention strategy
also kept on that list.
Most of the others I fully agree with that one.
I think I would like for council
to still retain vision of that one.
That's possible.
Councillor, just to make sure I'm paying back what I think you said to me.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:26:29
Your suggestion is that we want to keep the homeless prevention strategy on the list.
Thank you.
Councillor Walker.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:26:38
I'd agree with what John has just said, yes, definitely.
Cllr Belinda Walker - 0:26:41
Okay.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:26:45
Councillor Thomas, you look keen to jump in.
Yeah, no, thank you very much, Chair.
Cllr Paul Thomas - 0:26:50
Just a couple of things for me in terms of the appendices, if I may.
So, Appendix 2 associated with Code of Conduct.
One of the things that we've got on rules of definitions,
in one of the other annexes talking about planning,
we actually give an example in there
of what actually constitutes somebody's position
to demonstrate they're not predetermined.
Okay, so it's a good example, I think,
that's been put in there.
When you look at the information we have to put in,
in declarations, there isn't any guidance
in terms of how much information you need to put in
for either yourself as the person
who's putting that information in
or somebody else who's reading it
to understand whether there's a conflict of interest
at any point in any discussions you might have in the future.
So I just wondered, you know, is there something we could do to firm that up?
And so we could actually give an example in there.
But I think one of the things that we did at the New Ronditown Council is we actually did code of conduct training for all councillors.
Not that they all turned up, by the way.
But that's neither here nor there.
But when we went through that, there was some very specific guidance given by an informed legal representative who had dealt with Code of Conduct for years,
that said, this is the kind of thing you need to be putting in your declarations.
And it became really clear, so there's no ambiguity.
Because again, I think if you look in the Code of Conduct itself in 5 .1, which says, you know, this, you have to declare this or you have to declare that,
then it would make that very, very clear the amount of information you needed to put in there.
Because again, when you have a look at different Council's decorations,
some of them are very comprehensive and others are so thin, it's just not true.
So again, I just wonder whether we could actually have a look at that.
And in 5 .1e of the Code of Conduct, the disposition to participate is always granted by the monitoring officer, I believe that's correct, isn't it?
Yeah, okay. Thank you.
And then I've got another one, another couple of questions on index 4 on planning, if that's okay.
So in the report in 1 .16 .2 .4, it says that it talks about ward member
participation in planning committee business and says the ward member is
entitled to speak on an application.
However, if another Councillor who's not a ward member wishes to speak,
Then would they be speaking as a member of the public?
And those rules apply, or would they be speaking as a councillor?
That's my question there.
And on the same, in the same area, in 1 .16 .3,
I agree with the proposed changes to the questioning timetabling.
and the fact that you can't add additional speakers for the planning committee meeting after 5pm on the Thursday before the meeting,
which makes perfect sense for exactly the same reasons we spoke about earlier on.
But my question is, can speakers be added at the discretion of the chair?
And if they can't, I just wonder whether we need to make that clear in that advice
in Appendix 4.
And that's it from me.
Thank you very much.
You'll be pleased to know, Chair.
Thank you, Councillor Thomas.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:30:52
I don't know whether, Chairman, you would like to comment on any of those points explicitly.
The way they're jumping in, thank you.
Llywelyn Lloyd - 0:31:03
I think I can answer the second point, which is the one about late speakers or people who
haven't nominated by the time, we don't have an ability for the chair to add
them unless there are already existing speakers. So if there are, if there's a
registered speaker on the night in time and other late speakers then come
forward, we tend to add them to the speakers list until it fills the quotient
of for and against and the applicant. If there are no speakers, no, we don't
Generally, we don't have an ability to add them to it.
In my time here, we've only ever once not done that,
which is probably, we shouldn't have done.
While Gemma does some looking to the bits
about the other bit of the code,
just to touch on the end set point raised
by Councillor Godfrey, just to draw attention
to the delegation setup in paragraph 8 .3 .8
of the draught amended delegations,
you'll see that the delegated functions
have to happen in consultation with chair
of Planning and Licencing Committee
and the leaders of all political groups on all occasions,
and that a final copy of everything is also sent
to all members and members of the Planning
and Licencing Committee once those decisions have been,
well, those not decisions,
once those representations have been set.
So we will take it away and look at what best practise is about expanding that further to include the ward members for the areas.
It's definitely a point that we'll take away and give some serious thought to.
But at the moment it currently includes all group leaders and the leader of the portfolio holder and the chair of planning committee.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:32:53
Thank you, I don't know whether Gemma or Ewan like to come back on.
Ms Jemma West - 0:32:57
I was just going to come back on your point about the DPI form.
I definitely think there's more we can do to make it a little bit more user -friendly
and a bit more guidance for members, so we'll look at that and come back to you on that.
Could you just repeat your other question about the planning code?
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:33:13
Paul, is your microphone on?
I do apologise.
Cllr Paul Thomas - 0:33:20
Yeah, that's 1 .16 .2, bullet point four.
It says, Folk and Hard District Council ward members,
when a ward member is unable to attend, the group leader
of the council's political party may nominate another
councillor to act as a substitute
for the purposes of public speaking.
My question there is, if you're not the ward member,
but you are Folk and Hard District councillor,
does that entitle you to speak as a councillor or as a member
of the public if you're allocated a slot to speak at the meeting.
Llywelyn Lloyd - 0:34:02
Can we just rehearse the scenario of this?
So, Councillor X can't make it, but they would be the ward councillor speaking as ward
councillor.
They're not a member of planning committee.
Councillor Y is then nominated by their group to speak on their behalf to speak as the voice
piece for that ward.
And the question is, are they then speak, is that Councillor Y then speaking as a ward
councillor, as a member of the public?
My understanding would be as a substitute for, well, Gemma will nod at me in a minute,
as a substitute for the ward member, they will be speaking as the ward member, not as
member of the public.
Cllr Paul Thomas - 0:34:50
If I may, so the second scenario is that a ward Councillor, a Councillor from
another ward decides that he wants to, he or she wants to speak on a particular
planning application and asks to speak even though he's not the ward Councillor
and may not, may or may not be representing a political party then you
do they speak as a Councillor, the ward Councillor,
or a Councillor, or a member of the public?
That's what I'm asking.
Because, so where does that sit in the hierarchy then,
of those people in the meeting who are allowed to speak?
Because it's one in favour, one against the agent,
well, you know, that's not it, thank you.
No, no, I think it's a good exercise to rehearse,
it does occasionally happen.
Llywelyn Lloyd - 0:35:34
In that case, the ward member, the Councillor,
would obviously be speaking as a member of the public who happens to hold office in whatever seats they tend to,
but they would be fulfilling one of the public speaking slots, either in support or otherwise.
And it might be something for the purposes of clarity that we just need to rehearse, but General, I can take it away.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:36:07
Thank you, Councillor Thomas. Any other thoughts or questions?
Councillor Walker. I just have one regarding the change of deadline
Cllr Belinda Walker - 0:36:19
for Councillor questions. I can see obviously that it's a good thing
to be aligning ourselves with our neighbours and also it's quite a generous deadline.
I can see one potential difficulty that it might give members less chance to scrutinise
the portfolio holders' reports and formulate a question around that.
So, I wonder if that can be taken into consideration.
Councillor Preet has a thoughtful look on his face.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:36:44
I wonder if a solution, sorry, Chair, if I may.
Cllr Belinda Walker - 0:37:01
A solution might be for the portfolio holders to maybe publish,
not publish, but to send out to Councillors
and you've got the reports a day early or some time earlier,
I don't know if that'd be possible for the holders to do that.
Not to publish it, but to set it out to councillors.
Yes, great observation.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:37:19
You and Gemma.
Cllr Tim Prater - 0:37:29
I think I can only say, in terms of the book,
it's a really good point.
They are only published on the Wednesday with the agenda,
and therefore you're doing questions, closing questions at the same time.
Effectively, there's going to be no crossover in there.
I'd say as somebody who gets the privilege of writing cabinet member reports on a regular basis,
Gemma is chasing them by the Friday before a meeting, before they are published anyway.
I think most people generally try and make sure that they're there by then,
but there is sometimes slippage over the weekend.
and I am as guilty of that as anyone else.
And if you bring that deadline much earlier,
the earlier you make that deadline,
the less timely the report that you are gonna get is.
You're reporting stuff up until about a fortnight
before the meeting as opposed to things
that are happening a week before the meeting.
So the report is less timely
and there'll be less interesting stuff in it
to ask questions on.
So I totally get that there's a balance in there.
What you are most likely to end up with, I think,
and I think it would be perfectly reasonable,
is that you could leave your deadline as it would,
you could leave the report's deadline as it is now
on the Friday, and it could go out on the Monday or Tuesday
of the following week.
There will be some times whereby somebody is going to be late
and that they will follow that.
That's just the way that that works,
which would give you 24 hours or so to read all
of those reports and put in a question.
If that helps, I think that's,
but I don't think it's a constitutional point, actually.
I think it's a practise point,
because actually the cabinet member reports
aren't in the constitution.
But I think we could certainly go for that as a practise.
I'd just be wary about making the deadline
for those reports earlier, because you're just going
to mean that there's more and more time
between the report being written and the actual meeting,
and then they're going to get out of date, frankly.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:39:27
Before the council, did you want to share a point?
Ms Jemma West - 0:39:33
I was just going to add to what Councillor Prater was saying. Actually, the council
agenda is the deadline for publication is Tuesday, so it would be the day before the
deadline for council of questions, but I appreciate sometimes council agenda isn't published until
say 5pm on the Tuesday. I think operationally it would be quite possible to accommodate
that request and we could probably get the cabinet member updates out to all members,
potentially on the Monday, it might be that there might be one or two missing, which will obviously be filled in in the pack when that's published.
But it will give you something to work with, definitely.
Thank you. That would be a good solution, I think.
Cllr Belinda Walker - 0:40:08
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:40:09
Thanks, Councillor. I think Councillor Thompson, did you have a thought?
Yeah, I'm just on the same theme, really.
Cllr Paul Thomas - 0:40:13
So in 2 .8 .2 you talk about questions that have to go back to the member for clarifications,
which could be a scoping issue or something else.
So I just wonder, again, not a constitutional thing, but as Tim's law suggested, you know,
something which is, you know, a bit more operational, where we actually, you know,
give some advice about the kind of things that should be there.
So we end up with those things that will add value as opposed to grandstanding, for example.
So how do we separate those two things out?
Because we've got other means available to us to get an awful lot of the information
which is asked for through the questions and at question time.
So again, I just wonder whether there's an opportunity through advice to councillors
about questions that separates those things out, just to make sure they do understand
that we do have other vehicles we can use to get the information that we need.
Thank you.
Thank you, Councillor Thomas.
Ms Jemma West - 0:41:25
I think that's a really good point and it's absolutely worth us getting some guidance
out to members around that on what is a good question.
I think we do have to go back to members occasionally where they might have asked more than one
question within one question.
So we do occasionally need to ask for amendments.
But yeah, I think some guidance would probably be useful.
Yeah, thank you very much for that.
Cllr Paul Thomas - 0:41:50
I'm not looking to do a KCC and Steinie,
any input into what goes on.
But I just want to make sure that we make best use
of those 45 minutes.
And again, if everybody has the same criteria
that they're operating to,
I think it just helps everything in, it just helps the flow of meetings more.
Thank you very much.
Thanks, Councillor Thomas.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:42:15
If I could just add to that, I think in the slide you talked about the provision of an urgent question.
And again, maybe some clarity on what that means, what that is, what, you know,
is part of that bit of work, I think it's quite useful.
Any other thoughts, questions?
Councillor Wayne.
Cllr John Wing - 0:42:31
This is more an observation really as I used to sit on the planning committee.
I'm getting slightly concerned about public democracy and things.
I've sat on the committee and I fully understand about the officers and the walls they've got to work with.
I've seen a lot of arguments in this chamber about planning issues and I just feel that gradually over time it's getting worse.
I mean, I think it's where it's going nationally.
I absolutely agree.
This is what's come from above about where the government wants to pull us to go.
But that's more of an observation.
And the only other thing about the disciplinary new panel, I think it's a great idea.
And that's fantastic.
And that's about it, really.
That's great. Thanks, Councillor.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:43:17
I shared a similar issue view in our pre -briefing around a cynical view
that some of the planning delegation changes were potentially removing an element of the
democratic process in terms of scrutiny.
I'd be really useful to maybe share with the Chamber what your thoughts were on that, that
it was actually more a reflection of what is happening, the reality of the operation
today more than any new powers, quote unquote.
Is that a fair reflection?
Absolutely.
Llywelyn Lloyd - 0:43:45
Nothing that's, apart from the NSIP proposition, which is obviously a reaction to the challenges
of our time. Nothing that's in the Constitution today is not a delegated power that's been
in the Constitution for as long as I've worked here and probably beforehand. One thing that
happened during the Constitution review was we realised that actually the Constitution
included a lot of catch -alls in that everything was delegated with any exceptions to that.
And it is always the ability in the current Constitution for the Chief Banning Officer
and I've exercised this a number of times,
to say actually, whilst I could determine this,
we will send it to committee for members
to take a view on it, because it is important
and it needed to be dealt with.
I think crucially, great example of that
would be the harbour plots that came up last year.
Under the constitution, those applications
didn't need to go to planning committee,
but given the scale and nature of them, it was important.
The works that are listed in there now
around enforcement powers, true preservation orders,
issuing and going to the Magistrates,
which are all things that were already caught
by a very loose phrase, which is still in there slightly,
but we've just tried to be a bit more explicit
about current operational standards.
Trust me, no planning officer wants to be
the ultimate determiner of what he can and can't determine.
I'll leave that to other people,
and I'll just work within the framework we're given.
But I take the point, Councilman, but I assure you,
apart from, and even the NSIP piece,
to say sort of a catch -all.
I'd rather this authority had something
in front of an inspector than we missed the deadline,
which is short.
We're not in control of the timetable.
The planning inspector will set the timetables.
And if we miss deadlines, we could be found wanting.
And I'd rather we have the ability to get our position
in some way in front of an inspector
rather than miss a deadline
because we had to arrange a committee.
That's the only reason most things will go to committee.
And in fact, two weeks from today, we have a special committee on one of the first applications
that's coming to the district.
Thank you, Ed.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:45:54
Councillor Thomas.
Cllr Paul Thomas - 0:46:01
Just picking up on that point, and maybe put a slightly different perspective on what you
said.
2 .6 .3a, reminding members of the opportunity to contact officers to ask questions prior
to a meeting, can we put that in bold and red and maybe in slightly larger letters within
that constitution as well? Because again, I think anything we can do to help the officers
to be successful on the night has to be enough, particularly if you're going to take a contrary
view to the officers as it's specified in here. So again, I think, you know, my personal
I squirm sometimes in my seat when I feel like officers have been hijacked and asked when we've got complex issues we're dealing with.
And I just find sometimes that's unfair on our officers to have to answer in such a short time scale.
And I think that is, you know, we should put that in big flashing lights.
We should all wear that around our necks, the planning committee, actually, to be honest with you.
Yeah, thank you very much.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:47:07
I'm not sure when you want to come back on that and how truthful you want to be, but
any thoughts?
Llywelyn Lloyd - 0:47:11
I'd always encourage councillors to engage if they have questions.
Committee, the best time for planning committee is for the debate amongst members to raise
the concerns amongst themselves and the best meeting for a planning officer is one where
they're silent.
So yes, I fully endorse that.
And my door is always open, so please come approach us.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:47:30
Thank you.
Thank you.
Mr Ewan Green - 0:47:32
I think there's quite a number of these kind of almost operational matters that you're
raising, which is very good feedback for us.
And I think what I'd be very happy to do is wrap that up into almost like a member's guidance
note on the back of the new constitution, covering these points and reinforcing some
of the points you're making, because that feedback's really helpful to us.
It's not necessarily something to put into the constitution,
but a helpful kind of guide or update for members.
And I tend to do something from an annual perspective,
periodically throughout the year anyway.
So very happy to pick all these points up in one email.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:48:11
Does the end, thank you.
Go on, come to us.
So just one final thing.
So does that mean in terms of the recommendations,
Cllr Paul Thomas - 0:48:19
we make a recommendation L,
on here which says that that's what will be an output from this meeting today then,
in terms of advice to Councillors going forward. Thank you.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:48:36
Yes, I actually had a question myself, if I be so bold, Councillors.
But I was just actually curious, going back to the Code of Conduct, very quickly,
it's probably going to be kept in another document, but you mentioned around the update
regarding the kind of social media etiquette and so forth.
I was perhaps surprised that there wasn't anything around the use of AI, and in terms
of kind of future -proofing the next 15, 20 years of the constitution.
Is that because, was that deliberate and or is it because it's covered in another document
elsewhere, perhaps?
Mr Ritchie Bennett - 0:49:08
Thank you, Chair.
I think we can answer that to an extent in that, yes, we do have other documents around
social media and computer use and AI use for officers.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:49:24
Simple enough, thanks so much. Any other thoughts or questions?
Cllr Tim Prater - 0:49:28
Councillor Breter. Yeah, having listened to it, there were a
couple of unresolved questions in there. I just wanted some clarity as to how we're
then taking those on to Council. So certainly the one around the two policy
documents that was requested to be removed from the delegated list and put
back into the council list, is that you'd like that done,
that's done, so that should be a recommendation
and voted for, because that would give us
some clarity around that.
Also about the ordering of councillors' questions.
If you want it to be a different order
than the first one in gets first
through to the last one in is last,
then again, a recommendation would be really useful.
I'm absolutely keen to make sure
that we put in front of council
what you think is the right approach at this stage.
I'd very much like to avoid having a debate whereby we're taking lines in parts on the 20th of July.
Therefore, I'd like to pick up what people wanted to see in terms of this and make those changes
so that what goes to council, at least the people in this room go, you listened to that,
you did the things we'd asked, and I'm now not going to try and remove a word from the constitutional change.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:50:36
Councillor Prager, thanks. That was actually my next step, so good to take a steer on that in terms of next.
I did make a note of the issue that had to come up as a result. I think there's probably
a force into operational change, force into constitution kind of criteria. So let's just
take it one at a time and Councillors please tell me if I've forgotten any or missed any,
but that issue of council questions as raised by Councillor Thomas, the observation was
to change the format from a first come, first serve
to a more equitable distribution of questions.
Did we as a group, as a committee want to,
oh sorry, actually before I say the wrong words,
what am I asking Gemma?
I think you've actually summarised that really well.
Ms Jemma West - 0:51:21
So yeah, it would be a recommendation to council
suggesting that the structure of the questions,
as you quite rightly said, is more equitable
and that perhaps rather than being grouped together, each member's question will be separated
by other members.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:51:38
Would that actually be a show of hands to be useful or will you move it forward tonight?
Do we need to do anything more dramatic?
Ms Jemma West - 0:51:44
I think if we are happy to accept that as part of the recommendations, then the whole
lot would be accepted by the proposal and seconder and then voted on as a whole.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:51:59
Okay. Are we all in agreement with Paul's feedback on the questions? Yeah.
Yeah. I think not around the room, so I'll take that as yes. There were the two policy
take, again, not sure what the right word, but they're basically keeping the housing
prevention, sorry, homeless prevention strategy and the traveller, thank you, Euan, keeping
those on the list. Again, any strong, to include those within recommendations? Yeah, okay,
fantastic. Thank you, Jim. Thank you. There was, this may be a separate point, but including
ward members on infrastructure planning, I think we actually want some more secret advice
on that, or do we want to add that in now?
Mr Ewan Green - 0:52:46
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:52:49
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:53:06
Mr Ewan Green - 0:53:08
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:53:08
Mr Ewan Green - 0:53:08
Do you mind if I do some one more second?
Thank you.
I think I'm more comfortable with that
Mr Ewan Green - 0:53:21
for saying that we're in consultation with board members,
recognising that any decision that might be made
would necessarily be made by the leaders of planning policy
or the chair of planning.
So, if it's in consultation with including ward members, very happy to put that into
that.
Great, thank you.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:53:44
Councillor Colfry, satisfied with that suggestion?
Which more explicitly includes the ward member as part of the process?
Absolutely.
Okay, happy at the wording?
Grand, leave, offer this as irrelevant wording?
Yes.
A code of conduct training, perhaps that's more of an operational one than a constitutional
one, have you all agreed?
Portfolio holder reports, I think we all agreed earlier, it was more of an operational point
than a constitutional one.
And then the guidance on council questions and advice, probably more of an operational
one.
Have I missed any from feedback today?
No?
Okay, wonderful.
Thank you, everybody.
We really made the most of that.
Excellent work. In terms of the recommendations, Jimmy Ewing, are there different ones now?
There are 11 here, but we have a few others too. How would you like me to move forward?
Ms Jemma West - 0:54:48
Sorry, if we just make the recommendation would apply to recommendation one and then
two, you would be making the recommendations to Council. Can I suggest that the additional
points be added as H, I, and J. Sorry, L, M, N, P.
Yeah? Do you want me to read out all, everything, or can I just
bump it all up?
I think the recommendations are set out in the report. It's fine with the addition of this.
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:55:21
Thank you. Could be another hour. In which case, can I just, by a show of hands, is everyone
happy to carry the note forward and recommend to full council items A through L and P. I
think we got to have to propose. Oh, thank you. Council is happy to propose. John sounds
Cllr Paul Thomas - 0:55:37
Cllr Rich Holgate - 0:55:37
happy to second. We all in favour. Agreed. Wonderful. Well, cracking work, everyone.
Thank you. In which case, I think, yeah, that's the end of our meeting this evening and plenty
of time left to enjoy. Thanks so much. Good evening.