Issue - meetings
Constitution Review – Council Procedure Rules
Meeting: 12/10/2017 - General Purposes Committee (Item 4)
4 Constitution Review – Council Procedure Rules PDF 98 KB
General Purposes Committee on 5th July 2017 agreed to review the Council Procedure Rules. This report presents a revised set of Rules for recommendation to Council.
Additional documents:
- Appendix 1- Revised Council Procedure Rules, item 4 PDF 127 KB
- Appendix 1a- Revised Petition Scheme, item 4 PDF 114 KB
Minutes:
Hannah Ismail, Trainee Solicitor and Paul Greeno, Senior Corporate and Governance Lawyer, introduced the report which, following the Committee’s consideration in July 2017, presented a revised set of Council Procedure Rules for recommendation to Council. Ms Ismail and Mr Greeno advised that the revised Procedure Rules included several important changes from current rules, including:
· Deletion of the public questions rule;
· State of the Borough Debate rule amendments;
· A new rule providing for administration and opposition motion debates at ordinary meetings;
· Amendments to petition rules and a revised Petition Scheme; and
· Stronger powers for the Speaker regarding Members’ conduct and public disturbance.
Ms Ismail advised of a minor error in the report. The final line of Rule 11.5 (g) from Appendix 1 should read “…other amendments received by noon the day before the meeting”. Ms Ismail advised that this would be corrected before submission to full Council.
The Committee noted that the revised Council Procedure Rules would be discussed by full Council at the 22 November 2017 meeting. The Committee indicated that its preference is that the new Rules (subject to agreement by full Council) would then be applied from the start of the following ordinary Council meeting, scheduled for 17 January 2018.
RESOLVED:
That the General Purposes Committee:
1. Recommends to Council the changes to Part 4.1 of the Constitution as set out in Appendix 1 to enable these changes to come into effect; and
2. Noted that a further review of the Petition Scheme is planned for next year.