Agenda item

Ingrid Brown, Head of Legal and Democracy & Monitoring Officer presented this report and made the following comments:

·  The revised protocol changes aimed to improve the working relationships between Councillors and Officers; where some of the protocol was unchanged from before, but other parts detailed new provisions and was drafted after reviews carried out of these protocols and how they compared to other Councils;

·  One of the changes detailed was that going forward, Councillors will only be referred to as Councillors rather than being referred to as “Members”, to provide clarification and avoid confusion amongst the general public;

·  Other features of the report included the responsibility for delegated decisions, details of the specific roles of statutory officers, including Councillor interaction; Councillors representing local residents in legal proceedings, officer reports and what they should include; Officer involvement with local wards so that Councillors could carry out their roles in their wards more effectively; guidance around correspondence and Councillor briefings; handling local media; Councillor access to information and details on what would happen if protocol wasn’t followed.

Councillor Crittenden spoke under Council Rule 20.1 to comment on her approval of the document. She also wanted to highlight under paragraph 3.13 of the report, that detailed how Councillors should go about contacting Heads of Service and Officers will reply in a timely manner. She expressed that in the past, there have been issues in this regard due to Officers having large amounts of emails and work affecting response times.

Councillors made comments and asked questions as follows:

·  Councillors expressed their approval of the report and their agreement with Councillor Crittenden about Heads of Service needing further support to keep workloads down;

·  Recommendations were made regarding several paragraphs in the document where wording was a key factor, these included the following:

o  Regarding paragraph 1.7 "This Protocol applies to Councillors and Co-opted Councillors..." be changed to instead read "This Protocol applies to elected Councillors and Co-opted Councillors...";

o  Regarding paragraph 2.5 "... not be subject to the group or party whip." be changed to instead read "...not be subject to any group or party whip";

o  Paragraphs 2.7 and 2.10 are to be combined as the descriptors are too similar;

o  Regarding paragraph 3.2 "... they should not pressurise the Officer to make a recommendation contrary to the Officer’s professional view, nor victimise an Officer for discharging his or her responsibilities." be changed to instead read "... they should not pressurise the Officer to make a recommendation contrary to the Officer’s professional view, not criticise an Officer for discharging his or her responsibilities";

o  Regarding paragraph 3.7 "... This will be appropriate for example when the junior Officer is the only Officer with the relevant expertise to address the issue" be changed to instead read "... This will be appropriate for example when the junior Officer is the only Officer with the relevant expertise and all up to date information to address the issue";

o  Regarding paragraph 4.6 "Councillors must not make contact with any Officers..." be changed to instead read "Councillors must not make direct contact with any Officers...";

o  Regarding paragraph 8.2 "during the early stages of policy development, where practicable." be changed to instead read "during the early stages of policy development, wherever practicable";

o  Regarding paragraph 8.3 "Ward Councillors should be notified at the start of the exercise." be changed to instead read "Ward Councillors should be notified at, or wherever possible, before the start of the exercise";

o  An additional paragraph be added to prevent Councillors from posting correspondence with officers on social media.

·  Councillors raised concerns that whilst there would be ramifications for Officers for not following the new protocol, the same could not be said for Councillors, following changes in 2010/11 that removed sanctions against Councillors feeling that the new rules felt “toothless”. Officers recognised that although it felt like the new protocol was without ramifications for Councillors, that it was still best practise to have it in place as the majority of Councillors would follow these guidelines anyway and it still keeps a system in place for complaints;

·  It was brought up that the lack of access to information that Councillors felt they had, with problems arising from accessing the Intranet and hyperlinks in files not working as they should. Councillors felt that non-Cabinet Councillors were challenged especially in this regard;

·  Councillors followed up on the previous point about disciplinary action imbalance to also question the imbalance of health and wellbeing as Officers have support in place, but Councillors do not. Officers replied to clarify that Councillors did have access to the Employee Assistance Programme which was offered to Officers, but further discussions will be made to highlight this going forward;

·  In regards to paragraph 8.8 which detailed when an MP would be invited to the Council, regarding local ward issues, Councillors asked if the Councillor for said ward would be made aware of this. Officers informed Councillors that it would depend on the situation, but generally, ward Councillors would be made aware.

Councillor Austin proposed, Councillor Britcher seconded and Councillors agreed, that:

The CRWP has considered the contents of the report provided to Councillors and have approved with the amendments detailed above.