Meeting documents

The meeting was opened with a prayer by Councillor E. G. Davies.

1

CHAIRPERSON

RESOLVED to elect Councillor J. Arwel Roberts as Chairperson of the Isle of Anglesey County Council for 2004/2005.

In accepting the honour of being appointed, Chairperson, Councillor J. Arwel Roberts paid tribute to the retiring Chairperson, Councillor Mrs. B. Burns and to Mr. D. Burns for their commitment in representing the County Council in a dignified manner throughout their term of office.

Councillor Mrs. B. Burns, the retiring Chairperson, thanked all the Members and Officers of the Council for their support and co-operation during her term of office. She expressed gratitude to her husband Dennis for his support throughout her term as Chairperson. Councillor Burns gave a synopsis of her duties as Chairperson which involved representing the County Council at 255 various functions over the year.

Councillor Bob Parry, OBE congratulated the new Chair and wished him well for the forthcoming year. He paid tribute to the outgoing Chair. He had the opportunity to work with her and travel with her to numerous ceremonies and was very grateful to her for her friendship over the past year. Councillor Parry, also took the opportunity of thanking the members of the Executive Committee for their loyalty and also to the respective officers for their assistance during his term of office as Leader of the Council.

2

VICE-CHAIRPERSON

RESOLVED to elect Councillor John Byast  as Vice-Chairperson of the Isle of Anglesey County Council for 2004/2005.

Councillor Byast thanked the Members for their confidence in him and expressed his intention to co-operate with and support the newly elected Chairperson.

3

ANNOUNCEMENTS

The Chair referred to the loss of Alderman John Lazarus Williams, 79 of Llanfairpwll on Sunday last. On behalf of the Council he extended his deepest sympathy to his wife and three daughters.

Councillor John Arwel Edwards, as local member, paid tribute to Mr.Williams. Mr. Williams had never been a member of the Isle of Anglesey County Council but had represented Llanfairpwll Community Council for most of the existence of the old Gwynedd County Council. He had been a County Councillor of the highest calibre and had made a very special contribution to Education. He had been more than a successful County Councillor, he had been a great Welshman. His contribution to ensuring that the Welsh language was used in all aspects of life was immeasurable and his contribution was great to the political life of Wales. As was said in the Herald last week, losing ‘JL’ was like losing a part of Wales itself. On behalf of the County Council he extended his sincerest condolences to his family.

The Chairperson also paid his respects to the family of Councillor G.O.Parry,MBE, upon the loss of his brother-in-law whose funeral was being held today.

Members and officers stood in silent tribute as a mark of their respect.

The Chairperson also took the opportunity of congratulating those who were successful at the recently held Urdd Eisteddfod on Anglesey. Congratulations were extended to Lee Roberts, a pupil at Llangefni Secondary School, who had been chosen to represent Wales at the junior coarse fishing championships of the world in Croatia this July.

Congratulations were extended to all those members re-elected following the recent local government elections. A warm welcome was also extended to the 9 new members of the Council. The Chairperson extended his appreciation to former Councillors D.D.Evans, Rhian Medi, W.Emyr Jones and T.Lloyd Hughes for their dedicated years of service to this Council and wished them well for the future.

4

LEADER OF THE COUNCIL

Declarations of interest were received from the following members:-

Councillor Bob Parry OBE declared an interest in respect of any item of business on the Agenda which might relate to the employment of his son's partner who is employed by the Local Education Authority.

Councillor C. L. Everett in respect of any item of business on the Agenda which might relate to  the employment of his sister within the Housing and Social Services Department and in relation to his employment as Clerk of the Holyhead Town Council.

Councillor G.W.Roberts OBE declared an interest in respect of any item of business on the Agenda which might relate to the employment of his daughter within the Planning and Environmental Services Department.

Councillor E.Schofield declared an interest with regard to any item of business on the Agenda which might relate to the employment of his daughter at Oriel Môn, or the employment of his grandson within the Highways,Transportation & Property  Department.

Councillor J.Arwel Roberts declared an interest with regard to any item of business on the agenda which might relate to the employment of his wife at Tolldy Penrhos, Holyhead.

Councillor W.J. Chorlton declared an interest in respect of any item of business on the Agenda which might relate to his daughter's employment in the Environmental Services Department.

Councillor Glyn Jones declared an interest in respect of any item of business on the agenda which might relate to the employment of his wife within the Housing and Social Services Department.

Councillor Robert Lloyd Hughes declared an interest in respect of any item of business on the Agenda which might relate to the employment of his son in the Highways Department.

Councillor Bryan Owen declared an interest in respect of any item of business on the agenda which might relate to the employment of his son in the Economic Development Department.

Councillor Keith Evans declared an interest in Item 10 of these minutes and was not present at the meeting during any discussion or voting thereon.

In accordance with Rule 4.4.1.2. of the Executive Procedure Rules, the Leader of the Council named the following as the members he had chosen to serve on the Executive, together with their Portfolio responsibilities:-

Submitted and confirmed the minutes of the extraordinary meeting of the County Council held on the 27th May, 2004.

(pages 1 - 9 of this Volume)

Submitted - A report by the Managing Director setting out changes to the Scheme of Delegation relating to Executive functions made by the Leader and the Executive since the last ordinary meeting (Rule 4.4.1.4 of the Executive Procedure Rules - Page 131 of the Constitution refers).

Under Rule 4.1.12.4(ii) of the Constitution, Councillor P. S. Rogers asked the following question:-

“What power does this Authority have to discipline the Chief Constable of North Wales over his     failure to provide acceptable policing for the residents of Ynys Mon?”

The Managing Director in reply stated “This Council has no powers to discipline the Chief Constable of North Wales Police.  Under the Police Act 1996 and the Police (Conduct) (Senior Officers) Regulations 1999 such disciplinary powers are vested in the North Wales Police Authority.  I would refer the Councillor to the Clerk of the North Wales Police Authority - Kelvin Dent at Police Headquarters at Colwyn Bay - I can provide the Councillor with full contact details outside this meeting.”

He invited the Council, “if it did not have any powers, to ensure that the strongest representation was sent to the Police Authority, that for too long the Police Authority had not been active.  He referred to televised comments this week of the Chairman of the Police Authority in that the North Wales Police Authority is facing being bottom of the Welsh League.  Councillor Rogers expressed the view that this is not acceptable with the amounts of money being put in, and that a very strong presence on the Police Authority is needed, and it should no longer be a "job for the boys" on that Authority.  A very strong voice is needed because areas of Anglesey are not getting fair representation."

The Managing Director in reply declined to enter into a debate on the supplementary question but confirmed that he has spoken to the Divisional Commander, Chief Inspector Gareth Pritchard, after receipt of the main question, and that Chief Inspector Pritchard is more than willing to meet with Councillor Rogers to discuss the issue.

Reported by the Director of Legal Services/Monitoring Officer that the purpose of the report was twofold;  its first purpose was to assist the Council in reviewing the future of the Scrutiny and Overview function within the Council, including the impact on Special Responsibility Allowances for Members with special responsibilities, and its second purpose was to guide the Council on the new political balance arrangements in the light of the recent election and the proposed new scrutiny arrangements.

Prior to the election of the new Council, discussions had taken place between officers and members of the Council, particularly at the Modernisation Panel which met between November, 2003 and April, 2004, following which cross-authority member support had arisen for the replacement of the current 6 scrutiny committees with a new model comprised of a single scrutiny committee and two overview committees, the remits of which were set out in Appendix A of the report to this Council.

Regulations enacted by the Welsh Assembly Government provided that any Authority wishing to make any alterations to the role of structure of scrutiny and overview committees must obtain the Assembly’s consent before doing so.

An application for consent to change to the model set out in Appendix A of the report had been sent to the Assembly along with a copy of the report to Council and this Authority’s current arrangements.  It was accompanied by a request that a decision be made and that written confirmation be forwarded to this Authority at the earliest possible opportunity.

In the meantime, the Council must legally continue to have some form of scrutiny arrangements in force, not least of all because there needed to continue to be a mechanism for dealing with any called-in decisions which might arise before the proposed model could be put in place.  However, it was recognised that given the drive to put the new system in place as soon as practically and legally possible, there was little point in the present system continuing completely unchanged until this could happen.

The Director of Legal Services/Monitoring Officer noted that  there was a widely held view that the new aims should be introduced even though written consent had not yet been forthcoming.  However, she advised that in the circumstances if the Council decided to proceed before consent was given it may be necessary to consider whether the duty arose for the Monitoring Officer to then report to Council that this would be in breach of legislation which would have the effect of suspending the decision.

The Monitoring Officer stated that she would have to make her judgement at the time.  This duty was rarely exercised and only in clear cases, but was something the Monitoring Officer have to consider, as a statutory duty.

In the interim, the Monitoring Officer refers to the Managing Director's recommendation to members in the report that until consent was granted, 6 scrutiny committees should continue to exist, with politically balanced membership being confirmed, and Group Leaders making nominations, but that there would be no meetings and no chairs or vice-chairs elected or entitled to any allowances until consent was granted at the anticipated ‘special’ meeting of the Council on 13 July, unless a decision was called in, in which case a chair would be elected ad hoc for that meeting alone.  The political balance arrangements which would prevail from the day of this meeting until the new arrangements could be brought into operation were set out in Appendix B to the Managing Director’s report.  The Welsh Assembly Government would be urged in the meantime to provide a speedy response.

A report outlining the current position would be submitted to the 13 July meeting in any case, but if the WAG’s consent was forthcoming before then, the new system would automatically come into operation from that time, even if that was before 13 July.  The political balance which would prevail as from the time that the new arrangements came into force were set out in Appendix C to the report to this Council.  These were slightly different to the table at Appendix B because the new scrutiny arrangements reduced the total number of seats from 128 to 104, so that the numbers allocated to each group also reduced pro rata.  

The resultant changes to the Special Responsibility Allowances (SRA) which would operate from the coming into force of the new arrangements were shown in Appendix D of the report to this Council.  The change from six scrutiny Chairs to three Chairs and three Vice-Chairs receiving SRA’s would result in the same number of allowances being paid, albeit that the Vice-Chair allowance was less than that for a Chair.  Because the Executive will from now on comprise 10 members rather than the previous 9, a chair of the Licensing Committee would need to be elected in due course and the maximum number of SRA's that were permitted to be paid was 20.  If the Licensing Chair was to receive a SRA then another allowance would then need to be abolished.  It was suggested by the Director of Legal Services/Monitoring Officer that the allowance paid to the Chair of the Audit Committee might in the future be the allowance to disappear, but confirmed that for the time being the SRA’s in Appendix D, including the Audit Chair’s allowance could and needed to all be approved.

As to the matter of political balance, it was understood that members had informally been discussing the issue of what seats should be allocated to those members of the Council who were not affiliated to any Group.  As confirmed in earlier reports on political balance, there is no obligation under the Political Balance regulations for non-affiliated members to be offered any seats on committees, but the previous practice of this Council had nonetheless been to offer such members a pro rata share of the seats, in order to allow them to have a full contribution to the Council’s business.  Therefore, the tables shown at Appendices B and C were prepared with the assumption that this practice would continue.

There was no obligation in the Political Balance Regulations for this arrangement, and members might wish to debate the approach to be taken in response to this report.  If it transpired that the view of the Council as a whole was that some other approach was preferred, such as no allocation of any seats to unaffiliated members, or perhaps allocation of seats to scrutiny committees but not other committees, then the Council would need to fully explain its proposals to enable further consideration to be given to the effect on the tables at Appendices B and C.  

The Director of Legal Services recommended that the new scrutiny arrangements be introduced only once consent was given to avoid the Council being in breach of regulations.

1.1

That  with immediate effect  the present Scrutiny and Overview arrangements in 2.6.2 of Article 6 of the Constitution be replaced with the model set out in Appendix ‘A’ attached to this report.

11.2

That  the political balance arrangements set out in Appendix ‘C’ of the report to Council attached hereto shall be effective and preliminary meetings of the new committees be arranged for the election of Chairpersons and Vice-Chairpersons, such Chairpersons and Vice-Chairpersons to be entitled as from the date of their appointment to allowances as shown in Appendix D of the report to the Council save that the allowance for the chairperson of Audit Committee shall cease immediately.

RESOLVED to approve the following programme of ordinary meetings of the County Council for the ensuing year:-

21st September 2004 - 2.00 pm

9th December 2004 - 2.00 pm

3rd March 2005 - 2.00 pm

3rd May 2005 (Annual Meeting) - 2.00 pm

The meeting concluded at 3.10 p.m.  

       COUNCILLOR J. ARWEL ROBERTS

        CHAIRPERSON