Full council meeting cancelled – but decision-making continues

Shropshire Council’s Speaker has agreed to cancel the full Council meeting scheduled for Thursday 21 November 2013, following consultation with the four political group leaders. 

Councillor David Lloyd, who is the Council Speaker, which means he chairs the meetings of the full council, said it made sense to cancel the meeting because there were no items on the agenda that needed a formal decision. 

He said the few items on the agenda would be just as relevant for discussion at the next scheduled meeting on 19 December 2013. 

Councillor Lloyd said:

“With no item requiring formal ratification that could not be deferred until we next convene in December, the political group leaders agreed with me that it would be sensible to avoid using public money to bring all 74 members together to consider a number of non-essential items. 

“This was conditional of my undertaking to issue the Leader and Cabinet members’ responses to questions from councillors and, because they would be unable to ask a verbal supplementary question, they should approach the responsible portfolio holder if they needed further discussion. 

“This has been done and we can start with a clean sheet when we next meet. 

“I appreciate a petition was on the agenda for the meeting, but I see no reason why it cannot be debated in December.  I would disagree with any suggestion that cancellation of the meeting in the circumstances that prevailed undermines democracy in any way.” 

Like many other councils, Shropshire Council operates under a “Cabinet” model, which means that the majority of day-to-day decisions are made by the Cabinet, made up of the Leader of the Council and associated senior councillors, known as Cabinet members, who are each responsible for a particular portfolio, such as children’s services or adult services. 

Full council is when all 74 councillors meet and, according to the constitution, “decide the council’s budget and policy framework”.  There are no rules which state how often full council should meet, just that certain policies need to be approved by full council. 

There are more details about what these policies are in “part 2, article 4” of the council’s constitution (pages B6 to B8 in the following link) – http://shropshire.gov.uk/media/492767/02-part-2-articles-of-the-constitution.pdf. 

Shropshire Council recently gave more decision-making powers to Cabinet members, who can now make certain decisions without having to go through the Cabinet meeting process. 

The aim is to speed up decision-making, as Council Leader, Keith Barrow, explains here: http://shropshire.gov.uk/news/2013/06/council-to-speed-up-decision-making-process/ 

There is more information about the council’s general decision-making process here: http://shropsdemserv.web.coop/CommitteeServices/CouncilMeetingsAndDecisions/DecisionMaking.