Agenda and minutes

To elect a Chair of the Working Party until the next Annual Council Meeting.

RESOLVED – That Councillor Tom McGee be elected Chair of the Working Party for the period until the next Annual Council Meeting.

To appoint a Vice-Chair of the Working Party until the next Annual Council Meeting.

Councillors Kate Butler and Lisa Smart were nominated for election to the office of Vice-Chair of the Working Party for the period until the next Annual Council Meeting.

For Councillor Butler– 4

For Councillor Smart - 2

RESOLVED – That Councillor Kate Butler be appointed Vice-Chair of the Working Party for the period until the next Annual Council Meeting.

To approve as a correct record and sign the Minutes of the meeting held on 5 April 2017.

The Minutes (copies of which had been circulated) of the meeting held on 5 April 2017 were approved as a correct record.

Councillors and Officers to declare any interests which they have in any of the items on the agenda for the meeting.

Councillors and Officers were invited to declare any interests which they had in any of the agenda items for the meeting.

The following interest was declared:-

Personal Interest

To consider a report of the Monitoring Officer

The Working Party is asked to consider recommending a review of the Constitution and Business Programme, with a view to recommending a series of amendments.

The Working Party is invited to comment on the report.

Officer Contact: Vicki Bates on 0161 474 3219 or email: vicki.bates@stockport.gov.uk

The Monitoring Officer submitted a report (copies of which had been circulated) requesting the Working Party to consider a review of the Constitution, with a view to recommending a series of amendments.

The Working Party considered the following:-

·         Splitting the review into two sections, namely the Business Programme and amendments to the Constitution.

·         Reducing the number of cycles in the Business Programme for 2020/21 from nine cycles to six cycles.

·         Re-casting a six cycle Business Programme through the Municipal Year 2021/22.

·         The Working Party noted that moving the Scrutiny Co-ordination Committee to the beginning of the Scrutiny cycle had already taken place for 2020/21.

·         Whether area committees should take place in August and, if they did not, the effect on the determination of development applications.

·         Having regard to school holidays in the preparation of the Business Programme, particularly the October half term, but noting that this may be more problematical with regard to avoiding holding the Budget Council Meeting in the February half-term.

·         Whether or not to separate the Annual Council Meeting section into two separate meetings – the Ceremonial, Mayor Making section and the Council Business section, and abolish the Informal Council Meeting. The majority of the Members of the Working Party favoured keeping the Annual Council Meeting in its present format and retaining the Informal Council Meeting.

·         Whether to instruct the Local Government Association to undertake a ‘deep dive’ of how the Council undertakes its governance and its business programme. This was not supported by the Working Party at this moment in time.

·         Whether the inter-relation between the Council’s Constitution and the Mayoral Development Corporation’s Constitution needed to be considered further by this Working Party.

RESOLVED – (1) That the Monitoring Officer be requested to submit a report to the next meeting of the Working Party illustrating what the Business Programme for 2020/21 could look like by removing three cycles as an interim measure and re-casting a six cycle Business Programme through the Municipal Year 2021/22 and onwards.

(2) That future meetings of the Working Party be held as follows:-

·         3.00pm on 9 September 2019

·         5.30pm on 14 October 2019

·         5.30pm on 6 November 2019.