Decision details

The Interim Monitoring Officer submitted a paper providing further information requested at the last meeting on the delegation of decisions to individual members and the powers that may be contained in the Constitution to allow urgent decisions to be made by individual members.

It was noted that legal advice had been sought and indicated there would be a real risk of legal challenge to decisions made if the Council’s procedures were altered so as to give additional prominence to the role of individual Members in the urgent decision-making process. In practice such decisions were relatively infrequent and the process used only where it was not possible for a Committee decision to be made.

Members noted that there were ongoing discussions with the Council’s political leadership on the model of Executive Arrangements which they would wish to see in operation in respect of Cabinet decisions after 1 April 2009. One option the Cabinet could request the Committee to explore was individual Cabinet Member decision-making, as permitted by the Local Government Act 2000. If approved, such arrangements would ensure that officer urgency powers do not need to be exercised in all cases where urgent decisions need to be made.

RESOLVED – that the report be noted.