Issue - meetings

In accordance with Procedure Rules Nos.11 and 35 a period of 10 minutes is allocated for members of the public to address the meeting on any matter relating to the work of the body in question.  Individual members of the public may speak for up to 5 minutes but the Chairman or person presiding will decide how the period of time allocated for public speaking will be apportioned where there are a number of speakers. Members of the public are not required to give notice to use this facility. However, as a matter of courtesy, a period of 24 hours’ notice is encouraged.

Members of the public wishing to ask a question at the meeting should provide at least three clear working days’ notice in writing and should include the question with that notice. This will enable an informed answer to be given.

Keith Smith, Chairman of Macclesfield Civic Society, spoke in support of the establishment of a Town Council for Macclesfield; he considered it to be the only democratic option open to residents for the delivery of their services and he considered it to be the best of the options available.

Richard Watson thanked the Chairman for the clarification given in his announcement at the beginning of the meeting.  He stated that he would have like more information regarding the earlier consultation process and an assessment of why it had not been as successful as had been hoped.  He expressed concern that the information on the Councils website was not easily accessible; that details on the size of existing Parish/Town Councils already in existence in Cheshire East implied that Macclesfield was too large an area and this was not the case by comparison with Lemington Spa and Weston Super Mere for example; that no clear definition existed of what could be done by a Local Service Delivery Committee, and that the lack of progress was worrying in view of the total period of 12 months in which this work needed to be completed 

David Whalley made three key observations.  Whilst he sympathised with the position of Members and Officers he did not consider that the July consultation had been carried out well as the methods of publicity used had not reached those for whom it was intended; this needed to be remedied for future stages.  The advantages of having a democratically accountable local/town based body would be found to be a huge benefit in the support of local cultural initiatives, and his own experiences in setting up a number of cultural and community projects showed that the role of the internet and social media was critical for the next stages of the process, especially in engaging the under 30’s. 

Liz Braithwaite stated that the purpose of any consultation was to engage positively with the peopleat whom it was aimed.  She did not feel, however, that this had been the case in this process and that instead it had been left to the electorate to find out for themselves.  She wanted the relevant information to be made clearly available in order to make an informed decision.

In response to the points raised with regard to advertising and making information available a resume was given of all that had been done to get the information into the public arena for which a number of different methods of communication had been used.