Agenda item

This report responds to two matters raised by a number of Councillors in relation to the Scheme of Delegation. The Committee is asked to consider how it wishes to proceed to resolve these matters in a satisfactory way.

Recommendation

It is recommended that the Committee:

(i)    Considers whether to make any recommendations to Council on the delegation to the S151 Officer in relation to approval of fees and charges (matter 1). 

(ii)  Considers whether to make any recommendations to Council to limit the scope of the Scheme of Delegation to Officers once a matter has been brought to committee in order for a committee to retain ’ownership’ of an issue (matter 2).

(iii) Notes that the Audit Committee will be reviewing its terms of reference and potential areas of overlap with the terms of reference of the Standards Committee and Overview and Scrutiny, and that the Chairman and Vice-Chairman of the Standards Committee will be invited to contribute to this review.

The Committee noted that this item had been added to the agenda to respond to two matters raised by a number of Councillors in relation to the Scheme of Delegation.

Cllr Mark Merryweather, Portfolio Holder for Finance, Assets and Commercial Services, reminded the Committee that the Audit Committee minutes of November 2019 were included in full in the Council agenda for 10 December 2019, and clearly stated that the delegation included car park fees, so he was disappointed that some Members now felt that this was not clear.  On the matter of when there should be exceptions to the Scheme of Delegation, Cllr Merryweather felt that the Executive decision of 4 December 2018 had been compiled with, and there was no matter to be debated.  Howver, the Executive could always add a condition to any decision that a matter be referred back to the Executive for further decisions, even when they could be made under delegation.

Cllr Follows asked who these Councillors were and whether they were members of the Standards Committee.  Robin Taylor, the Monitoring Officer, stated that some were and some were not.  Cllr Goodridge said he was one of the Councillors who had raised the issue as a number of Councillors had approached him.  He felt that the Council should decide fees and charges at the budget meeting and the decisions needed to stay with them.  Some Councillors were also concerned about transparency of the S151 Officer being able to make changes to fees and charges under delegation..

Some Councillors did not support changes to the scheme of delegation as they felt there was no need for them.  Some Councillors also felt that it was a dangerous precedent to bring decisions of another Committee – Audit – to the Standards Committee when the Committee did not like the decision which had been made.

In relation to the delegation to the S151 Officer in relation to fees and charges Cllr Goodridge proposed a recommendation to Council that the Section 151 Officer be given delegated authority to approve minor changes in relation to fees and charges including car parking fees between budgets but the fees and charges were decided by Full Council at budget time.

This motion was seconded by Cllr Gray.

Robin Taylor, the Monitoring Officer, clarified that the Committee always had primacy of decision making.

Some Councillors felt that the word “minor” was ambiguous and that pan-Waverley car parking decisions at the start of the year did not work.

Some Councillors felt that the trust between Councillors and Officers meant that delegation to officers should be possible.

The Committee voted on whether it was felt necessary to make any recommendation to Full Council to amend the extant delegation to the S151 Officer.

On the Chairman’s casting vote, the Committee RESOLVED that there was no change necessary to the delegation to the S151 Officer in relation to fees and charges.

With regard to the second matter, on exceptions to the Scheme of Delegation, the Committee RESOLVED that a change to the Scheme of Delegation was needed and that Officers should bring back to the Committee a form of words that had been agreeded with the Chairman and Vice-Chairman.

The Committee noted that the Audit Committee would be reviewing its terms of reference and potential areas of overlap with the terms of reference of the Standards Committee and Overview and Scrutiny, and the Chairman and Vice-Chairman of the Standards Committee would contribute to this review.