Issue - meetings

The Council considered a report on the recent review of Council Procedure Rules which had been undertaken as part of the current work programme to update the constitutions of both Guildford Borough Council (GBC) and Waverley Borough Council (WBC).  The Joint Strategic Director of Legal and Democratic Services had prioritised the Council Procedure Rules as a high priority, requiring urgent attention. 

After reviewing both councils’ Council Procedure Rules, it was apparent that there would be little benefit in amending both sets of the current rules.  Officers had therefore recommended the introduction of a set of new Council Procedure Rules for both councils, using examples of good practice, based on the statutory framework. 

The work to review the Council Procedure Rules for both GBC and WBC was extensive, and had been presented initially to, and supported by, the Guildford and Waverley Joint Constitutions Review Group.  Subsequently, WBC’s Standards & General Purposes Committee (on 8 April 2024) and GBC’s Corporate Governance & Standards Committee (on 11 April 2024) had considered the proposed new Council Procedure Rules.   Details of the outcome of each committee’s consideration of the proposed new Council Procedure Rules were reported to the Council, and would be reported to WBC’s full Council meeting on 23 April 2024.

A key theme in the proposed new Council Procedure Rules was to clearly identify who had the authority and responsibility to discharge functions at council meetings, including proper officers, and the correct procedures to be followed, including appropriate communication channels.

Upon the motion of the Lead Councillor for Regulatory & Democratic Services, Councillor Merel Rehorst-Smith, seconded by Councillor James Jones, the Council

RESOLVED: That the proposed new Council Procedure Rules, as set out in Appendix 2 to the report submitted to the Council, be adopted into the Constitution, subject to the following minor amendments, as suggested by Waverley’s Standards & General Purposes Committee:

(a)         CPR 2.3 - Election of the Mayor and Appointment of the DeputyMayor (page 32 of the Council agenda): Amend the second paragraph so that it reads as follows:

“The current Mayor will preside over the election of their successor, unless they are unable to do so, in which case the current Deputy Mayor will do so. If the Deputy Mayor is ineligible to do so, due to the principle that a Councillor should not preside over their own election, the Monitoring Officer will call for a motion that a non-executive Member of the Council take the chair to preside for the first agenda item of business to Elect the Mayor. In the case of an equality of votes, the person presiding at the meeting, provided they are a councillor,shall give a casting vote in the case of an equality of votes”.

(b)         CPR 4.2 – Business at Extraordinary Meetings (page 37 of the Council agenda): Amend paragraph (vi) so that it reads as follows:

“(vi)    consider the items of business for which the extraordinary meeting has been called, and deal with any business remaining from the last Council meeting.”  ...  view the full minutes text for item 126