Agenda and minutes

P Westwood was nominated and seconded as Chair.

The appointment would be held over until there were more members in attendance to nominate and second the Vice Chair.

To confirm the Minutes of the previous meetings and discuss any matters arising from the Minutes.

The minutes of the meeting of 15 September 2016 were submitted.

Agreed:

That the Minutes of the meeting were recorded as a true record.

Matters Arising

§  The Annual report was presented to Council by H Taylor and was well received.

§  Copies of the Annual Report would be sent to the new Independent Members along with the previous year’s Annual Report which had the procedure for Standards in the appendices.

§  Members/Officer Relation Protocol was not included in the Agenda for Democratic Services Committee in November 2016 but would be raised at the next committee after the local elections in May.

§  There would be no formal training as such for the new members, however all members of the committee would receive training on the Code of Conduct in May, it was compulsory for all members to attend.

§  Discussion on Standards Committee training ensued and G Price mentioned that H Taylor the former Chair had given a presentation to Councillors on the Standards Committee.

To receive any announcements the Chair wishes to make.

As the Chair was newly appointed at the meeting, there were no announcements.

The Monitoring Officer will report on any complaints received since the last meeting.

No further complaints had been received since last time.

The Work Programme would be a matter for discussion post May, again, after the local elections.

One of the issues to consider would be liaising with other authorities for networking purposes and discussing their work programmes.

G Price gave an overview of the Ethical Standards Training for new members.

As there were two new independent members present, G Price went through the Ethical Standards Committee Training, PowerPoint handouts were distributed to those present.

A brief outline of the of the training included:

§  Background information

§  Members Code of Conduct

§  Registration of Personal Interests

§  Prejudicial Interests

§  How the Code is enforced

A co-opted Code of Conduct and Declaration of Interest forms were given to the new independent members to be completed and signed for recording purposes.

To agree the following dates:

Thursday 29 June 2017, 5.30pm in Committee Room 4

Thursday 26 October 2017, 5.30pm in Committee Room 4

The following dates were agreed:

Thursday 29 June 2017 at 5.30pm in Committee Room 4

Thursday 26 October 2017 at 5.30pm in Committee Room 4