Agenda and minutes

Councillor Mollie Lock declared an interest in Agenda Item 3, and reported that, as her interest was personal and prejudicial but not a disclosable pecuniary interest, she would be not take part in the consideration of the matter.

Purpose: The Standards Committee is asked to consider an application for dispensations for the Councillors listed in Table A to be able to debate and vote at any District Council meeting where discussions are held that could impact on the budget of the Town or Parish Council  on which they or a close family member are an employee or a serving member.

(Councillor Mollie Lock declared a personal and prejudicial interest but not a disclosable pecuniary interest in Agenda item 3 by virtue of the fact that she was one of the Members that had applied for a dispensation. As her interest was personal and prejudicial they took no part in the debate or voting on the matter).

The Committee considered a report (Agenda Item 3) concerning an application for dispensations for Councillors David Allen, Howard Bairstow, Jeff Beck, Brian Bedwell, Dominic Boeck, Jeff Brooks, Hilary Cole, Roger Croft, Richard Crumly, Billy Drummond, Sheila Ellison, Marcus Franks, David Goff, John Horton, Carol Jackson-Doerge, Alan Law, Mollie Lock, Royce Longton, Alan Macro, Tim Metcalfe, James Podger, Andrew Rowles, Julian Swift-Hook and Tony Vickers to be able to debate and vote at any District Council meeting where discussions were held that could impact on the budget of the Town or Parish Council  on which they or a close family member were an employee or a serving member..

One of the Disclosable Pecuniary Interests (DPIs) which Members were required to disclose under the Authority’s Code of Conduct was “Membership of other bodies: Details of any body exercising functions of a public nature of which you are a member or in a position of general control or management.”

It followed, therefore, that a District Councillor who was also a Town or Parish Councillor had a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest (DPI) to disclose in relation to discussions that would impact on the budgets of the Town or Parish Councils in the District.

The Standards Committee was asked to consider whether or not to grant a dispensation on the basis that “the authority considers that the dispensation is in the interests of persons living in the authority’s area” might be applicable. This was due to the fact that 24 of the 50 Councillors who had notified Officers that they would be present at the Council meeting had notified the Monitoring Officer that they had a DPI. The Monitoring Officer was of the view that this issue was substantive and a failure to grant a dispensation would impede the transaction of the business because of the number of members having the same DPI.

RESOLVED that:

Councillors David Allen, Howard Bairstow, Jeff Beck, Brian Bedwell, Dominic Boeck, Jeff Brooks, Hilary Cole, Roger Croft, Richard Crumly, Billy Drummond, Sheila Ellison, Marcus Franks, David Goff, John Horton, Carol Jackson-Doerge, Alan Law, Mollie Lock, Royce Longton, Alan Macro, Tim Metcalfe, James Podger, Andrew Rowles, Julian Swift-Hook and Tony Vickers be granted a dispensation be able to debate and vote on all matters that could impact on the budget of the Town or Parish Council  on which they or a close family member are an employee or a serving member until 31 March 2015.