Agenda and minutes

Venue: Town Hall

Contact: Imelda Grady 

Items
No. Item

31.

Minutes of the Last Meeting pdf icon PDF 103 KB

To receive, as read, the Minutes of the proceedings of the Council held on the 28th September 2016 and to confirm them or otherwise.

Minutes:

RESOLVED        The Minutes of the meeting of the Council held on the 28th September 2016 were confirmed and signed by the Chair.

32.

Declarations of Interest

To receive any declarations of interest.

Minutes:

There were no declarations of interest made.

33.

Mayor's Communications

To receive communications (if any) from His Worship the Mayor.

Minutes:

The Mayor congratulated Councillors Ida Carmichael and Roger Frost on being recognised in the national Councillor Achievement Awards. Councillor Ida Carmichael was given an honourable mention in the category of District Councillor of the Year, and Councillor Roger Frost was shortlisted in the Lifetime Achievement category.

 

The Mayor further reported that the Council had been shortlisted in the Local Government Chronicle’s Awards, in the ‘Driving Growth’ category for the work that had been done over many years under different administrations and thanked the members, officers and partners who had enabled this to happen.

 

 

34.

Public Question Time

To receive questions, statements or petitions (if any) from members of the public.

Minutes:

There were no public questions.

35.

Parliamentary Boundaries Proposals pdf icon PDF 1 MB

That Full Council consider the proposed changes to the parliamentary boundaries put forward by the Boundary Commission

Minutes:

Consideration was given to the Council’s response to the proposed changes to the parliamentary boundaries put forward by the Boundary Commission.

 

It was moved by Councillor Mark Townsend and seconded by Councillor John Harbour:-

 

“That the Chief Executive write to the Boundary Commission supporting the changes to the Burnley Parliamentary Boundary.

 

An amendment was further moved by Councillor Mark Townsend and seconded by Councillor John Harbour by adding

 

“and in doing so also make the following points; 

 

The Council does not agree with the Government’s arbitrary policy of slashing the number of MPs given the UK’s rising population. The Council also believes the proposals are based on out of date electoral registration data, which does not take account of the impact of individual voter registration (which took hundreds of thousands off the register) or those that applied to vote during the recent referendum (which added 2 million).  In addition, the Government has not proposed a reduction in the size of the executive. In making the executive branch bigger relative to the legislature, the proposals weaken Parliament’s ability to scrutinise and hold ministers to account. Neither are there any plans to reduce the number of peers, which means the elected House of Commons will shrink while the unelected House of Lords remains bloated. Since the enactment of the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act in 2011, 144 new peerages have been created.

 

However, Burnley Council supports the principle of creating constituencies of roughly similar sized populations, and is strongly of the view that the 2016 proposals are a significant improvement on those put forward in 2012. Whilst it would have been clearly preferable to retain the current co-terminous boundary between the district council and the Parliamentary constituency, the 2016 proposals do at least keep the main towns of Burnley and Padiham largely intact”

 

 

 

 

36.

Adjournment of Meeting

Minutes:

The Mayor adjourned the meeting for a short time to allow Members the opportunity to consider the amendment.

 

37.

The Meeting reconvened at 7.55 pm

Minutes:

On being put to the vote the original motion as amended was declared to be carried and it was RESOLVED ACCORDINGLY.

38.

Constitutional Updates and Delegations pdf icon PDF 90 KB

To note the constitutional updates since the last meeting to Part 3 (Executive) of the constitution by the Leader relating to the Head of Regeneration and Planning Policy and the Chief Executive, and to the Director of Resources; and to consider the exercise of delegations regarding the Director of Resources.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

 

Consideration was given to constitutional updates to Part 3 (Executive) of the constitution by the Leader relating to the Head of Regeneration and Planning Policy and the Chief Executive and to the Director of Resources; the exercise of delegations regarding the Director of Resources; and an update to Part 4.3 of the constitution which is the Budget and Policy Framework

 

RESOLVED

(1)  That the following constitutional updates by the Leader relating to Part 3 (Executive Functions) Scheme of Delegation  be noted:

 

(i)           18th October 2016 – Business Grant delegations of the Head of            Regeneration and Planning Policy amended, with some also transferred to the Chief Executive, as set out in appendix 1 to the report;

(i)            1st November 2016 – Delegations in the absence of the Director  

           of Resources, as set out in appendix 2 to the report.

 

      (2)That in the absence of the Director of Resources approval be given that approval be given that the Officers listed in the first column of the table in Paragraph 7 of the report shall have the authority to exercise such of the powers set out in the second column of the said table as are vested in the Director of Resources, save for any such powers as are contained in Part 3 (Executive Functions) of the Council’s constitution.

 

       (3)That approval be given to an amendment to Part 4.3 of the constitution regarding Paragraph 5 (b) of the Budget and Policy Framework to update the virement level from £10k to £20k.

 

 

39.

Questions

To deal with questions (if any) relating to matters not contained in the Minutes before the Council and of which notice in writing has been received in accordance with Standing Order No. 10(2).

Minutes:

There were no questions.