Is South Devon democracy under threat?
24th April 2020
Local councillors are furious with new measures with claims that democracy is being undermined and usual rights that we take for granted are being removed under the cover of the current corona crisis. An extraordinary vote at the ‘full council meeting’ of South Hams District Council yesterday afternoon (the 23rd April), has potentially put the normal process of collective decision making control into the hands of just two individuals. The Head of Paid Service (or his deputy) and the Leader of the council. The controversial motions that were put forward and successfully voted through were:
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Para. 3.1 ‘Meetings only to be held when required’ and the proposal to allow ‘the Head of Paid Service (or Deputy) in consultation with the Leader’ to decide which meetings are required to take place.
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Para. 3.1(b) ‘Meetings of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee/Panel shall only be held where they are required by law or in the opinion of the Head of Paid Service in consultation with the Chairman of that Committee decides are required due to the nature and a meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee/Panel would not overstretch the Council’s resources.’
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‘3.3.(a) In keeping with the rationale for holding meetings only where they are required,agendas for any such meetings required to be held shall not include any items for questions or motions on notice from Councillors.
3.4 (b) Where the Council Procedure Rules provide for questions from members of the public, deputations and petitions to be asked, heard or received at a meeting of the Council, the Head of Paid Service may, having regard to the nature of the question, deputation or petition, deal with any such questions, deputations and petitions without referring them to a meeting of the Council.’
Ward Councillor for Totnes John Birch is Chair of Overview & Scrutiny and has stated: “They’ve effectively stopped me having meetings and stopped me being able to do my job.”
This is a storm in a teacup…
Council Leader Judy Pearce
Chair of a local charity, The South Hams Society, Didi Alayli said prior to yesterdays’ vote: “These are perhaps the most worrying proposals as we can see no legitimate rationale for the proposed curtailment of rights. Why would the District Council wish to limit public and Councillor participation in decision making in this way?”
John Birch speaking on “The Full Totnes Breakfast Show” radio programme this morning stated: “Other regions, Exeter, for example haven’t closed down the democratic process. This crisis [covid19] is being used as an excuse for doing away with members in the decision making process”.
Jacqi Hodgson is the Ward Councillor for Dartington and has stated: “I am extremely concerned about this shut down of democracy, and the prevention of our inputs to District Council meetings and decisions during this crisis, and consider it an imposition on and the undermining of our elected representative duties. ”
The new ruling could be imposed for up to thirteen months. Ms Hodgson continues: “To attempt to put these new rules in place during such a critical time, when we all need to be able to pool our resources, propose and discuss good ideas and work as a team, this is an outrageous abuse of power during an unprecedented and challenging time; to attempt to implement this shut down for over a year is quite frankly a blatant attempt at a take-over of the Council.“
Councillor Judy Pearce is Leader of South Hams District Council and pointed out that the Meeting held on Thursday afternoon consited of 29 councillors of which only 7 voted against the proposals and so the items were voted through with a substantial majority. Ms Pearce said “These measures are entirely in line with government regulations for local council business” she continues, “…half those who voted for this were in fact, Lib Dem councillors.”
Government changes to local authorities
The UK Government have indeed allowed for procedural changes which are outlined here on the UK Gov website. On being asked about undermining the ‘Overview and Scrutiny Committee’, Judy Pearce told the Totnes Pulse: “This group scutinise the executive committee and we are not having these meetings at the moment. There are being done as and when, so effectively there is nothing for them to scrutinise. This is not life threatening” she continued, “We need to focus on our response to the community.”
The guidelines on the Government do not appear to openly sanction restrictions on normal scrutiny procedures however does state:
“Local authorities can decide not to hold the legally prescribed annual meeting. Where meetings are held, local authorities have the flexibility to hold them at any time of day and on any day, to alter how frequently they are held and to move or cancel them without further notice. “
A statement from The South Hams Society included: “We understand that there may need to be some limits on face to face representation due to the need for social distancinig but it is the duty of the District Council to adapt its ways of working to ensure that the voices of those it serves and its elected members can still be heard. This is critical if the Council is to continue fulfilling its democratic role.”
Cllr Pearce said any member can email the officers and continued by saying: “This is a storm in a teacup” and explained that these new measures were needed to ease the load on managing the difficult situation created as a result of Corona Virus. “Remote meetings are not easy. These Zoom meetings are very resource hungry and reports have to be approved and so on.”
South Hams District Council have responded to a request for a statement from Totnes Post in full as below
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Cllr Judy Pearce, Leader of South Hams District Council, said: “On Thursday, the agenda item to adopt the Remote Meetings Procedure Rules, was passed with a substantial majority. 21 Members voted in favour, including three members of the Liberal Democrat Party, one Independent Member, one Green Party Member and the Conservative group, with seven votes against and one abstention.
“These Procedurals were written to comply with the regulations attached to the Coronavirus Act 2020.
“This decision has been made because the Government recognises that we are having to work differently and because of this change in focus we do not have the capacity to follow the normal schedule of meetings. For example, many of those officers who would normally have resourced the council meetings are now working on the emergency response. Therefore, they have said that we can change how we hold council meetings, to make local democracy as efficient and effective as it can be at this difficult time.
“Secondly, I think that it is entirely sensible that we should only hold council meetings where strategic decisions have to be made, such as for the appointment of the new Head of Paid Service. With many of our core functions suspended, we will not be making important strategic decisions and therefore we do not need to hold our usual cycle of council meetings. Tactical decisions which have to be made to enable officers to respond to the coronavirus crisis can be done under delegated emergency powers.
“Once the crisis is passed and we can switch our attention back to our normal day to day functions, normal council meetings can and will resume as soon as it is safe to do so.”
Link supplied for the CoronaVirus ACT 2020
Is this a ‘storm in a teacup’ or is democracy being undermined?
Comment below…
Cllr Pearce, this assault on local democracy is far from a “storm in a teacup”. It is precisely in a time of crisis such as this that we need the highest levels of democratic integrity, transparency and accountability with processes of decision-making that we can see and trust and, when necessary, challenge. At a time when so many of our fundamental liberties have been stripped away and so many people in the community have been left highly vulnerable we need our local democracy to be functioning as well as it possibly can. This decision reflects an utter disregard and disrespect for the community that the Council is there to serve. Arguing that this step is necessary to protect your overstretched officers and because Zoom is inconvenient would seem like a bad joke if it wasn’t so deeply insulting and irresponsible. This “storm in a teacup” is set to engulf you if it isn’t reversed quickly.
We, as the opposition felt extremely strongly that this move was completely unacceptable. Cllr John Birch moved a motion to cut out the unnecessary loss of democracy from the new procedure and we all voted for that. The result was 13 opposition against 16 Torrie votes, we all suspect that if the Conservative party had not used the whip the motion would never have been passed.
Personally, it made me want to quit but I have committed to seeing this through and I will do so, even though I do not believe that a council run by an executive committee of 5 Torries and one Lib Dem can ever be truly democratic
Cllr Joseph Rose, Totnes
There has to more underlying this than just not wanting to use remote conferencing. They managed to use it for this resolution!! It’s looks to me to be a dereliction of duty by our Councillors. What can be done to challenge this? Local Government Ombudsman?
As a resident if Dartington I now have no representation by our elected councillor at SHDC. And it looks as though we may not have for up to 13 months! This is a denial of democracy and our human rights and I cannot accept that these councillors are u able to meet via zoom. I have had several very successful zoom meet ups since the lockdown and these were arranged by ordinary people using our phones! With a whole IT department, its nust not valid that SHDC cannot meet and be on view for us to see our representatives discussing issues and making decisions s in an open and transparent way. If oemrdinary people can do this on a phone or laptop I fail to see how this can be ‘resource heavy’. If Devon County Council,Teignbridge District Council and many parish councils can manage to keep a well publicised schedule of meetings albeit reduced in length continuing via zoom, then SHDC has no excuse. These draconian measures rob us all of our democracy and our councils accountability.
This is a complete assault on our democracy. I , along with other Town and District Councillors am appalled that this motion was voted through by a Conservative lead administration. Sadly, some members of the opposition including green and Lib Dem members voted for this. This outcome essentially means that key issues such as planning applications for example, are decided by just two people without any scrutiny from District Councillors or the public. This could potentially be the position for up to 13 months. People are justifiably questioning whether they should be paying their council tax. Judy Pearce, leader of South Hams Dustrict Council, this will be challenged! Please think again!
Thoroughly dishonest statements from Judy Pearce-the idea that Zoom meetings are ‘resource hungry ‘is actually palpably absurd -or is it the ‘Conservatives’ just can’t rise to the occasion
The votes from the independant group were obtained by a sleight of hand that amounted to a sop or …nothing -this was NOT scrutinised or defererred for due scrutiny as it certainly should have been .
The mendacity of the statement that Shams is pouring its resources into responding to the crisis is quite breathtaking-so far all we have actually seen is Shams cutting services….!
If the Con group really ARE committed to getting back to normal ASAP -why was this enacted for 13 months rather than 3 wks as reccomended by the Govt guidance ……?
The attitude of the district councils majority to and lack of respect for their colleagues is summed up by The execrable -sub Trumpian -comment from Llr Barstone .
Shame on you for your lack of courage -or is it just more incompetence…..?
I’d also like to point out that as the Tory members who are a majority, voted en bloc, the Lib Dem amendment was narrowly defeated – the choice then was for a shutdown with only the head of council to be consulted, or a shutdown with the head of the opposition included as well. It was a sop, but members of the opposition voted for the sop because it was (mildly) better than the alternative! That has resulted however in the Tory group ‘claiming’ that they have a large mandate for this appalling circumvention of democracy!
Great to see this Peter Shearn my question to the council would be – why are you pretty much the only council in the entire country who finds it too difficult to hold Online meetings? And – the government guidelines very clearly state that local democracy must not be allowed to be subverted – that local democracy and transparency are of the utmost importance – why have you interpreted that to mean removing scrutiny from council procedures? I would also like to know what will happen to the planning committee? Will officers make decisions on planning applications which would normally go to committee?