Council and Democracy

Agenda and minutes

Venue: Committee Room 2, Town Hall, Chesterfield

Contact: Graham Ibberson  01246 345229

Items
No. Item

9.

Declarations of Members' and Officers' interests relating to items on the Agenda.

5.00pm to 5.05pm

Minutes:

No declarations of interest were received.

10.

Apologies for Absence

5.05pm to 5.10pm

Minutes:

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Kelly, Blakemore and Kellman.

11.

Boundary Commission Review Communication Plan pdf icon PDF 57 KB

5.10pm to 5.50pm

Minutes:

The Service Director for Corporate presented a report to the Committee regarding the Local Government Boundary Review Changes and associated Communication Plan.

 

The purpose of the update was to consult with scrutiny members for a wider view on how to share information with the public for consideration as part of the development of the communication plan.

 

The report considered the challenges and opportunities around communicating to the electorate the changes around electoral boundaries following the Local Government Boundary Review Commission Review.

 

Implications for consideration included Financial, as there is a limited budget for elections which would be utilised to support the communication plan, Climate Change, an assessment of the overall communications plan will consider individual proposals from a climate change perspective, and Equality and Diversity.

 

The Chair thanked the Service Director for presenting the report and opened for suggestions from committee members.

 

Members discussed historical instances of certain polling districts which lead to lower electorate attendance and asked about the possibility of utilising double polling stations.  The Service Director confirmed that a working group was to be set up to look at polling districts and associated polling stations.

 

A member discussed the need to focus on the younger voters to encourage greater participation in these lower age groups and also queried how many boundary name changes were expected.  The Service Director confirmed that all social media channels would be utilised to target younger voters and that although specific numbers were unconfirmed a significant number of name changes were anticipated.

 

A member also highlighted that with the boundary changes, many voters will still not be changing wards even though the name of their ward may change, so there was a need to ensure voters were aware of this.  It was also asked if there was scope to look at this from a street by street perspective as opposed to voter by voter.  The Service Director advised that all aspects would be looked at taking into account name changes, moves and no moves.

 

Questions were also asked around lessons learnt from other areas and the possibility of utilising a post code checker for voters to be able to check which ward they would come under.  It was stated that it was hoped a post code type checker would be available online through the CBC website and lessons learnt from other areas who commenced work prior to CBC were being shared. However, this may not be possible due to the extremely pressured timetable impacted by additional Commission consultation and consideration periods.

 

When asked by a member if the posting of Council Tax bills could be utilised to share information, the Service Director discussed the potential cost implications of including extra content with Council Tax bills, but also confirmed that there were two planned publications of Your Chesterfield which would be highlighting the changes which would engage the same audience.

 

Final questions were asked around what data CBC currently held around political voter patterns and if this could be utilised in any way and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 11.

12.

Scrutiny Project Groups Progress Updates

5.50pm to 6.05pm

Minutes:

The Service Director for Economic Growth presented to the committee the Project Start Report (PSR) for the CBC Lighting Strategy.  The Scrutiny Project Group (SPG) members were confirmed as Councillors Caulfield, Fordham and Blakemore.

 

The PSR detailed the project aims and objectives, proposed benefits, scope and options.  Key risks were said to include time constraints and costs.

 

Recommendations would be made by the SPG to the relevant Overview and Scrutiny Committee (OSC) at the end of the scrutiny project.  OSC would consider the work and agree any recommendations to Cabinet or other decision making bodies.

 

Members discussed the climate change aspect of the strategy, highlighting projected light displays as an example.  The Service Director confirmed that the Lighting Strategy provided the opportunities to project different displays.

 

It was agreed that Democratic Services would set up a further meeting to discuss next steps for the SPG.

 

The Chair thanked the Service Director for presenting the PSR and commented on the quality and detail of the report.

 

Councillor Dyke provided a verbal update to the committee on the Outside Bodies SPG.

 

The initial breakdown of all listed Outside Bodies had been shared with the group with next steps to be agreed.

 

A member raised a point around the opportunity for the Council to make non members nominees for certain Outside Bodies.  The member also suggested a time limit for appointments to Outside Bodies.

 

The Chair requested all members to share all ideas with Councillor Dyke for feed into the project group.

 

RESOLVED –

 

That the updates be noted.

13.

Scrutiny Monitoring pdf icon PDF 133 KB

6.05pm to 6.10pm

Minutes:

The Committee considered the scrutiny recommendations implementation monitoring schedule.

 

RESOLVED –

 

That the scrutiny monitoring schedule be noted.

14.

Forward Plan

Forward Plan of Key Decisions 01  August to 30 November 2022 available by the link below

 

https://chesterfield.moderngov.co.uk/mgListPlanItems.aspx?PlanId=140&RP=134

 

6.10pm to 6.15pm

Minutes:

The Committee considered the Forward Plan for the period 1 August 2022 to 30 November 2022.

 

RESOLVED –

 

That the Forward Plan be noted.

15.

Work Programme for the Community, Customer and Organisational Scrutiny Committee pdf icon PDF 67 KB

6.15pm to 6.30pm

Minutes:

The Committee considered the items on its work programme for 2022/23.

 

RESOLVED –

 

That the work programme be noted.

16.

Minutes pdf icon PDF 69 KB

6.30pm to 6.35pm

Minutes:

The Minutes of the meeting of the Community, Customer and Organisational Scrutiny Committee held on 19 May 2022 were presented.

 

RESOLVED –

 

That the Minutes be approved as a correct record and by signed by the Chair.