West Berkshire Council leader says democracy has not been lost locally

Public participation has been limited during coronavirus pandemic

THE leader of West Berkshire Council has said that democracy does not need to be restored in the district because it has not been lost.

Lynne Doherty (Con, Speen) was responding to calls to allow greater public participation in council meetings.

The council changed its constitution in April, removing the public right to speak to remote council meetings and replacing it with the ability to make written submissions.

The changes were made as Government regulations removed the legal obligation to hold meetings at a specified physical location in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

The council said at the time it would review the situation.

Three months later, and with no announcement, shadow member for climate change Adrian Abbs (Lib Dem, Wash Common) asked “what efforts are being made to restore democracy by initiating hybrid meetings so the public can resume asking questions at meetings?”.

Mrs Doherty said she welcomed the question as it would allow her to set the record straight and “myth bust the notion that democracy needed to be restored”.

She said: “I fundamentally disagree that democracy has been removed such that it would need to be restored.”

The council said that the measures were needed to reduce the risk of challenges to its decisions.

The guidance states that if a councillor “cannot hear or be heard by any member of the public entitled to speak at the meeting, the [councillor] will be deemed not to be in attendance at the meeting”.

It continues: “Therefore, if a member of the public speaking to a meeting could not be heard by the members of that committee, then no valid decision could be made as the members would be deemed to be absent from the meeting.”

Mrs Doherty said the measures were to promote democracy because decisions could be invalidated otherwise.

Another result would be placing decision-making powers into the hands of the council’s chief executive Nick Carter.

She said the council had not stopped the public from asking questions at meetings, just that the process had changed.

And as meetings were being livestreamed and uploaded to YouTube, the council was reaching a far greater audience than before.

Saying that the situation was under review, Mrs Doherty said guidance recommended “that where meetings can take place digitally, without the need for face-to-face contact, they should do so.

“Therefore, while the council is committed to moving towards a new normal to facilitate options such as hybrid meetings, it is not our intention to act contrary to Government guidance.”

Unconvinced, Mr Abbs said: “Democracy is the public being able to have their say and to be heard.

“One of the most fundamental parts of planning is the question and answer session of people presenting.

“To stop them being able to be questioned and stopping councillors asking them and those putting applications forward questions and supplementary questions, and basically debate with them until we get to the bottom of what’s the truth, does remove an element of democracy.

“The guidelines do not stop us, they say hybrid meetings can be enabled and what you seem to have said is we’re not going to do anything about restoring hybrid meetings, and we have some rather big and important planning applications coming forward shortly.”

Written submissions are limited to no more than 500 words and must be submitted no later than noon, two days before the meeting.

The right to ask a supplementary question was removed, as well as presenting petitions, but e-petitions can still be submitted.