Members will be asked to make any declarations of interest in respect of items on this Agenda.

No declarations of interest were made.

To confirm the minutes of the meeting held on 25 July 2023.

The Committee agreed the minutes of the meeting held on 25 July 2023 as a correct record.

To receive reports on business which, in the opinion of the Chair, should be brought forward for urgent consideration.

There were no items of Chair’s urgent business.

Ross Jago (Head of Governance, Performance and Risk) ran through the proposed changes, with support from Alison Critchfield (Acting Head of Legal), and the following points were highlighted and discussed by the Committee:

a)    Article 5, paragraph 5.5 needed rewording as it read that following the death of the Lord Mayor, they could return;

b)    How to word the paragraph relating to not requiring a vote for reports to note at City Council meetings;

c)    If an age limit should be put in place for petition signatures and how this would be policed, or if ‘regardless of age’ would be better.

During these discussions it was agreed that the following further amendments would be made:

1.   Both ‘Councillors’ and ‘Members’ had been used interchangeably in the document previously and only Councillors would be used moving forward;

2.   Article 5 paragraph 5.5 would be changed to read “If the Lord Mayor resigns or dies the Deputy Lord Mayor will act as Lord Mayor until the next appropriate Meeting of the Council where a new Lord Mayor will be elected by the Council”;

3.   Article 5 would have an additional paragraph that would read “If the Lord Mayor is incapacitated the Deputy Lord Mayor will act in their place until the Lord Mayor is able to return to the role.”;

4.    Article 11 paragraph 11.5 would have the word ‘annually’ added to the end of the following sentence: “in the case of revenue projects when the decision involves entering into new commitments and/or making new savings in excess of £1million”;

5.   Part B, Paragraph 19.5 would be changed to read “Reports which contain only recommendations “to note” may not require a vote, unless a vote is called for by Councillors.”;

6.   The second bullet point of paragraph 2.1 in the Petition Scheme would have “regardless of age” added.

The Committee then agreed to:

1.    Recommend amended Part A, Part B and Petition Scheme Guidance to City Council for approval;

2.    To review the Officer/Member Protocol at a later meeting.