The panel will be asked to agree panel arrangements and rules of procedure.

Mrs Hopkins, the Community Safety Manager, PCC, introduced the report and advised that the rules of procedure would be finalised once all relevant regulations and guidance had been received from the Home Office/Local Government Association and would be considered again at the first, formal Panel meeting.

The Chair confirmed that it would be more appropriate to use the term Vice Chair (rather than Deputy Chair) as this was the term familiar to most Members.

Ms Shore, Democratic and Member Support Manager, PCC reminded Members that agreement had already been reached that the two Independent Members must comprise one resident of, or person who works in, Devon (includes Plymouth and Torbay) and one resident of, or a person who works in, Cornwall (and the Isles of Scilly).

It had been suggested that one of the positions i.e. the Chair or the Deputy Chair of the Panel, could be filled by a member from Cornwall (and the Isles of Scilly) and the other position by a member from Devon (including Plymouth and Torbay) and advised the Panel that it may wish to add this criteria to the Panel Arrangements and Rules of Procedure?

Ms Shore highlighted that section 5 of the report outlined the recruitment and selection of Independent Members.  Section 5.6 stated that, ‘Each shortlisted candidate will subsequently be invited to address the Panel and answer questions for a time-limited period, following which the Panel will make its decision.’ 

It had been suggested that:

• if the Panel at its first, formal meeting was required to interview candidates (potentially 12 people) this relatively lengthy process could leave insufficient time to allow proper consideration of the other items of business. 

• asking candidates to make a presentation and answer questions in front of a panel of 18 members may be intimidating for many people and the Panel would not want to discourage any application.

• due to members’ existing commitments, it may be impractical to convene a further meeting of the entire Shadow Panel prior to the first, formal meeting.

Alternative arrangements could be that, at today’s meeting, the Shadow Panel appointed a Selection Panel comprising six members: three from Devon (including Plymouth and Torbay) and three from Cornwall (and the Isles of Scilly).  Each shortlisted candidate would subsequently be invited to address the Selection Panel and answer questions for a time-limited period, following which the Selection Panel would make recommendations to the Police and Crime Panel.   Also, a small Panel of six members would be easier to convene.

Members discussed and were in broad agreement with the above proposals and also requested that:

• substitute members of the Panel should be allowed (Panel arrangements – section 7) as not all members would be able to attend each meeting and it was important for each authority to be represented at each meeting.
• Members of the public should be able to ask questions of the Panel more often than once a year (Panel arrangements – section 31).  Most councils allowed public questions at each meeting.

AGREED:

*Cllr Robertson advised that he would, if Cllr Hicks so wished, givehis place to Cllr Hicks (who had sent his apologies for absence to the meeting).