Minutes:
Under the provisions set out in Section 100B(4) of the Local Government Act 1972 (as amended) the Chairman of the Meeting was of the opinion that this item could be taken as the first item on the Agenda as urgent business due to the need for this Committee to give consideration to the matter prior to it going to Full Council on 14 July 2015.
RESOLVED: to add the item as the first item on the Agenda.
The Committee had before it a report outlining the governance implications of the Chief Executive leaving the Council at the end of September. Full Council needed to make appointments to certain statutory roles, in particular that of ‘Head of the Paid Service’. Under the Constitution, the Remuneration Committee must make a recommendation to Council as to the person it thinks should be appointed to that role.
On 23 June 2015 the Remuneration Committee recommended the appointment of the Chief Legal Officer, Peter Clark. If Council agreed to make this appointment, then a new Monitoring Officer must also be appointed. This was because the law says that a person can’t be appointed as both Head of the Paid Service and Monitoring Officer. Consequently, the Remuneration Committee had also recommended that Nick Graham be appointed as the new Monitoring Officer, if appropriate.
A further role that needed to be appointed was that of County Returning Officer. The Returning Officer oversaw elections to the County Council. Appointments to that role were made by this Committee and so a report on appointing the County Returning Officer would be considered at the September meeting.
As this Committee was responsible for ensuring effective governance across the Council, it was important that it be assured of two things:
· that any new appointment to the role of Monitoring Officer would maintain the level of input and oversight we experience from the current Monitoring Officer
o Nick Graham wass currently also the Deputy Monitoring Officer and was significantly experienced in the range of issues that came before this Committee. There would be no change to the support and advice the Committee currently received.
o Both Peter Clark and Nick Graham currently attended/chaired various governance boards and management groups, for example Oxfordshire Children Safeguarding Board, Corporate Governance Assurance Group and Information Governance Group as well as others.
· Cabinet would now determine what alternative senior management structure should be put in place across the Council.
o This would then form part of the budget to be agreed by Full Council in February 2016.
o This Committee would want to be assured that any review by the Cabinet resulted in strong governance arrangements.
o At the Remuneration Committee on Monday, the Leader of the Council also expressed his intention that this Committee should be consulted on any draft proposals - so that it could provide Cabinet with commented in relation to audit and governance matters.
During debate, members stressed the importance of the Committee being consulted on matters within its remit at the correct point in the process.
RESOLVED: to note that a report on the changes following Senior Officer Appointments would be brought back to the next meeting and AGREED the proposal as put forward by the Leader of the Council that the Committee be consulted on any future draft proposals.