Agenda item

Members noted that Susan Pearson had not been granted a dispensation to speak or vote on either COLPAI or Golden Lane matters and, therefore, Mr Graeme Harrower would be speaking on her behalf.

General concerns were expressed about the rejection of dispensation requests, particularly where they had been granted for the Barbican Residential Committee (BRC) but not for the Community and Children’s Services Committee.  Members felt that the policy was not being applied consistently.  Whilst the Chairman would not want to discourage Members from appealing against the decisions, he also suggested, and Members agreed, that the Committee take a resolution to the Standards Committee setting out these concerns.

Members also experienced a Member attempting to comply with the Standards Committee’s suggestion that residents, and electors, can be adequately represented by communicating their views through another Member. Members agreed that this proved to be something of a farce, when responses to comments led to further questions conveyed via that Member who eventually came to refer to himself as a ‘ventriloquist dummy’.

Given that Community and Children’s Services addresses many matters of substantial interest to residents in the City, it was the Committee’s view that precluding those Members who represent residents from speaking on these issues leads inevitably to an inability to fully consider residents’ interest.

Further, the Committee did not believe that hearing from Members who live in the City would cause any harm which the Standards laws and rules are intended to avoid.  Members believe the current position causes harm to residents, particularly in the context of the City where many Members are not resident in the City and represent wards pre-dominated by non-residents. Members also expressed concern that the breadth of the denial of dispensations contrasted unfavourably with the way in which apparently similar concerns related to Temple’s commercial residents were dismissed.

Therefore it was RESOLVED, That -  the Standards Committee be asked to craft a set of dispensations that ensures that residents’ interests can be fully represented by their elected representatives. To this end, Members of the Community and Children’s Services Committee urge the Standards Committee to research the dispensations policies of nearby London Boroughs that seek to address this issue.