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Read SLCC’s submission below to the government’s ‘Enabling remote attendance and proxy voting at local authority meetings’ consultation, submitted on 19 December 2024:

Do you agree with the broad principle of granting local authorities powers to allow remote attendance at formal meetings?

SLCC responded ‘Yes’.

Do you think there should be specific limitations on remote attendance?

SLCC responded that ‘There should be no limitations placed upon councils with regard to setting arrangements for remote attendance of council meetings, up to and including full remote attendance’ and provided additional comments as below:

Councils should be given the freedom locally and individually to select the most appropriate arrangements for themselves and their electorates. Councils should be required to have a formal policy on their use of remote attendance.

Drawing on experience from SLCC members who are community council clerks in Wales, which operates under its arrangements for remote and hybrid attendance (The Local Government and Elections (Wales) Act 2021), any central prescription may introduce unintended technological and administrative burdens on small councils with few (or only one) member(s) of staff.

The government recognises that there may be cases in which it is necessary for councils to hold meetings fully remotely. Do you think there should be limitations placed on the number of fully remote meetings councils should be able to hold?

SLCC responded with the comments below:

Some types of meeting may be ideally suited to fully remote attendance. It is reasonable that a proportion of full council meetings should remain, in principle, in-person meetings. Any definition covering ‘half of council meetings’, or any other proportion, needs to be clear to differentiate between meetings of full council and meetings of committees with delegated functions and decision-making powers. It also should be clear whether the requirement would apply to the council or whether it extends to any requirement on individual councillors under the Local Government Act 1972 to attend.

If it is accepted that all meetings may have a facility for remote attendance, then it would also be reasonable to require all meetings to be live streamed and/or recorded to facilitate remote public access. But we would support the principal that it is for individual councils to set and operate their own policies. For many councils, the opportunity to be flexible when local (or national) emergencies arise, which prevent physical attendance is a clear opportunity. It should not be administratively complex and risk the validity of meetings already held if an arbitrary threshold is not met over the course of a year. It is reasonable that the flexibility should be a decision for the council itself.

Do you think there are any necessary procedural measures that would help to ensure a remote or hybrid attendance policy is workable and efficient?

SLCC responded that:

• Councils should be required to publish a list of attendees joining the meeting remotely and give notice if a meeting is being held with full remote attendance

• Councils should be required to ensure that standard constitutional arrangements are followed for hybrid and fully remote meetings

• Councils should be required to make arrangements to ensure restricted items (where a council decision is taken in private to protect confidentiality) are managed appropriately and to require remotely attending members to join from a private location

And provided additional comments as below:

The requirement at 1) should be that these declarations must be made in the minutes of the meeting. Prior notice would be a constraint on individuals who may need to change from physical to virtual attendance at short notice.

There are challenges to ensuring that anyone attending a meeting to consider restricted items is attending in private, is not accompanied by others who are not entitled to attend a restricted session, and that the session is not recorded. Due to the lack of effective controls through existing mechanisms, government should consider whether breach of confidentiality under such circumstances might constitute an actionable offence and, if so, under which jurisdiction. In tandem with strengthening the standards regime – explicit reference to breach of confidentiality, including in virtual settings, in a revised Code of Conduct may be the most appropriate mechanism.

Do you think legislative change to allow councillors to attend local authority meetings remotely should or should not be considered for the following reasons?

SLCC responded that legislative change to allow councillors to attend local authority meetings remotely should be considered because, ‘It is a positive modernising measure; it would likely increase the diversity of people willing and able to stand for election in their local area, making councils more representative of the communities they serve; and councils would be more resilient in the event of local or national emergencies which prevent in-person attendance.’

SLCC also responded that ‘It would be more difficult for councillors to build personal working relationships with colleagues, and engage with members of the public in attendance at meetings.’

And provided additional comments as below:

‘The proposed flexibilities build on the increased ease of participation experienced by many during 2020 and 2021 in England and (for comparison) since 2021 in Wales.’

In your view, would allowing councillors to attend formal local authority meetings remotely according to their needs particularly benefit or disadvantage individuals with protected characteristics, for example those with disabilities or caring responsibilities?

SLCC responded that allowing councillors to attend formal local authority meetings remotely would benefit members.

And provided additional comments as below:

Councillors with certain disabilities, those recovering from illness, including communicable infections, and for those whose attendance is challenged by age or by caring responsibilities will more easily be able to attend meetings which are remote or hybrid.  Certain classes of meeting, which are required, but which do not rely on public presentation and may otherwise be conducted swiftly may be better conducted remotely.  This is particularly relevant for local (parish) council meetings which are required for mundane governance tasks which in principal councils are more routinely exercised by executive members or by officers under delegated powers which are either not available or less used in the local council sector.

In addition to provisions allowing for remote attendance, do you consider that it would be helpful to introduce proxy voting?

SLCC responded ‘No’.

Are there circumstances in which you feel proxy voting would not be appropriate?

SLCC responded with the below comments on proxy voting:

Decision making by councils and their committees, particularly amongst local councils, is informed by the information laid at the committee and the debate held in the meeting. The decisions are made on a different basis to those under parliamentary procedure or under company law where the provision for proxy voting is currently used.  Proxy voting is not appropriate to decision making in parish councils and does not suit the basis of those decisions in law.  The appointment of a proxy is unnecessary for committee meetings, where substitutes may already be appointed.  In full council meetings it would reduce openness and transparency in decision making.