A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Council and councillors

Agenda item

MEMBER INDUCTION AND DEVELOPMENT PLAN

To receive Report No. 45/2019 from the Strategic Director for Resources.

Minutes:

Report No. 45/2019 was received from the Strategic Director for Resources.

 

Mr Hemsley, Leader and Portfolio Holder for Rutland One Public Estate & Growth, Tourism & Economic Development, Resources (not Finance or Communications), introduced the report, the purpose of which was to ask Members to review the proposals for the induction and ongoing development plan and provide feedback and suggestions for improvement.

 

During discussion the following points were noted:

 

      i.        It was suggested that Member and staff relations should be included within the induction, including detail of the best way to obtain guidance and whether this should be sought from officers or directors.

    ii.        It was felt by the Panel that Scrutiny training, how to be an effective Ward Councillor, and Finance should be mandatory training for all members.

   iii.        Miss Waller felt there needed to be more flexibility with the technology on offer for Councillors as there was no mention of a desktop computer being available as she had been given one by the Council. Miss Waller also suggested it would be useful to give Members a demonstration of how to use IT equipment so they could get a better idea of what they preferred.

   iv.        It was stated by Members of the Panel that they would often initially read the reports on their tablet and would then make notes on a hardcopy. Mr Hemsley suggested Members use the Mod.Gov application which enables users to annotate and bookmark reports. Training would be available to Members on the application.

    v.        While Members could be encouraged to go paperless, Miss Waller stated it needed to be accepted that people would ultimately work in the way most comfortable to them.

   vi.        Members welcomed the idea of having role profiles for all key Councillor Roles. Other role profiles suggested included Group Leaders and Deputy Chairs.

  vii.        Miss Waller stated that a mentoring system for new Members needed to be set up thoughtfully and professionally with a structure.

viii.        Miss Waller mentioned she was not completely clear how to sign up to external training as it seemed old fashioned to ask the Leader of the Council if they could attend training.

   ix.        Mr Baines was not keen on the idea of having a short training session before committee meetings as it would mean there was potential for Members to be at a meeting for over 3 hours causing the meeting and Members to be less efficient. Miss Waller stated however that she and other Members felt the training received before every other Audit and Risk Committee was very useful and could be applied to other committees. The training received before the meetings was tailored to the items being discussed at that meeting and in turn make the meeting more efficient.

    x.        Mr Bird suggested it would be useful to have dry runs of committees to explain to Members how the meetings were run.

   xi.        Miss Waller suggested that Member Development should be a part of the Constitution Review Working Group.

  xii.        Miss Waller suggested information regarding key external organisations that the Council worked with and how they interacted with the Council would be useful to Members.

xiii.        Mr Brown asked what would happen if a Member did not attend a mandatory training session. Mr Horsfield stated that it would be up to the Leader of the group the Member was a part of. If a Member was non-aligned it would be a decision of the Council.

xiv.        The Panel thanked Mrs Taylor for the work that had gone into the Member induction and development plan.

 

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