PURPOSE

1. To agree a process to review the first publication of the Members Attendance Record for the period 1 May to 31 October 2003.

BACKGROUND

2. The Committee will recall that last year, following a recommendation from this Committee, the Council agreed a procedure whereby Members’ Attendance Figures would be published on a six monthly basis to illustrate the amount of work undertaken by Members during the 6 month period.

3. The first such publication took place in early December and included the period 1 May to 31 October 2003. Copies of the figures for each member where sent to a range of local media and have been placed on the Council’s web site with a link from each members own page. Copies will be available at the meeting.

4. During the initial compilation of the figures a number of “glitches” were discovered with our recording mechanisms and I am pleased to say that following assistance from Members we have been able to resolve these and make the process more accurate. However it also came to light that there was some difficulty over the definitions of “Meetings Attended” – we only record attendance at meetings of Council, the Executive, the Select Committees, the three regulatory Committees and formal Task Groups. However many members attend a whole range of other meetings organised by officers of the Council and a number of these rather confusingly frequently have the appearance of a meeting falling within the initial list. Given the number and range of these meetings it would be difficult to record all member attendance – however some form of clear definition needs to be agreed.

5. A further point that has been made is that when a Member submits their apologies in advance for a meeting and arranges for a deputy to attend for them then they should not be recorded as not having attended as they had in fact assured that they were represented at the meeting. This needs to be considered carefully as for some meetings (most notably the Council and the Executive) deputies cannot be appointed to attend and such an arrangement would mean treating individual members in different ways.

6. An additional point is the reporting of these figures in the press and what they mean. The reports presented by Solent TV and the County Press placed a lot of emphasis on the “headline” figures of numbers of meetings attended – but as the Committee appreciated last year this does not necessarily reflect the real work undertaken by a member.

PROPOSAL

7. If the Committee, in the light of the above, wishes to undertake a full review of the current process, with a view to suggesting some amendments it is suggested that the following process is agree:

a. That a questionnaire be sent to all Members asking for their comments, what they feel are the shortcomings of the existing arrangements and most significantly how they feel the public should be informed about the amount of work that they undertake.

b. That the public be asked (possibly through the Citizens Panel) for their views on the value of the current process and how they would like the information on what members do published or made publicly available.

c. That the media be asked for their views on the utility of the current approach.

d. That a small panel of say three members of this Committee (including an Isle of Wight Councillor) work through the feedback from the above to recommend any changes that may be necessary.

8. In the light of the suggested review, and the length of time that this is likely to take it is suggested that the current arrangements continue for the next publication date which will cover the period 1 November 2003 to 30 April 2004.

RECOMMENDATION

9. That the publication of the Members Attendance Figures be reviewed in line with the proposal detailed above and that the current arrangements remain for the next publication date which will cover the period 1 November 2003 to 30 April 2004.

BACKGROUND PAPERS

Members attendance figures as published in December 2003

Contact Point : Chris Mathews, F 823280

JOHN LAWSON

Monitoring Officer