Issue - meetings

To consider:

·       Request form a member of the public

·       Officers’ response to the points raised in the request for scrutiny

·       If a specific recommendation(s) needs to be made

It was resolved to:

·       Note the response of the officers, acknowledge that governance arrangements were in place and to continue to scrutinise the Plan on an annual basis.

·       Recommend to the Cabinet Member for Environment that consideration should be given to ways of increasing the response to public consultations and obtaining input from the public and others.

·       Request that information on expenditure be highlighted and detailed in the Climate and Nature Emergency Plan Annual Report to ensure transparency.

It was confirmed that the member of the public was unable to attend due to unforeseen circumstances. In his absence, the Scrutiny Adviser read out a written statement provided by him, which elaborated on his request by setting out the following points:

·       The money spent as part of the Climate and Nature Emergency Response Plan should meet the public benefit test of the Charities Act 2011, to ensure that decisions were evidence-based, transparent and could be scrutinised effectively.

·       That it was harder to demonstrate how projects were prioritised and whether they met the public benefit test, whether any other projects had been considered and what evidence had been used to reach a decision if public consultations and Cabinet oversight were not part of the governance of the Plan.

·       The importance of good governance arrangements.

·       It should be ensured that experimental schemes were fit for the future. If the Council ran an electric fleet vehicle pilot, the results of the pilot would not reflect the true future cost of the electric fleet.

·       The Plan's projects should identify the public benefit over time into the future. Public benefit from any project could diminish if costs continued to rise. The Council needed to demonstrate that this was being taken into account.

·       Delegated rights increased the risk of untested assumptions. Concern that projects may be approved on the basis of outdated information or optimism bias  without being scrutinised.

In response to the request for scrutiny and to the written statement elaborating on the individual's request, the following observations were submitted by officers:-

This request by a member of the public to scrutinise the issues was welcomed, appreciating the public interest in the Plan's work.

Assurance was given that the governance of the Climate Change and Nature Board was being considered continually, giving close consideration to its operations and financial decisions, and noting that a written response to the request for scrutiny had been submitted as part of the meeting documentation.

The Corporate Director confirmed that the Charities Act 2011 did not apply to the operation of the Board or the Council generally, clarifying that the Local Government and Elections (Wales) Act 2021 and democratic procedures were the relevant considerations for Cyngor Gwynedd.

In response to the request for scrutiny and to the written statement elaborating on the request, the following observations were submitted by Members:-

They thanked the individual for submitting this request for scrutiny, taking pride in the public interest in the field.

They disagreed with the concept that Climate Change and Nature Board matters were not subject to scrutiny, as this committee scrutinised the matter regularly. It was added that a cabinet member was present for that scrutiny process and that the observations of this committee had a positive impact on the Board.

It was confirmed that public consultations were being held regularly on climate and nature emergency matters to ensure that the people of Gwynedd had the opportunity to voice their views in the formulation of the Board's projects. However,  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5