To submit the report of the Council Leader (attached).
Minutes:
The Leader, Councillor Dyfrig Siencyn, submitted a
report that had been considered by the Cabinet at its meeting on 17 December
2019, seeking approval to the draft response which had been prepared on behalf of
the Council to the Consultation on the Local Government and Elections (Wales)
Bill - November 2019.
It was noted that the Cabinet had approved the
draft response to be submitted to the Full Council for approval.
During the discussion the following matters were raised by individual
members:
·
There was agreement with the
observation that another tier of government was unnecessary, and that voluntary
collaboration was the way forward.
·
It was noted that the second bullet point in the box
"PART 1 - ELECTIONS" in paragraph 11 of the response was vague, as it
firstly referred to supporting the concept of using a single transferable
voting system, however it then stated that this Council preferred one-member
wards. To this end, it was suggested
that this paragraph be amended to note that the Council supported the concept
of using a single transferable voting system; however, if the first past the
post system was kept, that the Council supported one-member wards as this
provided the strongest connection with the community. In response, it was noted
that the message transferred to the Boundary Commission was that this Council
preferred one-member wards. Should the
voting method continue as it was, this is what the Council would support, and
the response could be amended to reflect this.
·
It was noted that the Council was still awaiting to
hear back from the Boundary Commission after submitting the response to its
proposals, and there remained a lack of clarity in relation to the Bangor wards
and some areas of the Llŷn Peninsula.
In response, it was noted that the matter was still in the hands of the
Minister. It was also explained that if
the Bill was legislated upon before the next County Council elections, and
consequently the number of voters increased to include young people aged 16 and
17, this could change, regardless of the considerations of the Boundary
Commission. It was further noted that
the Bill provided for one-member wards, and should this be legislated upon, it
was likely that the proposals of the Commission would need to be revisited, as
they included two-member wards and were therefore not in-keeping with the
Act. On this basis, it was not believed
that any benefit would come from requesting an early decision from the Minister
on the response to the Commission's proposals, because the new legislation, in
due course, could overturn some of the issues that the Council did not agree
with in the proposals of the Boundary Commission. It was further noted that it was technically
possible to have a single transferable voting system in one-member wards as
well, although this would not fulfil the aim of the system, namely to reflect
the percentage of people who voted for each party.
·
It was noted that a single
transferable voting system in one-member system would not be particularly
contributory, and 3-4 member wards would be required for it to be truly
contributory. In response, it was explained that the single transferable voting
system in one-member wards ultimately ensured that the majority of the constituents
in that ward supported the person being elected. However, it was acknowledged that if a party
gained a particular percentage of the vote throughout the whole of Gwynedd,
this would not ensure that they had the same percentage of seats on the Council. For this to happen, multi-member wards would
be required. It was suggested that this needed to be examined further, and to
amend it if required in order to ensure consistency in the responses.
·
Support was expressed to the
draft response, subject to the advice given as this affected various wards in
various areas.
·
It was suggested that larger
sized wards were required, with a higher salary so that people would fulfil the
work on a full-time basis.
RESOLVED
(a) To
approve the draft response to the consultation on the Bill.
(b) To
delegate the right to the Leader to respond on behalf of the Council, and adapt
the draft document to reflect the observations of the Council.
Supporting documents: