Agenda item

To consider the report and proposed scheme (attached).

Following a motion moved by Councillor J Philip and seconded by Councillor C Whitbread, which was adopted by Council on 1 November 2018, the Working Group was asked to consider a proposed scheme to confer the title of Honorary Alderman or Alderwoman.

The Service Director (Governance and Member Services) reported that there was currently no formal method of recognising past eminent or notable service. Presently the only formal method of recognising the past service of a former councillor was by length of service and the issuing of a lapel badge when a member stood down or was not elected. The issuing criteria was used below:

·                Bronze lapel badge for 10 years’ service;

·                Silver lapel badge for 15 years’ service; and

·                Gold lapel badge for 20 years’ service.

The Local Government Act 1972, under section 249, allowed the Council to confer the title of Honorary Alderman (or Alderwoman) on persons who had, in the opinion of Council, rendered ‘eminent services’ to the Authority as past members of the Authority but who were not then members of the Authority.

It was a Council decision to confer the title which had to be passed at a meeting specially convened for the purpose (i.e. an extraordinary meeting) and approved by vote by not less than two-thirds of the members present. An Honorary Alderman could attend and take part in such civic ceremonies as the authority might from time to time decide but, as such, had no right to:

(i)      attend meetings of Council, Cabinet or Committee other than as a member of the public,

(ii)      receive any of the allowances or other payments to which Councillors were entitled.

Section 249(2) provided that such an honour could only be held by someone who was not a serving Councillor of the Council. As such, were a recipient to be re-elected or co-opted back onto the Council, they would lose the title bestowed.

Members might wish to add further criteria, but the suggestion was that there should be some criteria by which an application could be judged, which were listed below:

(i)      No longer a serving Councillor; and

(ii)      To have served at least five consecutive terms of office (i.e. above the level of Gold service); or

(iii)     Had held a significant position of public responsibility within the Council, for a minimum period of one year; or

(iv)    Had provided demonstrable eminent service to the Council throughout a long and distinguished period of public service; and

(iv)    The proposed recipient must be willing to accept their nomination.

The recipient would need to be willing to accept the honorary title before Council. It was an honour to receive this title and should therefore not become a political matter. Appropriate consultations with Group Leaders on nominations would be required. The Alderman / Alderwoman would be presented with a Badge of Office and their name entered into the Roll of Honour, which would be maintained by the proper officer.

Honorary Aldermen were entitled to wear the badge of ‘Honorary Alderman’ at Civic events within the District, but only at civic events outside the District at the specific request of the organiser. Those elected to the Roll of Honorary Alderman/Alderwoman were entitled to use the title of ‘Honorary Alderman of the District of Epping Forest’.

Following notification of the death of an Honorary Alderman/Alderwoman, the District flag would be flown at half-mast over the Civic Offices on the day after the date of notification of death and on the date of the funeral.

Officers had also suggested a mechanism where the award could be removed from a former member. The law required its suspension should the member come back onto the Council.

The Council, had approached Fattorinis’, Birmingham, and two options (using the existing Council design) were shown in the agenda report and the costs this would involve. It was recommended that the Council be asked to approve a DDF sum of £3,500 to purchase the initial stock of badges. However, any costs would only be applied when the stock was used.

The honorary scheme was, overall, favourably received by the Working Group and the following points were raised:

·                Five terms or 20 years was generally considered a long time, even though that mirrored the gold service length, but it was noted this was not the sole criteria that could be used.

·                Essex County Council had reduced its length of service from 20 years to 15 years. This might have been because people were becoming councillors later on in life and it should not just be about length of service. A councillor’s research into other authorities’ schemes had shown the average service length was between 12 – 15 years.

·                The removal of ‘consecutive’ was proposed, that four terms or 16 years in office was more appropriate, and use of ‘years’ instead of ‘terms’.

·                If the Council was to merit eminent service then 20 years was out of kilter with modern trends and a reduction on length of service was favoured.

·                The use of ‘eminent service’ was in the legislation, but it should be left to the proposer and seconder to give the information to qualify this.

·                To have held a significant position of public responsibility within the Council for a minimum period of one year was considered too short by some, but specifying a minimum period seemed sensible.

·                A proposal that the badge was retained by the family in the event of the death of a recipient.

·                A suggestion was made that perhaps the Group Leaders could be involved in the initial checking of nominations received that they met the criteria, rather than by the Chairman and Leader.

·                A flag flown at half mast following the death of an honorary alderman the day after the ‘notification of death until the funeral had taken place’ could become a lengthy time, which was agreed. The Council observed the national flag protocol on when and which flags could be flown.

·                As the Council only used chairman and not chairwoman was there a requirement to use alderwoman. It was noted that the use of alderwoman was added subsequently to the LGA 1972 Act s249, but recipients could be asked what they wanted to be called.

·                The use of ‘suspend’ rather than ‘remove’ the honorary award was suggested, but it was noted that the Act specified that an alderman / alderwoman could not also be a serving councillor.

It was agreed that the Service Director would redraft the terms of the scheme incorporating the above points.

RESOLVED:

(i)         That the Working Group support the motion referred from Council on the establishment of a scheme to confer the title of Honorary Alderman or Alderwoman.

(ii)        That the proposed terms of such a scheme be approved, subject to suggested alterations made at the meeting.

(iii)       That the amended scheme be recommended for adoption by Council on 20 December 2018.

(iv)      That a DDF budget sum of £3,500 be recommended to Council to fund the implementation of the scheme, purchase a supply of badges of Office and a Roll of Honour Book.