Issue - meetings

To consider a report and agree that the Cabinet will not exercise its executive powers to determine the Council’s position regarding the devolution deal.

i.  That a report be presented to a Special Meeting of Full Council on 29 June 2016 to consider devolution proposals so far as they relate to Huntingdonshire; and

ii.  At the conclusion of the Special Meeting of Council on 29 June 2016, a Special Meeting of the Cabinet be held to determine a position on the proposals in order to meet the deadline of 4 July 2016.

The Cabinet considered a report by the Managing Director (a copy of which is appended in the Minute Book) to enable the Council to consider the devolution proposals prior to the Cabinet exercising its executive powers.

Cambridgeshire and Peterborough were invited to submit proposals jointly with Norfolk and Suffolk for an East Anglian devolution agreement.  Extensive negotiations between and within the Councils across the East Anglian region had concluded that the improvement of statutory functions and the development of the functional economic area was most appropriate through two combined authorities, namely Cambridgeshire and Peterborough and Norfolk and Suffolk, each with a directly elected Mayor,

The proposal requested that the Council consider the devolution proposal for wider consultation before submission of the proposals to the Secretary of State.

It was explained to the Cabinet that the recommendations contained within the Officer’s report needed to be revised as legal advice subsequent to the publication of the Cabinet agenda indicated that the final decision regarding the content of the devolution documents was a decision required by the Executive. 

Therefore at the conclusion of the Special Meeting of Council on 29 June 2016 a Special Meeting of the Cabinet would be convened to determine a position on the devolution proposals in so far as they relate to Huntingdonshire.

The report to Council would include three documents being the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Authorities’ Statutory Governance Review; Devolution Scheme; and Devolution Proposal.  It was noted that the same report and Appendices would also be presented for approval to each authority within the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority (C&PCA) region.

It was a legal requirement that public consultation be undertaken where a Combined Authority was to be established.  The consultation would relate to the proposals contained in the Devolution Scheme and would be open for a seven week period to August 2016.  Once the consultation period had expired the C&PCA was required to provide the Secretary of State with a summary of the consultation responses.

In response to a question it was explained that although the decision at the Cabinet meeting on 29 June would not be the final decision and did not legally commit an authority to participating in a C&PCA, any significant change in the proposals after the public consultation commenced was likely to require a new scheme to be prepared for consultation, and therefore the timetable for creation of the C&PCA would not be met.  Whereupon the Cabinet,

RESOLVED

i.  that a report be presented to a Special Meeting of Council on 29 June 2016 to consider devolution proposals so far as they relate to Huntingdonshire; and

ii.  at the conclusion of the Special Meeting of Council on 29 June 2016, a Special Meeting of the Cabinet be held to determine a position on the proposals in order to meet the deadline of 4 July 2016.