We asked, you said, we did

We asked

We asked for your views on the current ways you can get involved in the council decision making process at council committee and the proposed additional ways for participating at formal decision-making bodies.

Our aim was to improve and expand the current offer for participation in council decision making meetings. The feedback from the consultation was utilised to help shape the rules in the council constitution on participating in the council decision making process.

The consultation document was split into two parts, the first focused on the current arrangements for public participation. The second part set out the proposed new approach for public participation at full council and committee meetings. Further details about the consultation are set out in the consultation document.

You said

We received 53 responses to our consultation on public participation at council committee meetings. Overall, the responses to the consultation demonstrates support towards enhancing participation at council committee meetings.

Key themes from the consultation feedback were supportive towards enabling:

• more people to get involved with the Council decision-making process
• Public Questions to be raised at other council meetings such as at Full Council and Cabinet
• lowering the threshold for Petitions to be raised at Council decision-making bodies
• use of the option to raise Deputations (for groups of people to raise a matter at Council decision making meetings)
• participation in scrutiny of the Council.

The detailed breakdown and findings of the consultation are set out in the findings report which is accessible via link the here.

We did

We reviewed your feedback from the consultation and utilised the information to develop arrangements to broaden the opportunities for public participation at council decision making meetings.

Following the analysis on the results of the consultation, a number of arrangements were drafted and subsequently approved at the Full Council meeting on 28 February. The new arrangements will come into effect as of May 2023 as part of the new Council Constitution and include the following processes outlined below.

• we will adopt the word ‘citizen’ in the context of participation at council committee meetings which includes residents living in Barnet as well as those people who study, work or have businesses in Barnet
• as part of the Governance Review project arrangements will create a dedicated council democracy webpage to help you understand how they can participate in council decision making by setting out the options including for deputations, petitions, public questions and overview and scrutiny involvement
• to promote further engagement in council decision making, the arrangements for Public Questions will be expanded to other council meetings such as Council, Cabinet and Committee meetings
• a new arrangement for deputations (signed by between 5 and 24 people) will be embedded in the council’s governance arrangements
• we will lower the threshold for petition signatures to be discussed at council meetings and therefore easier for citizens to receive responses.

The full details of the new arrangements for participating in Council decision making meeting were approved at the Full Council meeting on 28 February 2023 and can be accessed here.