Rother councillors call for return of powers to hold remote meetings

At a full council meeting on Monday (May 16), they backed a motion to write to the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) urging it to bring legislation allowing local authorities to hold decision-making meetings virtually or in a hybrid form.

Councils had previously been able to do this under the special provisions of the Coronavirus Act 2020. While councillors can and often do still attend meetings virtually, since these powers expired last year members are currently required to be physically present to vote.

Moving the motion, council leader Doug Oliver argued the powers would allow the council to be more efficient when conducting its business.

He said: “I think we are all in agreement that the hybrid meetings under the emergency powers worked and I look around at so many colleagues here, who have to make long journeys into the town hall during winter and various other times.

“A comment was made recently that this may just encourage people to stand as councillors, if they don’t think they have to make an arduous journey into the town hall to attend meetings.

“When you think about it this idea has been put forward at East Sussex [County Council] via the various means there, the District Council Network, the [Local Government Association] and our MPs are very supportive of this. It really does work having these hybrid meetings.”

While the motion saw backing across the council chamber, the support was more guarded from some, who raised concerns about the potential loss of physical meetings as a result of such powers.

Others, however, argued that the powers would offer choice rather than necessarily leading to the loss of physical meetings.

Cllr Kevin Dixon (Lib Dem) said: “What we are asking for in this motion is the ability to decide how we conduct our business and then work from there. [But] I quite agree we do need in-person meetings.

“The other thing we just need to be careful of, while allowing people to stay at home, is that we do not have absentee councillors.”