STANDING ORDERS Appendix C - Member Role Profile

Role Profile

Councillors for the Council of the Isles of Scilly

  Background: The Council of the Isles of Scilly have 16 Elected Members, these are taken from 5 island parishes, with St Marys’ electorate being represented by 12 councillors. The last ordinary election was held in May 2021. In 2017 the Boundary Commission reduced councillor numbers from 21 to 16 following a boundary review. The Council of the Isles of Scilly meets in public session once per month on average to discharge the responsibilities of a Unitary Authority. In addition to Council meetings there is a Scrutiny Committee, and a Licensing Committee.  15 of the 16 councillors sit on the Licensing Committee and all planning authority responsibilities are discharged at meetings of Council.  Therefore all Members are required to have extensive knowledge of these quasi-judicial areas of Council responsibility. In addition to these committees there are shared bodies and the IFCA, all of which are a mixture of membership criteria, with the Council being one of many bodies represented.   ‘Unitary Authority’ status: The Council of the Isles of Scilly was not actually properly defined as a ‘Unitary Authority’ at the time of the Local Government Act 1992, but the Council of the Isles of Scilly does provide (or have the responsibility of providing) all local government services in its area, which is the definition of a Unitary Authority. It therefore stands alongside the City of London Corporation as a local government entity that doesn’t quite fit within the standard definitions used elsewhere, and separate provisions are made in law when legislative changes are introduced that affect local authorities. If considered to be a Unitary Authority, it comfortably sits as the smallest of the 56 Unitary Authorities in England both in terms of population and area.  Rutland is the closest other authority in terms of population as it serves 39,500 people, whereas in terms of area we are beneath Slough which covers 33 square kilometres. We have no neighbouring authority with which we share a land-border, therefore shared services are not as easily achievable as they might be elsewhere.         Responsibilities of Ordinary Councillors: The following is taken from the role description of a councillor from the Local Government Association. As a democratically-elected local representative, you have a unique and privileged position and the potential to make a real difference to people's lives. However, being a councillor is hard work. Every day you will be expected to balance the needs of your local area, your residents and voters, community groups, local businesses, your political party (if you belong to one) and the council. All will make legitimate demands on your time on top of your personal commitments to family, friends and workplace. As a councillor you will have many different roles to balance. As the local elected representative you will engage with residents and groups on a wide range of different issues and take on an important community leadership role. At the council you will contribute to the development of policies and strategies, including budget setting, and you may be involved in scrutinising council decisions or taking decisions on planning or licensing applications. A councillor's primary role is to represent their ward or division and the people who live in it. Councillors provide a bridge between the community and the council. As well as being an advocate for your local residents and signposting them to the right people at the council, you will need to keep them informed about the issues that affect them. In order to understand and represent local views and priorities, you need to build strong relationships and encourage local people to make their views known and engage with you and the council. Good communication and engagement is central to being an effective councillor. As a local councillor, your residents will expect you to:

respond to their queries and investigate their concerns (casework)

communicate council decisions that affect them

know your patch and be aware of any problems

know and work with representatives of local organisations, interest groups and businesses

represent their views at council meetings

lead local campaigns on their behalf.

  Community leadership is at the heart of modern local government. Councils work in partnership with local communities and organisations, including the public, voluntary, community and private sectors, to develop a vision for their local area, working collaboratively to improve services and quality of life for citizens. Councillors have a lead role in this process.   Councils need clear strategies and policies to enable them to achieve their vision for the area, make the best use of resources and deliver services that meet the needs of local communities. As a local councillor you will contribute to the development of these policies and strategies, bringing the views and priorities of your local area to the debate. How you do this will depend on the committees and forums you are appointed to. However, the council's policy framework must be signed off by full council, on which every councillor sits.   Councils are not just service providers, they also act as regulators. As a councillor you will consider issues such as planning applications and licenses for pubs and restaurants and ensuring that businesses comply with the law. In these roles, councillors are required to act independently and are not subject to the group/party whip.   As a councillor you will be required to adhere to your council's agreed code of conduct for elected members. Each council adopts its own code.   All standards matters are the responsibility of individual councils, which are required to promote and maintain high standards of conduct by councillors. You must register any registerable pecuniary interests for yourself, your spouse or a partner you live with, within 28 days of taking up office. It is a criminal offence if you fail, without reasonable excuse, to declare or register interests to the monitoring officer.   Local Context Each councillor has a seat on Council, on which there are 16 seats.   A majority is required for any decision, which for this Council represents a maximum of 9 votes necessary in order to pass any decision put before them.   Due to the low number of councillors allowed there has necessarily been a reduction in the number of committees run by the authority, so the vast majority of all decisions necessary by the local authority are decided at monthly meetings of Council.   This means that every single councillor must have excellent oversight and understanding of a vast amount of subject areas which ordinarily another Council may not require of their entire membership.   Allied to this, councillors must make decisions that have to take into example the isolation of the islands, both in terms of geographical location (28 miles from mainland Britain) but also in terms of the fragility of the transport infrastructure.   Any Council meeting could include decisions which have huge implications for the wellbeing of the island community, a community which includes vulnerable persons, and a community that is estimated to be 90% based on income from the tourist season running from March to October each year.  In addition to this, the councillors are stewards of the environment, they have to make decisions that balance safeguarding, the economy, and the environment.  This is true of any Council, but on Scilly everything is more acute and fragile.    The islands’ economy is circular, with the Council being one of the biggest employers any local authority job losses lead to a reduction in money being spread around the local economy.  People who work at the Council spend their money locally, and this in turn supports local commerce.  Social housing is vital due to the synthetically high-value of open market housing on Scilly, and this is further exacerbated by a low-level of income for most of the residents of the islands.   The Council must also take into account that models of working elsewhere do not always apply to the islands where there isn’t a surfeit of private businesses willing to offer the public an alternative delivery model for some services, such as leisure facilities, or residential care, or housing, or has been the case with water and sewerage.  The economy of scale here does not make the islands a good investment opportunity for many businesses, so each councillor must be keenly aware of economic factors that affect small communities and apply them in their thinking.   The Council’s revenue budget has been in the region of £4.5m each year but this does not begin to tell the story of the financial considerations at play in any given year.  The Council must consider replacing its runways, it must therefore consider passenger numbers and how to increase them, but in doing so it must also consider any impact of large visitor increase on the cost of waste collection and disposal, and on water and sewerage usage.  Essential services need reserves in order to ensure their survival into the future.  In recent times the islands have been greatly assisted by government, but this is never a guarantee.  To not put requisite funds aside could be viewed as a failing, or can be viewed as a calculated risk, but none-the-less is a big risk, and this is a common example of the type of decisions that councillors on Scilly are faced with.   Allowances It should be noted from the very outset that the determination of the level of allowances within an allowances scheme is not an exact science and that the Council of the Isles of Scilly is not required to make a decision informed by an Independent Remuneration Panel.  It should also be noted that the Isles of Scilly is absolutely unique in terms of legislation, scale, remoteness, risk and size of population, therefore comparisons with other areas are very difficult to make use of.    The difficulties involved in drawing meaningful comparisons with other unitary councils is underlined by the fact that the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) excludes the Council of the Isles of Scilly in its 'near neighbours' benchmarking modelling.’   Therefore councillors should set their allowances at a level where they are comfortable to defend their allowances to the public.   Member allowances must enable and facilitate the Members' roles and responsibilities as far as practically possible while taking into account such factors as workloads, political structures, the nature of the council, and local economic conditions.    This role profile document has set-out some of these extraordinary economic factors.