Meetings and Political Structure

Attendance Records

The Governance Services team maintains a record of attendance at the core political structure meetings, which councillors are appointed to each year by the Assembly. These are known as ‘qualifying’ meetings.

Qualifying meetings include all the Council’s main committee and sub-committee meetings plus other meetings Councillors are formally appointed to, such as school governing bodies and the Housing Forums.

Ward surgeries, local ward activities, ad-hoc meetings with officers and other informal business meetings are not counted as qualifying meetings. You may wish to keep your own records of these activities.

Legislation states that if a councillor fails to attend a ‘qualifying’ meeting during a six-month period, he/she will immediately cease to be a councillor. The system used by the Governance Services team alerts councillors to any periods of non-attendance of longer than three months. This means that steps can be taken before the six-month deadline.

If your are unable to attend a meeting, please notify the Committee Clerk of your apologies in advance of the start of the meeting and these will be recorded.

For further information contact: Alan Dawson, Head of Governance & Electoral Services by email: alan.dawson@lbbd.gov.uk or phone: 020 8227 2348