Agenda and draft minutes

No Apologies for Absence were received.

Members and Officers are invited to make any declarations of pecuniary, personal and/or prejudicial interests that they may have in relation to items on the agenda, and are reminded that they should re-declare their interest before consideration of the item or as soon as the interest becomes apparent.

Members and Officers should make their declarations by stating:

a)    The item they have the interest in

b)    Whether it is pecuniary, personal and/or prejudicial interest

c)    The nature of the interest

          There were no Declarations of Interest made.

To approve as a correct record the minutes from the last meeting of the Committee held 11 October 2021, as attached.

The Minutes of the meeting held on 11 October 2021 were approved by the Committee as a correct record and signed by the Chair.

To receive questions from the public (for a period of up to 15 minutes)

The Chair confirmed that one question had been submitted for this meeting. This was from Mr Chester and asked what the justification was for considering the level of salary for a vacant post in Exempt business?

The Chair responded confirming that the reason for the item being considered in Exempt Business was because at this point in time, the information being discussed was about the business affairs of the Authority and so it was not appropriate for the discussion to be held in public session. 

The minutes from this meeting would make recommendations to Full Council on 10 January 2024 where the salary would be published as part of the minutes and once Full Council had made a resolution.

The Chair confirmed that there were no items for this meeting.

The Committee is asked to confirm its start times for meetings for the remainder of 2023/2024.

The Committee

                     RESOLVED

That the start times for its meetings for the remainder of 2023/24 be 6.00 pm.

The Committee is asked to consider passing the following resolution: -

That under Section 100a (4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public and accredited representatives of newspapers be excluded from the meeting for the following item of business on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Act by virtue of the paragraph specified against the item.

The Committee

                     RESOLVED

That under Section 100a (4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public and accredited representatives of newspapers be excluded from the meeting for the following item of business on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Act by virtue of the paragraph specified against the item.

The purpose of this report is to make recommendations to Full Council in relation to the appropriate remuneration of the Chief Executive Officer post.

The Chair invited the Group Head of Organisational Excellence to present her report summarising the information that it needed to consider in making recommendations on the remuneration to be paid for the Chief Executive Officer post.

The items that the Committee were being asked to consider were based on recommendations made to this meeting from the meeting of the Chief Executive’s Recruitment & Selection Panel held on 19 October 2023. That meeting also made a recommendation to Full Council on 10 January 2024, which was to seek approval to appoint a full-time permanent Chief Executive.

The Chair referred to the last meeting of the Recruitment and Selection Panel and to the Officer’s report which was asking this Committee to:

·       To make recommendations on the annual salary to be paid to the Chief Executive

·       Whether this should be an all-inclusive salary or whether any additional allowances should be paid

·       Whether to continue to align the annual pay award with the national pay award or revert to linking pay to the annual appraisal and subsequent  review by the Remuneration Committee

Debate then took place on what the salary for the Chief Executive should be; should a relocation bonus be applied; should the post holder be able to claim expenses and if so, what would these be; and should the salary be aligned to the national pay award or be subject to linking pay awards to the annual appraisal.

Following a lengthy debate, the Committee

          RECOMMEND TO FULL COUNCIL  - That

(1)  The annual salary to be paid for the permanent Chief Executive be £140k;

(2)  This salary be an all-inclusive salary with no other allowances being paid; and

(3)  The annual pay award should continue to be aligned with the national pay award and should not be reverted to linking it to the annual appraisal panel and subsequent review by the Remuneration Committee.