Issue - meetings

The Lord Mayor welcomed Councillors, officer and members of the press and public.

He made the following statement:

“The report for this evening’s meeting has been published at short notice and has not been open for inspection by members of the public for at least five clear days prior to the meeting.

In my opinion, there are special circumstances as to why the item should be considered at this meeting as a matter of urgency.

At the Extraordinary Council meeting held on 9 January 2025, we received an urgent report concerning the Council’s proposed response to the Minister of State concerning the English Devolution White paper. Members will recall that Council resolved on that occasion to support the submission of a Letter of Intent to government by 10 January 2025 indicating Exeter City Council’s opposition to any future proposal for one unitary council for Devon and expressed Exeter’s intention to submit interim plans for unitary status for Exeter once the invitation had been received from government. The resolution was unanimously supported by Members and the letter of intent was duly submitted.

Following the Extraordinary meeting of Council, the Minister of State for Local Government and English Devolution, sent a letter dated 5 February 2025 to the Leaders of two-tier and unitary councils in Devon - formally inviting proposals for local government reorganisation. In that letter, the Minister of State required local authorities to submit an interim plan on or before 21 March 2025 with a full proposal to be submitted by 28 November 2025.

The time between receipt of the letter dated 5 February 2025 and the requirement to submit an interim plan on or before 21 March 2025 is extremely short and substantial efforts have been made to put the interim submission before you in advance of the submission date.

Despite the interim proposals not being published with five clear days’ notice, I consider that there are special circumstances to justify proceeding to consider the report and proposals this evening.

Those reasons are that there was a short period of time between the invitation from the Minister of State to submit interim proposals and the deadline by which those interim proposals have to be submitted to the Minister.

If the interim proposals are not issued to the Minister of State by Friday 21 March, then the Council’s position will be compromised. The interim proposals and the requirement to submit them to the Minister of State within a short timescale means that the issues need to be considered and determined by this Council as a matter of urgency and cannot be delayed. We will therefore proceed to consider the report and the interim proposals for submission to the Minister of State.”

The Lord Mayor welcomed Councillors, officers and members of the press and public. He made the following statement:-

“The report for this meeting has been published at short notice and has not been open for inspection by members of the public for at least five clear days before this meeting.

In my opinion as Lord Mayor, there are special circumstances as to why the item should be considered at this meeting as a matter of urgency.

The government originally intended to publish the English Devolution White Paper in November 2024; however, it was not published until 16 December 2024.

In the letter addressed to all two-tier councils and neighbouring unitary authorities dated 16th December 2024, the Minister of State for Local Government and English Devolution, in referring to the English Devolution White Paper and the government’s manifesto pledge to transfer power out of Westminster through devolution and to fix the foundations of local government’ set out the proposal to postpone the local government elections scheduled for May 2025, -  in order to help to manage the demands imposed on those authorities keen to proceed with devolution.

More recently, in their report dated 8 January 2025, Devon County Council have requested that the County Council elections scheduled for May 2025 be postponed.

On this basis I consider that there are special circumstances, which are: that the deadline imposed by the Minister of State of Friday 10th January 2025 means that these issues need to be considered and determined by this Council as a matter of urgency relating to whether submissions should be made to the Minister of State expressing this Council’s intentions as set out in the report before us.

If this council’s intentions are not submitted to the Minister of State by Friday 10th January 2025, then its proposals could be compromised.”