Brighton & Hove Council Engagement Consultation Criticised

Concerns have been raised that a public consultation into how people can play a role in Brighton and Hove City Council decision-making does not include the current option of a deputation.

The survey – Join Us in Shaping Brighton and Hove’s Future – on the Your Voice section of the council’s website said that – as well as deputations – people could currently also ask questions and present petitions to full council and committee meetings.

But according to the survey, the options – should the council move to a cabinet system – would be to ask questions at full council, cabinet and overview and scrutiny committees and present petitions to the full council.

Despite not including deputations in the consultation, the council said that it would continue to offer people this option.

Deputations give groups of six or more people up to five minutes to raise an issue with councillors and to receive a response.

Questions are limited to 100 words and a petition requires 1,250 signatures for a debate although organisers all have an allotted time to present even the smallest petitions to the council and relevant committee.

At the last meeting of the full council in February, people living in The Ridgeway, Woodingdean, called for action because their homes had flooded 10 times in 14 months.

And recent deputations have included parents wanting safer streets near schools and residents asking for railings to be put back in Upper Abbey Road, near the Royal Sussex County Hospital. Another deputation objected to the closure of Mile Oak Library.

In the past four months, deputations of parents at Bright Start Nursery and St Bartholomew’s Primary School, in Brighton, and St Peter’s Primary School, in Portslade, have spoken up for existing facilities.

Bright Start parent Ed Armston-Sheret said:

“Deputations allow people to put forward an alternative argument and raise more substantive points than are possible in a question. I’d be really concerned if they were scrapped.

“I presented a deputation about cuts to Bright Start Nursery and this was the only point during the process where I felt like councillors actually sat and listened to the points parents and carers were making.”

Emily Brewer, who campaigned to keep St Peter’s open, said:

“Deputations are a vital part of debate between the public and the council.

“It provides a platform for local communities to be heard in a way that is more detailed than just asking topline questions which aren’t always fit for purpose.

“As someone who has taken part in deputations due to my daughter’s nursery and school closure, I find it shocking that they are not included as this limits how debate between the public and the council would be steered.”

Brighton Access for Disabled Groups Everywhere (BADGE) founder Pippa Hodge has led deputations in the past five years on special educational needs and blue badge parking to highlight issues that councillors might not otherwise know about.

She said:

“A well-written deputation and speech encourages advance reflection by councillors. It encourages them to reconsider proposals in light of new information and perspectives that may be outside of their own lived experience.

“From an equalities perspective, a deputation can explain in more detail the concerns and potential impact – or highlight an important ‘levelling up’ opportunity – and give essential background context, such as government guidance or best practice, which can be educational and ensure that councillors are making robust and fair decisions from a position of greater understanding and awareness.

“We can’t expect councillors to be experts in all areas but they make big decisions that impact people’s lives for better or worse.”

Conservative group leader councillor Alistair McNair said that it was worrying that deputations were not included in the consultation.

He said that, when he advised residents on how to present their case to the full council, most were aware of petitions and questions but few were aware of deputations.

Councillor McNair said:

“Often the situation is so grave there is no time for a petition. Often the situation is so complex that a simple question will not do.

“Is this the Labour administration trying to reduce the means by which residents can make their voices heard? Let’s hope not.

“But the consultation needs to be updated. All current methods of reaching the administration must be maintained.”

Green group convenor councillor Steve Davis was concerned about a “top-down cabinet” where decisions would not be made and debated in real time but instead the public voice would be silenced.

Councillor Davis said:

“I’ve lost count of the number of deputations that have changed minds on the council – whether that’s calling on the council to declare a climate emergency to tackling racism, preventing flooding in local streets, saving domestic violence funding, stopping the release of sky lanterns.

“Deputations allow people to go into important detail about what they need and have made a real difference.

“Labour has no mandate to scrap the city’s democratic decision-making process. Labour say they want to increase public involvement.

“In reality, their hasty plan to introduce a cabinet system that shuts down challenge looks set to see public involvement in council reduced to, at its worst, a series of council-run ‘talking shops’.

“These sudden, rushed changes only betray Labour’s plan to run the council ‘their way’, with little scrutiny. Now more than ever they must be held to account.”

The council said:

“We have no intention of ending deputations.

“We launched the consultation as we’d like to hear other ways in which we can involve the public, in addition to deputations, public questions and the presentation of petitions.

“We’ll consider all responses to the consultation before finalising our public engagement plans.”

The Your Voice public consultation is open until Sunday April 21 on the council website.

A meeting of full council is due to vote on moving from the current committee system to a cabinet system instead.

The meeting is due to start at 4.30pm on Thursday (March 28) at Hove Town Hall and is scheduled to be webcast on the council’s website.