Exclusion from voting

August 31st, 2022 by James Goudie KC

Exclusion of Committee members from voting was one of the issues in R ( Spitalfields Historic Building Trust ) v Tower Hamlets LBC ( 2022 ) EWHC 2262 ( Admin ). The Judge’s analysis in relation to this begins at para 111. The starting point is that every member of a local authority council or committee has a prima facie entitlement to vote at a relevant meeting. Any restriction of the entitlement requires statutory authority. Where consideration of a planning application is deferred, the two meetings form part of a single decision-making process. A local authority is entitled, by provision in its Constitution, to say that, as far as possible, members should be present for all of that process in order to vote. Such a provision constitutes the regulation of “ proceedings and business “ of the committee, within the power in para 42 of Sch 12 to the Local Government Act 1972.

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