How long should a councillor speak?

WARRINGTON Borough Council has voted to increase its membership from 57 to 58 – after a row over how long an opposition councillor was allowed to speak.
Liberal Democrat leader Cllr Ian Marks was stopped after he had spoken for five minutes – and had to hand his papers over to his deputy, Cllr Bob Barr, for him to complete the speech.
Afterwards, Cllr Marks (pictured) said: , “I had asked for permission to exceed the five minutes allowed for speeches beforehand and it was outrageous of the Labour Group not allowing me to finish what I had to say.
“They just wanted to go home.”
The extraordinary meeting of the council was called to debate a Boundary Commission electoral review.
The council voted to increase its membership by one and then agreed to go out to public consultation on the timing of future elections.
The choice is to carry on as at present – electing a third of the council each year for three years and then having a year without an election – or having one election for the whole council once every four years.
Cllr Marks said the whole review had been badly handled by the Labour group.
“We first heard about it in a letter from the Boundary Commission received on June 13 last year and they are now complaining about the tight timetable.
“All parties agree that the process we are going through is flawed. We think the three decisions we have to make are closely linked together. We have to propose the number of councillors we want, the method of election and the make-up of the wards but the Boundary Commission insist we make the numbers decision first and worry about the ward make-up in a few months’ time.
“The case has not been made to increase the number of councillors by one. We think it should remain unchanged – and indeed there is a strong argument for actually reducing the number of councillors in line with savings elsewhere in the council.
“There was unanimous support for the decision to ask the public whether they want to continue voting for a single councillor in three out of four years or change and vote for all councillors every four years.
“We strongly support a continuation of the present system because it is more democratic, makes councillors more accountable to residents and provides more continuity.
“There is a danger the consultation could become a farce because the Boundary Commission insist that elections in three out of four years requires the total number of councillors to be divisible by three. The council has voted for 58 which is not divisible by three, so it will appear that the council has already made up its mind to have all-out elections and intends to ignore the outcome of the consultation.”