Questions Without Notice from Party Spokespeople

Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Finance and Local Government – in the Senedd at 1:47 pm on 18 January 2023.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of Sam Rowlands Sam Rowlands Conservative 1:47, 18 January 2023

Thank you, Minister. If I may, I just want to focus my last question on virtual council meetings. It's an issue that I've raised a number of times here in the Chamber and an issue that I raised with you last week as well. Also, we saw yesterday another media story showing a shambolic situation where it looks as though an alleged sex act took place over a Zoom meeting during a meeting of Flintshire council's cabinet—completely inappropriate, but again highlights some of the issues that we see in meetings of local government taking place virtually. Whilst virtual meetings, of course, do have positives, I raised with you last week my concerns about how these are being managed. I raised with you the concerns about a councillor allegedly driving whilst voting, we've seen evidence of proceedings being edited before they're published online, and now the latest news reports of this awful act that took place up in Flintishire council. It shows how virtual meetings can be abused in a way that can't happen in face to face, in-person meetings. So, last week, when we met, Minister, you said that you'd be looking to issue further guidance to councils. I wonder whether you would look to accelerate the issuing of that guidance and have those discussions with councils to ensure they're offering hybrid meetings and not just virtual meetings, because face-to-face meetings are so important for our residents and in the working of councils.