It is with tremendous delight that I am able to quote my musical hero and report that last night history was made in Guildford Borough Council. As far as I can tell, Guildford has had a council chamber since one was built on the Guildhall in 1683, and in the following 328 years no photos or recordings of any meeting have been made or published. I understand that, for at least a few hundred of these 328 years there were technological limitations as to what could be done, but times have indeed a-changed.
A photo like the one below has never been taken before. This was the very first frame from my footage. It's blurry, it's a bit wonky, but it's mine. And soon I hope that what it symbolises will belong to all of us.
This is a fantastic milestone on the path to an open, accountable, transparent and democratic council.
As a member of the public I was given permission to film the proceedings provided I undertook to provide the council with a copy of all footage and that I would comply with any legal requirements. For any other would-be citizen journalists, legal advice from the office of Eric Pickles is available
here.
My motives on this are very clear - I want to be allowed to film at council meetings because I believe that in an open & honest democracy it should be a right.
Some of the advantages of allowing filming are already clear - so far I have had 3 requests from different members of the public for bits of the footage and will be delighted to help. I hope that one day in the near future these requests will be made directly to the council.
The main disadvantage is that a lot of what the councillors discuss is astonishingly dull, and you can end up with a lot of footage to support this.
My footage is being uploaded as I type this & will be posted on here in the near future. You are welcome to spend around 3 hours of your life viewing it - it's time that you won't get back but there are some real gems in there, mainly from members of the public. This includes people talking about a lack of consultation on the relocation of the bus station and residents from Shalford concerned about a lack of planning for the Stonebridge traveller site. All of these members of the public displayed a frustration at the lack of adequate consultation with and involvement of the community affected. I feel hugely encouraged that we have so much passion & commitment from within our community, and hope that this can be put to good use. Maybe next time this type of public involvement could even be carried out before lengthy reports are written telling us what we're going to have done to us?
As things stand at the moment, if you want to record a meeting at Millmead Council Chambers, you have to submit a request & the councillors consider your request, discuss it if they want to, and take a vote to decide whether or not to allow your request. I was pessimistic, for the reasons outlined in my earlier letters to the Surrey Advertiser.
Still, sometimes it's great to be wrong, and on this occasion I couldn't have hoped for a better outcome.
How did they vote? Here's a summary, colour-coded for political party:
FOR - Chapman, Creedy, Franklin, Freeman, French, Gillian, Goodwin, Gunning, Harwood, Hogger, Jackson, Juneja, McShane, McShee, May, Meredith, Nelson-Smith, Palmer, Phillips, Reeves, Rooth, Searle, Sutcliffe
AGAINST - Billington, Bright, Carpenter, Elms, Furniss, Garrett, Hewlett, Holliday, Hooper, Jordan, Lockyer-Nibbs, Mansbridge, Powell, Randall, Taylow, Wicks, Wright
An embarrassing amount of blue in the "AGAINST" group, but a nice mix up there from those who said "FOR". Maybe this would be a good starting point for the cross-party working group?
There was one abstention from the mayor Terence Patrick, who I think felt it was inappropriate to take either side - fair enough given his position. As far as I can tell, all Labour & Lib Dem councillors turned up, and 7 Conservative councillors (around a fifth) did not attend the meeting, preferring to stay home & watch X-Factor. (I made that bit up as there is no way of knowing, as far as I'm aware).
I was particularly encouraged to see that Tony Rooth, as Conservative council leader, voted to allow filming on this occasion, and although I am finding this hat rather chewy, I look forward to following the progress of the working group that he has promised will look into making the council more camera friendly.
To those who voted no, I hope that you will come round to the same way of thinking as your more progressive colleagues. It is not 1683 any more - we have wonderful technology that can be used to improve the way that you interact with your electorate. Hopefully your concerns will be somewhat allayed by the fact that no councillors were harmed in the making of this film.
Where next? This whole issue of filming is part of a much bigger debate about openness & transparency. My request was prompted by the 2 motions that I mentioned here on 30th November. The motions with several amendments were passed at the meeting, and I genuinely believe that the message might be getting through. It is up to all of us to continue to fight for better transparency, better involvement and better democracy from our council.
Below are the motions as passed. A great achievement for all of us!
This Council resolves:
(1) To investigate simple and efficient procedures to improve public participation at Council meetings and transparency of decision-making including, but not limited to, the following proposals:
(I) To introduce a half hour Leader’s Question Time, where no notice of a question needs to be given, to give the public the opportunity to scrutinise the Council’s policies
(II) To allow members of the public to submit motions to Council, for debate, up to 24 hours before the start of a Council meeting
(III) To introduce webcasting of appropriate public meetings of the Council
(IV) To allow any member of the public to use recording equipment at Council meetings.
(V) Decisions involving the disposal of significant Council assets are made in public, and are subject to call-in.
(VI) Clearer descriptions of the items to be considered are included in the Forward Plan, so that both councillors and members of the public have more time to consider the topic and prepare representations.
(VII) To consider such other proposals which may be suggested by councillors to improve transparency of decision-making and encourage greater involvement from the public.
(2) To establish a cross-party Constitution working group (comprising three Conservatives, two Liberal Democrats and one Labour councillor) to carry out the investigations referred to in (1) above and to submit proposals for the Council’s consideration by May 2012.
