Legal advice - secrecy

Question

A town council at their last meeting resolved to hold part of the meeting in private to consider legal advice.  During the private session they resolved to follow 'option C' of the recommended courses of action from the solicitor.  The minutes only record that the council resolved to follow option C, without saying what option C is.  The legal advice is not attached to the minutes or posted on the website, and no extract has been provided, so the public do not know what the council has decided to do on what is an important local issue related to the future of a community building.

I understand why the meeting was in private to consider the legal advice and reach a decision, but now that the decision has been made I would expect that the public would be able to at least find out what option C is.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this and any advice on how to proceed?  I am not a member of the council in question - it is the town where I work.

Answer 1

The minutes should record decisions made.
”Option C” might have been what was adopted but this does not record the action resolved for adoption which might need to be referenced at a later date.

Comments

Thanks, I agree.  What would you recommend as a course of action?  I am thinking of writing to the clerk to request one of the following 1) simply publish the legal advice in full, 2) publish an extract of the advice that contains the full wording of option C or 3) update the minutes to include the full wording of option C in the resolution.

Answer 2

I've some sympathy when a clear minuted decision would signficantly hinder potential outcome/resolution. Referencing a confidential report (which is retained) does enable a degree of control. For arguments sake they wish to purchase property at an auction to secure its long term future and need to set maximium bid (clearly you wouldnt want to resolve to say The Town Clerk authorised to bid up to £1.5 million and offer £1.25 million prior to auction). Publish them minutes and then wonder why they didnt accept.. I try to avoid confidential sessions as much as possible and try to be as transparent as we can (within reason).

Comments

Thank you for this.  I appreciate you conveying the other side of this argument, and understand the argument you're making.  And to a degree I agree with it - if revealing what was agreed would hinder ongoing case or legal strategy.  It still leaves me wondering about the level of information that should be shared with the public and the timeline for sharing it.

---

Presumably you know what the general subject under consideration is since it
is an important local issue - the council doesn’t have to share legal advice but it should publish a resolved decision ie to bid not to bid for purchase of (to follow the existing example.
There are many ways to share simple elements of fact without divulging contractual or sensitive details.
I would simply ask WHAT have you actually resolved to do - in broad terms.