parish council elected the chair at the AGM the out going chair refused to sit so the elected vice stood

Question

at the AGM the outgoing unelected chair refused to preside , the vice took over ( how was elected as a councillor) the arnold baker book makes it clear that the out goignchair should preside or leave the room... how does that effect the vote if he remained ?

  also the vice had an origional vote and casting vote , our standing orders state that the person presiding only has the power of the chair , as the chair was unelected and therefore only had a casting vote would that mean the person presiding would only have a casting vote ??

Answer 1

The outcome is not affected. The outgoing chair should have presided, and in his absence the outgoing vice chair.

But the outgoing chair cannot be forced to preside, and refusal to preside has to be treated as if they were not present. The decisions made by the meeting, including the election of a new chair, are perfectly valid.

Since the vice chair was elected as a councillor, they had an original vote on the selection of the new chair, and also in the case of a tie, a casting vote by virtue of presiding over the meeting.

It is not the person who has a title that has the casting vote, it is the person who is presiding at the meeting.

(Had the outgoing chairman presided, they would have had only a casting vote).