If this is not complied with would it make the appointments unsafe

Question

Thanks for the answer. The thing is I have applied for the last two vacancies on our all male Parish council, ( not that I am a feminist, I just think women should have some representation on our council) at no time was I informed that I could ask for the poll. I only found out by accident, they are trying to tell me that the positions were advertised and notices posted but they have no legal requirement to inform people of the ten elector rule in the notice or the adverts, how is anyone to know. It was only that someone had tipped me off that they had been told the first time by the local authority but had ignored it again for the second appointment. Do you think this would make the last two appointments unsafe?

Answer 1

People can have a hard time where a local council follows the strict rules but avoids the spirit of the legislation, which aims at democratic participation.  Quite a lot of things must be made public, but generally councils are not obliged to inform any individual or group.  It is sufficient to post a notice in public.

There are some things you could do that might help:

• Make sure you know the council's procedure for posting public notices - where can people be sure to be able to see them?
• If the notices are published somewhere obscure, complain to the council that they are not adequately meeting their legal obligations
• Look regularly for any new public notices
• Aim to know the basic requirements imposed on local councils for handling vacancies - you may well have got most of them by now
• Ask the council to consider setting up an electronic mailing list for all public announcements - they are not obliged to do this, but can be pressed to give reasons if they don't

This site was created because there are very limited resources for individual councillors or people wishing to become councillors.  Councils and clerks have access to the National Association of Local Councils and its local branches, and clerks can refer to the Society of Local Council Clerks.  Neither of these will advise an individual councillor or would-be councillor, which can leave them isolated, especially in a dispute.