Chairmen's Committee - Approved Committee Minutes - 21 October 2015

Present

Deputy  J.A.N.  Le  Fondré,  President  and  Chairman,  Corporate  Services Scrutiny Panel

Deputy S.M. Brée, Chairman, Economic Affairs Scrutiny Panel

Deputy R. Renouf , Chairman, Health and Social Security Scrutiny Panel Deputy A.D. Lewis , Chairman, Public Accounts Committee

Deputy D. Johnson , Vice-Chairman, Environment, Housing and Technical Services Scrutiny Panel

Apologies

Deputy L.M.C. Doublet , Vice-President and Chairman, Education and Home Affairs Scrutiny Panel

Connétable A.S. Crowcroft , Chairman, Environment, Housing and Technical Services Scrutiny Panel

Absent

In attendance

 Mr M. Orbell, Scrutiny Officer

Ref Back

Agenda matter

Action

1.  Records of meetings

The Committee approved the records of its meetings held on 7th July (revised), 15th and 21st September, and 13th and 14th October 2015, which were signed accordingly by the President.  

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2.  Activity Reports

The  Committee  noted  the  Panel  and  Public  Accounts  Committee activity reports. The Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee gave members  an  oral  update  on  his  Committee's  report,  which  led  to general discussion of items concerning the States as Shareholder and conflicts of interest for Scrutiny members.

It was noted that the Environment, Housing and Technical Services Scrutiny Panel had asked all Scrutiny members if they would like to participate in a review of proposed changes to Taxi Regulations; no positive responses had been received to date.

Following  a  referral  back  to  Scrutiny  during  the  debate  on  20th October, it was noted that a review of P.46/2015: Draft States of Jersey  (Transfer  of  Functions  No.8)  (Miscellaneous  Transfers) (Jersey)  Regulations  201-  would  now  be  shared  between  the Corporate Services Panel, which had already carried out work on the proposed  transfers  of  Property  Holdings  and  Fisheries,  and  the Economic Affairs Panel, which would focus on the remaining transfers of Sport and Culture to the Economic Development Department, and Digital, Competition and Innovation to the Chief Minister's Department. The debate would continue on 15th December. Deputy Maçon, having previously been co-opted to work on the review with the Corporate Services Panel, would be approached to see if he wished to join the Economic Affairs Panel on a similar basis for its part of the review.

The Committee noted that since the Activity Reports were drafted, following a briefing from the Economic Development Department the Economic Affairs Panel had also agreed in principle to carry out a review of proposals for a revised Licensing Law.

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3.  Draft  Code  of  Practice  for  Scrutiny  Panels  and  the  Public Accounts Committee

The Committee agreed that the draft Code of Practice should be prioritised on the agenda for the next Committee meeting. It was anticipated that the discussion would take up about an hour of the meeting.

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4. Shared information: Livelink

Members expressed different views concerning the use of electronic devices to access documents in meetings, as opposed to relying on printed copies. The use of Livelink was not yet common amongst members or their Panels. Some members felt it could not replace the ability to make notes on hard copies in meetings, although it was noted that there were ways of adding notes to documents on some electronic devices. It was suggested that there might be some benefit from additional training in the use of devices provided for Members.

Some members reported being able to see Livelink pages relating to States departments, but not individual documents uploaded to them, leading to some uncertainty over what access would be obtained by Members using Livelink. It was explained that a permissions system should ensure that members could only access documents uploaded specifically for their own Panels or Committees. The aim would be for Panel/Committee  Officers  to  upload  key  documents  relevant  to specific reviews for members to refer to conveniently when needed; it was not intended to replicate entire review files. Access was also read-only',  so  if  members  wished  to  make  changes  or  annotate documents they would have to save these to a local copy.

The  Committee  agreed  that  it  should  be  left  to  individual Panels/members to decide whether they wished to avail themselves of the shared document facility. It was noted that no specific training should  be  required;  where  needed  Officers  would  be  able  to demonstrate how to access Livelink to their Panels/Committees.

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5.  Use of social media

The President introduced this item on behalf of the Chairman of the Education and Home Affairs Scrutiny Panel, who was unable to attend the meeting due to illness. It was suggested that Scrutiny was failing the public by not communicating with them properly, as many people preferred not to use the established media. The Chairman was in favour of using social media (particularly Facebook) for advertising Scrutiny calls for evidence. Scrutiny's previous experience of using Facebook  was  discussed,  and  it  was  explained  that  the  Scrutiny Facebook  page  had  initially  attracted  some  interest,  but  this  had waned after a time, possibly partly because department policy and resourcing  issues  meant  that  posts  from  third  parties  went unanswered.  This  one-way  communication  had  earlier  been highlighted  by  advisers  as  a  potential  weakness  in  Scrutiny's approach  to  Facebook,  which  users  generally  thought  of  as  an interactive medium. Subsequently an increasing number of abusive and  objectionable  messages  began  to  be  posted  on  the  Scrutiny

Facebook  page  by  third  parties;  at  one  point  the  page  was  also believed to have been hacked'. Without the means to control these incidents it was eventually decided to close the Facebook account to avoid damage to the reputation of Scrutiny. Events and information were still added on Twitter; the States Assembly similarly had a Twitter account but did not use Facebook.

Members agreed that this issue should be discussed further at the next meeting. Matters for consideration would include what members wanted to achieve by using Facebook or other social media, how issues of resourcing and time constraints could be addressed, and what to do about third party comments.

6.  Future Meeting

It was noted that the next meeting date was 10th November 2015, 9.30am-11.30am, Le Capelain Room, States Building.