Our Parish Council is a non-party political body which prides itself on focusing on the needs of the community without fear or favour.
The Council meets every regularly throughout the year. Meetings are held at venues across the three villages.
The Council has important Committees who look after specific areas of Council activity these are Environment, Finance and Overview, Planning and Staffing while who suggest policies and make recommendations to the main Council.
The Planning Committee is a statutory body and whilst it doesn’t possess any planning panels, it is an advisory body to Bradford MDC’s Planning Department and Planning Committee.
The Finance & Overview Committee considers in detail the Council’s financial planning and makes recommendations on spending to Full Council.
The Environment Committee has a delegated budget which is allocated to Environmental Projects across the Parish. The Committee also has an overview of the Parish Council’s Allotments and receive reports from the Parish Council’s Allotments Officers.
Staffing Committee deals with all staffing related issues.
There are twelve elected or co-opted Councillors, along have two part time staff: a Clerk and a Village Warden, and Casual Toilet Attendants.
Our Council helps provide ‘seed’ capital for local groups who want to extend their reach or start new activities for the benefit of the community as well as supporting groups who want to establish themselves within our parish.
The Clerk
The Clerk is employed by the Council to provide administrative support and professional advice for the Council’s activities.
The Clerk cannot be self-employed. It is important that Councillors, partner organisations and the local community appreciate the clerk as a professional officer.
The Clerk is not answerable to any individual Councillor – not even the Chairman. The Clerk is an independent and objective servant of the Council, recognising that the Council is responsible for all decisions and taking instructions from the Council as a body.
The Clerk is the ‘Proper Officer’. This title used in law refers to the appropriate officer for the relevant function. The Council must appoint officers it needs to discharge its functions. In finance, the Proper Officer is known as the Responsible Financial Officer. The ‘RFO’ is often the Clerk, but not always.
As an independent and objective professional, the Clerk advises the Council on whether decisions are lawful, researches topics of concern and provides unbiased information that helps the Council make appropriate choices.
Legally councils can agree to delegate decisions to the clerks because they are professional officers whos independence allows them to act on behalf of the council.