2016-06-07 Services & Organisation Committee Agenda

SERVICES & ORGANISATION COMMITTEE MEETING AGENDA                                       7 JUNE 2016


As a general guide, where a legislative instrument refers to a particular power of a ‘Local
Government’ this is a power of Council and therefore, that power is only able to be exercised by
Council unless that power has been appropriately delegated.

In some instances, the CEO will have particular powers provided by legislation by virtue of
holding the position of CEO within the Local Government. Such powers can be identified where
the legislative instrument refers to a particular power of a “chief executive officer’ as opposed to a
‘Local Government’.

It is important to note that if the CEO or Local Government delegates a particular power, they can
still utilise this power and if required, retract a delegated power from a person to whom they have
delegated the power to, or amend or condition the delegation as desired.

Council’s Delegations Register

In accordance with the LGA, Council has in place a Register of Delegations recording all
delegations made by the Council to the CEO, and delegations, which the CEO has on delegated
to various employees and contractors. The Register of Delegations must be made available to
the public for review upon request.

Pending adoption by Council, the updated Delegation of Authority relating to Asbestos
Management and new Delegation relating to environmental biosecurity (provided at Attachments
1 and 2) will be entered into Council’s Delegations Register. The CEO will then where
appropriate, on-delegate various powers to relevant positions within the organisation to ensure
efficient operations.

Delegations Review Process

Pursuant to section 257(4) of the LGA, Delegations to the CEO by Council must be reviewed by
the local government annually. This ensures that the Delegations align with any relevant
legislative changes and new legislation enacted during the previous year.

LGAQ provides local governments with a ‘Delegations Register Service’. This service outlines all
possible delegations within the list of local government related legislation in the following two
documents:

1.     The Register of Delegations – Council to CEO; and
2.     The Register of Delegations – CEO to Employee or Contractor.

The Governance Branch uses the content of the registers provided by LGAQ to review Council’s
Delegation of Authority documents and put forward changes to current delegations and new
delegations to Council to consider for adoption.

LGAQ engages King & Company Solicitors to provide assurance that its Delegations Register
Service are up to date and can be relied upon by local governments. The LGAQ will update this
register in July 2016 after which the Governance Team will undertake the comprehensive annual
delegations review.

In the meantime, as a result of recent legislative changes, the Governance Officer has identified
that the two delegations subject of this report require approval prior to the annual delegations
review.




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