Hassocks Parish Council

Agenda

A meeting of the Parish Council is being held on Tuesday 9 July 2024
at 7.30 pm in the Council Chamber, Parish Centre, Adastra Park, Hassocks.

Parish Clerk – 2 July 2024

Members of the public are encouraged to come to the meetings and there is an opportunity for them to address the Council relating to the non-confidential items on the published agenda. A period of 15 minutes will be set aside in item 4 Public participation. It may be necessary to consider particular items in confidential session and where this arises, these items will be considered at the end of the agenda.

AGENDA

1. APOLOGIES

To accept Apologies for absence.

2. DISCLOSURE OF INTERESTS

To deal with any disclosure by Members of any disclosable pecuniary interests and interests other than pecuniary interests, as defined under Hassocks Parish Council’s Code of Conduct and the Localism Act 2011, in relation to matters on the agenda.

3. MINUTES

To accept the minutes of the Parish Council meeting held on the 11 June 2024.

4. PUBLIC PARTICIPATION

Up to fifteen minutes will be available to allow for the public to make representations, answer questions or give evidence in respect of any items of business included in the agenda, in accordance with Standing Orders.

5. TO ACCEPT THE FOLLOWING MINUTES

5.1       Planning Committee – to agree the minutes for the 3rd June 2024 and to note the minutes for the 24th June 2024.

6. FINANCE

To approve the Financial Report (Appendix 1 – To view appendix 1 please click here) and authorise the list of payments in the sum of  £33,123.69 issued between 1 May 2024 and 31st May 2024. (Appendix 2 – To view appendix 2 please click here)

7.  REPORTS

7.1      West Sussex County Councillor

7.2       Mid Sussex District Councillors Report

7.3       Police Report

7.4       Rail Matters

7.5       Youth Initiatives

7.6       Reports from Councillors on meetings outside bodies where the Council is represented.

8. CHAIR’S REPORT

8.1       Current matters (oral report).

9. CLERK’S REPORT

9.1       Councillor Co-option –The Council currently has one vacancy and is now able to consider co-opting a suitable person onto the Council. The vacancy is about to be advertised and it’s anticipated if successful, Members will be able to consider co-option of a new Member onto the Council at its September meeting.

9.2       On-line banking signatories – The Council is in the process of setting up/establishing an on-line account and initially identified six authorised signatories:

Cllrs Weir, Simmons, Bunting, McBeth, B Hatton and Barton.

Since this time, one of the above Members has resigned and with holidays and availability to improve resilience, Members are requested to consider nominating further signatories for consideration. This will provide further resilience and facilitate the authorisation of payments electronically.

A prerequisite of any signatory is that they are comfortable using technology and have up to date securities on their PC’s.

9.3       Current Account – In addition, the Council will retain its existing account with Barclays alongside its on-line account and currently has the following signatories, Cllr Weir, B Hatton, Neil and Bunting. Due to holiday commitments and availability, Members are requested to consider nominating at least one, possibly two, additional signatories to provide further additional resilience on this account.

To amend signatories on this account can be a drawn out process , however the prerequisite of any signatory is that they would need to be available to attend the office from time to time to provide a ‘wet signature’ for payments. It is anticipated that most of the Council’s day to day business activities will be moved over to the on-line bank account.

10. URGENT MATTERS AT THE DISCRETION OF THE CHAIR for noting and/or inclusion on a future agenda.

11. DATE OF NEXT MEETING

To note that the date of the next Council meeting will be 10th September 2024

EXCLUSION OF PUBLIC AND PRESS

In view of the confidential nature of the business about to be transacted Councillors will be referred to the Confidential Agenda. If any members of the public or press are in attendance they will be requested to withdraw from the meeting in the public interest.

FILMING, RECORDING OF COUNCIL MEETINGS AND USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA

During this meeting members of the public may film or record the Committee and officers from the public area only providing it does not disrupt the meeting. The Confidential section of the meeting may not be filmed or recorded. If a member of the public objects to being recorded, the person(s) filming must stop doing so until that member of the public has finished speaking. The use of social media is permitted but members of the public are requested to switch their mobile devices to silent for the duration of the meeting.