Suspended inspections, relax on FOI deadlines and virtual meetings – how councils could look from now on due to coronavirus

Some Northampton Borough Council meetings are currently scheduled to go ahead at the Guildhall, others have been cancelled

A series of measures were announced by local government secretary of state Robert Jenrick MP yesterday, including advice on how council meetings could look moving forward.

The government has confirmed that routine Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspections will be temporarily suspended during the COVID-19 outbreak, while they also said Ofsted would ‘look very favourably’ on any requests to defer inspections.

The announcement came yesterday, shortly after Prime Minister Boris Johnson had advised against all ‘non-essential contact’ and trips to pubs, theatres and mass gatherings.

Such advice is also leaving councillors and members of the public questioning whether council meetings will go ahead.

So far Northampton Borough Council has decided to postpone its Pensioners’ Forum, which was scheduled for next Wednesday (March 25) due to the outbreak. But a scheduled planning committee meeting for this evening (March 17) at The Guildhall is currently going ahead.

Although no decision has yet been made by the district councils in Northampton, Daventry and South Northamptonshire – nor the county council – to postpone meetings Mr Jenrick said that the government would ‘consider bringing forward legislation to allow council committee meetings to be held virtually for a temporary period’.

This could mean meetings being held online, but it is not yet clear whether the meetings would be broadcast or be accessible for members of the public or press.

Mr Jenrick’s announcement said Westminster would also consider bringing forward legislation to remove the requirement for annual council meetings to take place in person. The annual council meetings usually take place in May.

Meanwhile, the deadline for local government financial audits will be extended to September 30, and councils will be able to use their discretion on deadlines for Freedom of Information requests – meaning many could take longer than the current deadline of 20 working days.