The Mayor and
Executive (Cabinet)
The Mayor is responsible for all
executive decisions and provides strategic leadership.
Executive decisions are all decisions which by law are
not reserved to the council or its committees.
He/she must operate within the policy and budgetary framework
agreed by the council, and the constitution. Of course, the Mayor
cannot practically take every decision so he delegates most of his
decision-making to officers.
What is the Executive?
The Mayor must appoint a cabinet of between two and nine members,
picked from the elected councillors. The Executive is made up of
the Mayor and Cabinet and when it meets collectively they are known
as the Cabinet.
Each Cabinet member is in charge of a portfolio, rather like a
Government minister. The portfolios are based on specific services
that cut across these areas such as regeneration, human resources,
finance and children. The Mayor can, if he/she wishes, give these
councillors decision making powers
(see Mayoral scheme of delegation (pdf). At
present, however, the role of the Cabinet is advisory.
By law the Mayor must appoint a Deputy Mayor from amongst the
cabinet. However, there is no defined role for him/her unless the
Mayor dies or is incapacitated. Of course, the Mayor can go on
holiday and leave specific authority to the Deputy Mayor to act in
his/her place.
When does the Cabinet meet?
When the Mayor is making decisions in consultation with multiple
Cabinet Members or Executive Advisers, he will make these decisions
at Cabinet meetings. These are held every month, except in August,
at the Town Hall, East Ham, generally on Thursday evenings. They
are open to the public.
The Mayor has decided that the public are welcome to attend these
meetings.
See the calendar for dates of meetings.
Agenda and reports
Agenda and reports are published 5 clear working days before the
meeting and are available on our website or at libraries, service
centres and council offices or you can contact Debbie Boon on 020
3373 1253.
The decisions are also published, usually between 2 and 5 days of
the meeting, although implementation is usually delayed for a
further five days to allow for
call-in.
See
agendas and minutes if you want to know what is being discussed
at a particular meeting.
Occasionally the Mayor has to make decisions which need to be made
in private. These include matters involving identifiable
individuals including our employees, commercially sensitive
information and legal advice given in confidence.
What's the role of the Mayoral Advisers?
In addition to Cabinet members, the Mayor has appointed Exective
advisers. These are other councillors who may be asked to advise
the Mayor on a particular issue, service or project, but they are
not part of the Executive. They cannot have delegated authority to
take decisions on behalf of the Mayor.
See
Executive Advisers for the details of the councillors who have
been appointed as Cabinet members or mayoral advisers, together
with their portfolios.
Types of decisions made by the Mayor
The Mayor will make 2 types of executive decisions, known as key
and non-key decisions.
Key decisions: Key decisions are decisions of the
Executive which either result in the Council incurring expenditure
or making savings of more than £½million; or which are significant
in terms of the effects on two or more wards. Some key decisions
are delegated to officers. All key decisions must be published in
the Forward Plan, which comes out every month and covers the next
4-month period. (see key decisions and Mayor's forward plan.)
Non-key decisions: These are decisions which may be taken
by the Mayor or by officers on behalf of the Executive. The vast
majority of council decisions fall into this category and they are
taken routinely by officers within the policies laid down by
Members.
The Mayor, following consultation with cabinet members and mayoral
advisers at a cabinet meeting will recommend the budget and key
policy proposals to the full council. This is known as the 'policy
and budgetary framework'.