New Year but same rules at ‘meetings about meetings’

At 3.44pm, forty-four minutes into the first City Council meeting of 2022, councillors decided how they would meet for the remainder of January, including having at least three more meetings.

That it took three-quarters of an hour to get to a stage where they voted by a majority that meetings would be conducted online only, until they decide otherwise at another meeting, possibly in February, shouldn’t be all that surprising for anyone who follows these things at City Hall.

But still, even by Galway City Council standards, it was quite something.

The procedures committee met the previous Thursday but failed to agree unanimously that meetings would go online-only. Fianna Fáil, through its councillor on the committee, MJ Crowe, pushed for hybrid meetings, a blend of in-person and online. When agreement wasn’t reached, it went before a full Council to decide.

The first mistake at the Monday meeting, though, was that nobody thought to put it on the agenda.

Mayor Colette Connolly (Ind) attempted to introduce the item. There had been no agreement at the procedures committee meeting but, because of the Omicron variant, meetings should move online, she said.

“I don’t see it on the agenda,” said Crowe. “It affects the meetings going forward – we have to deal with it,” replied Colette.

Ailish Rohan, meetings administrator, chimed in. “We’re in a pandemic . . .”

If it was that important, it should be on the agenda, countered MJ.

“It was agreed it would be on the agenda. It’s not on the agenda,” he said. Speaking to Ailish, MJ said it was “not up to you to decide what’s on the agenda”. There were rules governing meetings called standing orders, he said, and suggested people should familiarise themselves with those rules. Ouch.

Chief Executive Brendan McGrath said that the agenda for Monday’s meeting had been sent out on Wednesday, the day before the procedures committee met, so it could not have been put on the agenda.

Couldn’t the Council have sent out a supplementary agenda on Friday, after the procedures committee stalemate asked Mike, rhetorically.

Niall McNelis (Lab) wondered how it could now be put on the agenda; Donal Lyons (Ind) made a formal proposal to that effect. But this being the City Council, that proposal couldn’t just be taken, because you can’t change the agenda will-nilly.

The solution? Standing orders had to be suspended, as per the rulebook. How did nobody think of that beforehand?

Eventually they voted 17-0 to suspend standing orders. No such unanimity on the substantive issue of online meetings, though. FF and Declan McDonnell (Ind) argued for in-person to continue, the rest argued against, with a little help from Council staff. Too much help, according to Declan. “With all due respect,” he began. “The meetings administrator should not be coming in after every speaker!”

Ailish had the final say on this matter, though. She read out the roll-call vote on the proposal for online-only meetings – 12 for, five against.

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.

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