Agenda item

            The Committee considered the undernoted report:

“1.0      Purpose of Report or Summary of main Issues

1.1       To consider the process to be used to identify 8 elected Members to be considered under a public appointment’s process to fill 4 places on the Board of the Belfast Harbour Commissioners.

2.0       Recommendations

2.1       The Committee is recommended to:

·        employ a one-off proportionality exercise for the purpose of identifying the political nomination of 8 members for consideration for appointment to the Board of the Belfast Harbour Commissioners.  Note only 4 members will be chosen.

·        to agree which of the proportionality systems it wishes to use.

3.0       Main report

3.1       Key Issues

3.2       The Belfast Harbour Order (Northern Ireland) 2002 provides that a maximum of four of the Harbour Commissioners shall be Members of Belfast City Council.

3.3       Correspondence has been received from the Department for Infrastructure dated 31st October indicating that the Council should provide to it the names of eight Members who would be willing to serve as Commissioners from which four would be selected by the Permanent Secretary following an interview under a public appointment’s process.

3.4       The Department has also pointed out that a Councillor would not be permitted to serve more than two terms (normally of four years each) as a Commissioner and no more than ten years in total.

3.5       The Committee is reminded that, in June, 2011, when the former City Council was considering the appointment of Members to the Harbour Commissioners, it was decided that a one-off selection process using the d’Hondt system to select 8 nominations was the proper way to proceed rather than including the selection of names as part of the overall pool of nominations to outside bodies.

3.6       Again in April 2015, the Council agreed to the use of a one-off selection process, with each of the proportionality systems considered at that time, that is, d’Hondt, Saint Lague and the Quota Greatest Remainder, achieving the same outcome.

3.7       In keeping with this principle, a one-off d’Hondt exercise for eight nominations would provide the following result:

3.8       Therefore, Sinn Fein – 3 nominations, DUP – 2 nominations, Alliance – 2 nominations and SDLP – 1 nomination.

3.9       The Sainte Lague method would provide the following result:

3.10      Giving Sinn Fein – 3 nominations, the DUP – 2 nominations with the Alliance, SDLP and Green having 1 nomination each.

3.11      The Quota Greatest Remainder method does not produce an order list but would provide the following result and number of nominations:

3.12      Sinn Fein – 3 nominations, DUP – 2 nominations, Alliance – 1 nomination, SDLP – 1 nomination, Green – 1 nomination

3.13      Financial & Resource Implications

            There are not any financial implications for the Council associated with this report.

3.14      Equality or Good Relations Implications

            The suggested approach to be employed to select Members for consideration for appointment to the Board of the Belfast Harbour Commissioners is in keeping with the principles of proportionality established in the Local Government Act (Northern Ireland) 2014.  Therefore, there are not any equality or good relations considerations associated with this report.”

            The Committee agreed:

·        to employ a one-off proportionality exercise for the purpose of identifying the political nomination of eight members for consideration for appointment to the Board of the Belfast Harbour Commissioners and noted only four members would be chosen.

·        to the use of the Sainte Lague method.