Peter Symonds College
PUBLIC ACCESS TO AGENDAS AND MINUTES
Copies of the agenda, minutes and papers of each meeting of the Board and its committees are available via the Clerk and in the case of the minutes will be available on the college website for a period of twelve months. The only exceptions to this are in the case of minutes and papers deemed by the Corporation or a committee to be confidential. The Corporation and its committees shall determine when an item is confidential by reference to the Instrument and Articles and the College Policy on Confidentiality. Agendas shall be available as soon as the committee members or, in the case of the Board, the Governors have received them, and before the meeting. Minutes shall be available in draft form after approval by the Chair. Non-confidential papers considered at the meeting shall be made available after the meeting.
The Board and its committees will annually review the minutes and papers deemed confidential during the previous twelve months and in the case of the committees their individual reviews will be presented to the Board at the same meeting that the Board makes its own annual review. If the Board is satisfied that the original reason for dealing with the matter on a confidential basis no longer applies, or where the public interest in disclosure outweighs that reason, then it will arrange to make that material available.
Public Access to Meetings
Persons who are not the Clerk, members of the Board or any one of its committees, may request to attend or be invited to attend Board or Committee meetings, or parts of meetings. Any such request or invitation in respect of Board meetings will be at the discretion of the Board (or its Chairman on its behalf), or with regard to the Committees at the discretion of the Chair of that Committee. Any invitation will only be given in exceptional circumstances and shall be issued through the Clerk who will stipulate the portion of the meeting which the person may attend. Such persons may only speak if invited to do so by the Chair of the Corporation or the Chair of the Committee. The attendance of such persons and the point in the meeting at which they leave shall be recorded in the minutes.
In order to protect personal privacy, any person wishing to attend a meeting of the Board or any of its Committees or who wish to contact members directly on any other issue should do so through the Clerk or, in her absence, the Assistant to the Clerk who will forward any request and/or correspondence to the relevant member(s) or relay contact via e-mail or telephone.
The Register of Interests of members is available to the public for inspection via the Clerk, or in her absence, the Assistant to the Clerk.