The Clackmannanshire Access Forum Partnership Agreement

The information on this page sets out the roles, responsibilities and objectives of the Access Forum.

Background

Section 25 of the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 places a duty on each local authority to establish at least one local access forum.

Aims

The Forum aims to work in partnership with Clackmannanshire Council to:

advise and assist on access matters through an inclusive and balanced approach; and
promote and raise awareness of local and national access issues and initiatives.

The Forum will seek to achieve these aims by:

acting as a consultee in relation to statutory obligations, such as the identification of a Core Path Plan, as well as other access matters;
promoting and sharing good practice, and enabling effective networking;
assisting Clackmannanshire Council and its partners in delivering Clackmannanshire Outdoor Access Strategy objectives; and
engaging in constructive debate to seek agreement on access issues through a consensual approach.

Structure and Membership

The Forum will meet at least quarterly.

Members of the Forum are elected at an Annual General Meeting.

To enable the Forum to be effective, balanced and inclusive, it will consist of representatives from 4 key stakeholder groups:

Land Managers
Community Groups
Agencies and advisory groups
Users

The Role of Representatives on the Forum

Representatives of the key stakeholder groups should endeavour to ensure that the views they express are wider than their own personal or group views.

Appointing a Representative

To ensure that the Forum is balanced, each of the stakeholder groups (Land Managers, Community Groups, Agencies and advisory groups and Users) will be given the opportunity at an AGM to nominate and agree on 4 members to represent their interests.

Once elected, a representative will be appointed for not less than 1 year and not more than 4 years. Normally, it would be expected that 1 member (1 of the longest serving members) of each stakeholder group would stand down at the AGM. A representative having stood down, is not prevented from standing for re-election.

The Council will act as the facilitator in this process.

Clackmannanshire Council may appoint 4 representatives to the Forum. 2 will be Councillors, normally 1 representing the administration and 1 representing the opposition, and 2 will be Council officers - the Access and Countryside Projects Officer and 1 other officer representing the Sustainability Team. Other Council officers can attend as observers, as and when considered appropriate.

The Forum will have a maximum of 20 representatives.

Appointing a Chairperson

The Forum will be responsible for the election of a Chair Person and Vice Chair who will serve for a period of 2 years. Normally it would be expected that the position of Chair would rotate amongst the 4 key stakeholder groups in the order of land managers, users, agencies and advisory groups and community groups.

Conduct of Meetings

Quorum

To be quorate, 3 out of the 4 stakeholder groups must be represented at a meeting. If a meeting is not quorate, it will be postponed and a further meeting will be arranged as soon as possible.

Substitute

Should a stakeholder group representative be unable to attend a meeting, they may, by agreement with the Chair or the Access and Countryside Projects Officer, nominate a temporary substitute, drawn from the same stakeholder constituency, to attend in his/her stead for that meeting (only).

Failure to attend meetings

If a representative, or their deputy, fails to attend 3 consecutive meetings of the Forum; then the Council may, and taking account of any advice provided by the Forum, take the decision to rescind their membership.

Disclosure of a personal interest

A member of the Forum who is directly or indirectly interested in any matter brought up for consideration at a meeting shall disclose the nature of their interest to the meeting. Failure to disclose may result in membership of the Forum being rescinded.

Appointing of advisors

The Forum may invite advisors to meetings to provide expert advice on any matter which may arise.

Working Groups

The Forum may appoint working groups for the purpose of advising the Forum on either topic based or area based matters.

Working groups may comprise any individual or organisation which will enable the Group to fulfil its role. Working groups will:

Have clear terms of reference and life expectancy
Report to the Forum

Administration of Meetings

The following will be adopted as standard procedures for meetings of the Forum and working groups :

positions will generally be reached through consensus; (Where a position cannot be reached through consensus, it will be reached by individual vote. Note: That any position is advisory and that members will have equal voting status. Observers are not entitled to vote.)
members of the Forum may request items for inclusion in the agenda; (Normally, this would be of a general, rather than personal, nature.)
members of the public may request items for inclusion in the agenda through a Forum member who can be identified on the Access Forum Representatives page on Clacksweb;
agenda items will be agreed by the Chairperson in consultation with the Council's Access and Countryside Projects Officer; and
agendas, minutes and any other relevant papers of Forum meetings will be posted on the Council website.

Clackmannanshire Council will be responsible for the provision of facilities for meetings of the Forum, the AGM and, at its discretion, for meetings of working groups.

Communications

A Communications Plan will be developed by the Forum to ensure that all information relating to it and any working groups is available to its members and the public.

Members of the public can attend Forum meetings as observers with prior (2 days) notification to the Access and Countryside Projects Officer.

The Forum will be responsible for the periodic review of this partnership agreement.