The Portfolio Holders collectively make up the membership of Cabinet, which is the body which takes most of the decisions required by the Council.

Each Portfolio Holder is allocated a particular service (or group of services) to monitor and provide a political perspective. In addition, each Portfolio Holder has been given delegated authority to take decisions in respect of a limited number of specified matters, after undertaking the necessary consultation processes. All the details regarding this delegation is set out in Part 3, Section 3 of the Constitution.

How it Works

As part of the new arrangements for carrying out the Council's decision making procedures, some routine items of business, which would normally have been dealt with by Cabinet, are now delegated to individual Portfolio Holders.

The procedure works by the officers preparing a report called a "Draft Decision Notice". The reports are referenced by a report number, prefixed by the letters PHD, eg. PHD21. In addition to publication on the Council's website, the Draft Notice is issued to the following for consultation.

• All Members
• Press (unless exempt or confidential)

The Draft Decision Notice is issued five clear working days before the actual decision is made, in order that any issues can be raised with the Portfolio Holder. If five or more of the Members informed requests, the Leader may require the decision to be referred to the full Cabinet.

Once the five clear working day period has elapsed after the issue of the Draft Decision Notice, and the Leader has not referred the matter to Cabinet, then the final decision is made by the Portfolio Holder.

Once the final decision has been made, including comments on any representations received, a copy of the Final Notice is sent to the press (except in the case of exempt or confidential items) and can be viewed on the Council's website, using the links below or by clicking on the relevant Portfolio Holder listed above.