How not to run a Parish Council!

In the report about the Governance Review it is stated that: "CPC is a large council with a busy and frequent meeting schedule." The report lists number of meetings as thus:

I'll look at the last council meeting.

Full Council: 16 Meetings a year.

At the last Full Council Meeting on 6th December 2016 the agenda ran to 23 items. Of these 17 items:
Items 1 to 3 are legally required.
Item 4 Police report.
Item 5 Chairman's Announcements
Item 6 Clerks Report - where he informs everyone what hard work he does.
Item 7 Residents Correspondence - None received.
Item 8 County and District Council Matters. The County Councillor didn't attend and the Chairman (Cllr Crocker) is also a District Councillor. This item could be deleted.
Item 9 Financial Statement - There is a Finance and Policy Committee. This item should be moved to this committee.
Item 10 Pedestrian Crossing - This item should be moved to the Planning Committee.
Item 11 City Deal - This item should be moved to the Planning Committee.
Item 12 Governance Review - This item should be moved to the F&P Committee.
Item 13 Website - This item should be moved to the F&P Committee.
Item 14 Timebank - This item should be moved to the F&P Committee.
Item 15 South Cambs Awards - This item should be moved to Leisure and Amenities.
Item 16 Land Transfers - This item should be moved to the F&P Committee.
Item 17 Traffic Matters - This item should be moved to the Planning Committee.
Item 18 General Correspondence - Items contained should go to other Committees.
Item 19 Committee Reports - Vital part of the committee system that these report to full council.
Item 20 Exclusion of Press and Public - Legal requirement because of Item 21.
Item 21 Staffing - Staffing issues must not be considered by the whole council. These should be considered by a small sub-committee of F&P or by F&P as a separate item.
Item 22 Re-admittance of Press and Public - Legal requirement.
Item 23 Date of next meeting.

The problem with Council meetings is they are too long. There is a scheme of delegation of powers to committees. If this was followed with a much better scheme then Council would do much less than at present and committees more. This is the crux of the problem. Far too many decisions are taken at Council when, properly, they should be taken at Committee level.

How would a proper committee system work?

On a 8 week cycle there would be 1 one Council meeting every 2 months. 1 Planning Committee meeting a month which could be held on the same night as a council meeting when that is held. 1 Finance and Policy meeting every 2 months and 1 Leisure Meeting every 2 months. This would increase the number of F&P + Leisure meetings by 1 each. Cut the number of Council meetings from 16 to 6. Cut the number of Planning meetings from 26 to 12.

Instead of having 52 meetings this would be cut to 30.

Following a the delegation scheme would mean the Committees would be more powerful. Council Meetings would be short and to the point.

Ron says: The way the Parish Council is working is a lot of effort for little return. More meetings doesn't mean a well run Council. The problem, as I see it, is the clerk and the chairman know how to run a small council which meets monthly. This means work is concentrated on Council Meetings. This is wrong. The work of this size of council must be concentrated on the Committee system. The number of meetings could also be cut if the Planning Committee was cut too!