Section 5: ADVICE TO BOARDS This section provides for an education authority official to attend and to speak at Board meetings. The same rights are given to councillors whose electoral ward covers either part or the whole of the school's catchment area. It also provides that the education authority is required to give advice to the Board on request. The section also defines the role of the headteacher as the Board's principal adviser and sets out the position of the headteacher and school staff in relation to the conduct of the Board's business. It therefore provides for Boards to receive advice from a wide range of sources. Section 5(1) provides for an education authority official to attend and to speak at any meeting of a School Board in the authority's area. The official is not obliged to attend each and every Board meeting, nor need it always be the same person who attends the meetings of a particular Board. The subsection prohibits the official from becoming a member of any Board within the authority's area, in their capacity as an education authority official. However, if they are the parent of a pupil at a school, they can be a member of that school board in their personal capacity. Section 5(2) gives councillors the right to attend and to speak at Board meetings of any school that has a catchment area either partly or wholly within his or her electoral ward. Councillors are not obliged to attend meetings. The subsection prohibits councillors from being a member of any School Board which is within his or her council's area. The provision does not affect councillors who were already Board members on 13 October 2000 who can continue to serve out their term of office under the provisions of section 3 of the 1988 Act. In addition, the provision does not prevent a councillor from being a member of a Board in another local authority area in any appropriate capacity. [Under the previous provisions, councillors were only prohibited from being members of a School Board if their electoral ward fell wholly or partly within the catchment area of the school. The extension of the prohibition has been made to avoid a conflict of interest which might arise if a councillor was both a parent member of a Board and on the Education Committee making decisions relating to that school.] Section 5(3) deals with the role of the headteacher. In effect the headteacher will be principal professional adviser to the Board. It would be competent for an acting headteacher to exercise any of the functions of a headteacher under the Act, except chairing appointments committees under Schedule 2, if they themselves are a candidate for appointment. Paragraph (a) gives the headteacher the right to give advice to the Board on any matter that is within the Board's competence. It also places a duty on the headteacher to provide the Board with such advice if the Board so requests. Advice may be given orally or in writing or both. Paragraph (b) entitles, but does not require, the headteacher to attend and to speak at Board meetings, and also determines that the headteacher is not to be a member of the Board. The Act places certain other duties on the headteacher and also confers certain rights. Section 10(2), for example, provides that the headteacher must give the Board, when established, a statement of the policies being applied at the school, and section 10(3) provides that the headteacher must give the Board an annual report. Other rights and duties are contained in sections 9, 12 and 18. Taken together sections 5(1), 5(2) and 5(3) prevent any person who becomes an adviser to the Board under the terms of the Act from being a member of the Board. Section 5(6) requires authorities "to take such steps as are appropriate" to ensure the availability of the headteacher and staff, thus providing that authorities need not require more than is possible under any agreement on terms and conditions of service that may be in force. |