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General Purposes Committee
Monday, 29th June 2026 at 6:30pm

 

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Good evening and welcome to the general purposes committee meeting.
My name is Councillor Kamrul Hussain and I will be chairing this meeting.
This meeting is being held in person.
Committee members and key participants are present in the meeting room.
Only the committee members present in the meeting room will be able to vote.
Other persons may be also attending remotely.
Committee members and others who have chosen to attend remotely have been advised by the
committee officers that should technical difficulty prevent their full participation in the meeting,
it may proceed in their absence if I feel it is necessary.
some housekeeping now.
There are no fire alarms test planned to take place
during this meeting.
Should the fire alarm sound,
please calmly follow the signs to the nearest fire exit
and please do not use the lifts.
This meeting is being filmed for the council's website
for public viewing.
Cameras are focused on those participating in the meeting.
but anyone in the room may be caught on the camera in the background.
I would remind members at the meeting to only speak on my direction
and to speak clearly into their microphones
to ensure that their contributions can be properly recorded.
Please can all participants now switch your phones to silent mode
for the duration of this meeting.
Is there any apologies for today's meeting? Justina?
Yes, Chair. Councillor Abu Talar Chaudhry has sent his apologies.
Councillor Guillaume Kibria Chaudhry is substituting in his place. That's the only apologies I received.
Thank you, Justina. I will now ask the committee members present to introduce themselves.
please also state any declarations of interest that you may have in the agenda items and
the nature of the interest
Thank you. Can I start from my swipe, please?
Sorry council Peter goals Island Garden Ward no declaration of interest
Just gone through it's no declaration of interest
Councillor Kobi Ahmed, Weavers Ward, no DPAs.
Councillor Shafi Ahmed, Whitechapel Ward, no DPAs. Thank you.
Thank you, Chair. Councillor Goulame, Kobi Achudhuri, Poplar Ward, nothing to declare.
Thank you, Chair. Councillor Jonathan Purcell, Bo East Ward, nothing to declare.
Thank you, Councillors.
This is our first meeting in this municipal year of 26 -27.
And we need to elect a vice -chair for this year.
I would like to ask if there are any nominations
for vice -chair.
Yes, Councillor.
I know Councillor Elias isn't here yet,
but can I nominate Councillor Elias for vice -chair, please?
Any seconder?
Yeah, I'll second that, Chair.
Does the committee agree to the appointment of Councillor Elias as vice -chair of the general
purpose committee?
The minutes from the last meeting on 17 March 2026 have been circulated.
I wasn't a member of that committee on that time probably
Councillor Shafi and Councillor Kabir Ahmed and Councillor. He wasn't a council
But the councillor was previously on this committee. Can you come?
Can you confirm the correct record of the proceeding correct
Yeah, thank you, thank you
Agenda item 5 .1 is GPC terms of reference, membership details and meeting dates for 26 -27.
Justina Bridgeman will introduce the report.
Thank you, Chair. Good afternoon, members.
This is the terms of reference, quorum, meeting dates and times for the General Purposes Committee.
These were brought to you at the general full council meeting on the 20th of May.
And I'm just asking now if you're happy with it and you can agree to the meeting time of
6 .30 in the committee room 1.
Thank you.
Do members have any questions?
No, thank you.
So we can agree on that recommendation.
We have already agreed.
The report has been noted.
Our second item is an update on any governor applications received.
Before we discuss on this report, so we have received this report just earlier today and
around 4 o 'clockish and I think I didn't have enough time to make a informed
decision I don't know any other member received it early and also the report
doesn't state anywhere why it is urgent for us to hear today
yes councillor Gold
to public bodies of which we are making an appointment to a public body, we should have
had them just to look through to see if there's, to put it crudely, a conflict of interest.
I've just collected this and the meeting was half beginning when I was going through
to see if I recognised any name, recognised their addresses, or knew them. Supposing one
did vote through something and then suddenly a member of the public says, hang on, Council
X has voted for this they live in the same road their
Friends neighbours or associates. I do think that we anything like this where we're making an appointment to public bodies
We must have in advance if only to protect ourselves
Councillor Shafi
Thank you, and I'd like to also echo the same concerns of councillor gold. I'm also a serving governor of a
of a governing body at a primary school in Tower Hamlets
and have been since 2010.
And I would also like to see that these kind of papers
are given to us in good time so that we can make
a sound reading of what we see in front of us
rather than coming to a meeting two hours prior to
and making a decision.
I mean, the decision is, I know there's cheques
and balances made prior to bringing this paper forward.
But, and again, it talks about governance,
it talks about transparency, and this is what we want
to portray as our envoy colleagues are mentioning
of these things.
So it's very important that these concerns are raised
and these concerns are taken care of going forward.
And I think it's important to note that this,
In this meeting, this is noted in the minutes.
Thank you, Councillor Shafia, I'll come to you. Matthew, please.
Thank you, Chair. Partly I was just going to say that Farhad from Governance Services is online, so can talk to the report if needed.
But just something, if it was useful to the committee and for Farhad to think about as well, is that the next meeting is only on the 8th of September,
Which is not far given school holidays and the like as well. So I don't know whether any of these decisions
Have to be taken before then or whether if members felt it more appropriate whether some of them should be pushed back
It may be some now some then it's just is it's just an idea
I'm you know, just I thought it was worth making sure you consider it
but as I say forehead is there and I'm sure he would like to introduce his report and
Talk a bit about it
Thank You Matthew before we hear from for that
Councillor Jonathan, please.
Thank you, Chair. I think the point has been adequately made, but I think particularly for councillors that are in full -time work or after school run, it's effectively impossible with a two -hour run in to read it or consider it at all.
So, yeah, I'd like to echo Councillor Armand and Councillor Gold's in that regard.
Councillor Kabir.
I think also we should have at least a director here in this meeting because with officer
member protocol it's very unfair to sort of go below that level, a director level in addressing
key concerns to officers, although they may be service heads, it goes outside that officer
the
We have to read and digest the papers.
Otherwise, we would simply nudge things through,
and that's not good governance for any council to run.
Now, I don't know where the blockage is from,
but I would like Matthew from Democratic Services
and the director of education to actually formally explain
themselves why these papers were late for our next meeting.
Thank you, Councillor.
Yes Matthew.
Thank you, yeah, to confirm,
as I'm technically a deputy chief officer,
as I report to Shupri, who reports to chief executive,
it is appropriate to challenge me.
And I'm happy to undertake to take that back
and report back with the director of education
as to what happened.
But I suggest we take that discussion away now
from this meeting, and then we just look at
what's actually in the paper
and determine what decisions need to be taken
and what don't.
Fahad, over to you.
Well, guys, I will be, firstly, welcome everyone, councillors.
Thank you for your time.
I will be steered by you.
This meeting was rescheduled from the last meeting that we were supposed to have a few months ago.
So there are nominations that have been delayed.
We've had last minute entries come in as well so I'm not
too concerned about that. But I'll be steered by you.
I'm happy to go through the report and give
you a breakdown and if you're happy to accept
the nominations at this stage then we can go back
to the relevant schools and say they've been
the nominations have been approved.
So I mean I'll go through the report.
We have we have three appointments new
appointments and three reappointments. We were waiting on another three applications,
but I couldn't delay it any further in terms of publishing the report. Unfortunately, those three,
well fortunately and unfortunately, those three nominations are from a global majority background.
So for this round, we would have had nine in total and three from a global majority background.
As it currently stands, Francesca is a new appointment, Tower Hamlet's resident for the last seven years.
Sorry, sorry, as it's confidential...
They are in the...
No, I didn't...
Yeah, sorry, is it possible for you to continue your report without stating the names?
Okay, the names are in the report, which are published, my understanding, but there's no personal details.
They have been papers. Have you had papers in the past? No. No. Never.
Okay, look, you've got a Tower Hamlets resident there who is a schoolteacher, a new appointment.
You've got a Chief of Staff within the NHS, which is a major coup for us, which is a new appointment.
You've got another, I mean, four Tower Hamlets residents there, one of them is a new appointment.
The reappointments you've got again, I mean these are all people with ties with Tower Hamlets.
You've got, I'm going through the keywords like you've got someone here from Cliver Chance,
also lives in Tower Hamlets reappointment and another really really good reappointment,
a family support manager that also works in Tower Hamlet. So of the six, we've done a due diligence
on them and in terms of the calibre of experience and expertise they bring, absolutely worthwhile to
governing boards. It's just unfortunate that we didn't have the other three make this list,
who are from a global majority background, but they should make the next list in September.
So, Fahad, why do you want us to take it to David? What is the urgency?
Well, as you can imagine, schools close in three weeks and there's governing body meetings for these schools in the next three weeks.
So that just means if they're approved, the governing board is fully cohort for the beginning of the next academic year.
Thank you.
We understand the urgency.
This is my first meeting and no disrespect to any officer, but this is, to be honest,
we don't expect these things.
If we don't make any informed decision, because of this urgency, I will take this paper today,
we will take a decision on today, but for the future reference, this is totally unacceptable
and we
Not in only this committee Matthew. I want you to relay this message to the correct people
This is should have had this should have never happened and in the future
We don't wanna see any meeting and we get paper only two hours before and we cannot make an informed decision
This is not fair to the councillors
So just because of this urgency
one of accepting this paper for today. Thank you.
So
I've looked over, sorry chair, I've looked over and it's gone through GDPR. I hear what has been said of the necessity to get them before the beginning of the coming school year.
I think we've expressed our concerns, but I think for to get them in place, I suppose we accept them.
But I would have to say, one, I don't think this should happen again.
And I do not wish to be critical, but I think we don't have that many meetings a year,
but I think the relevant officer should be in the room with us so we can ask questions quite directly into the room
and not over a television screen that's put into the public.
I mean we only have four meetings a year. So it's quite possible to adjust one's working plan working within those four
I
Totally agree with it. It comes to the court
Does any other member of any questions
Yes, counsellor on it
I think
There are two sets of applications if I'm correct one is for new
governors and the other is to renew existing governors in the school. I think
that's listed in the paper. I'm happy to agree with you and pass these
through due to the urgency but again and I've made it clear on a number of
fronts if I you know I think it's really important that everybody understands
that we also carry responsibility as a committee.
And as a result of that, you know,
sometimes people may feel upset
that we're not making the decisions that they expect,
but, you know, without reading and due diligence,
you know, it won't be appropriate for us
to also make those decisions.
And again, I agree with Councillor Gulls,
that officers presenting papers should be present.
If they can't be present, then either their senior
or another member of staff needs to come in
and present those reports.
I'm very disappointed that we've got
democratic services officers here.
We've got no one from the education department.
In the past, when I have attended GP committee meetings,
there has always been officers present.
And this is the first time I've ever seen
that not a single officer is present.
other than the Democratic Services offices.
So I think the relevant directors need to get that message as well.
And we need some kind of senior representation within the meeting as well.
If I could concur with Councillor Kabir, I don't wish to say anything,
but the first committee meeting I have attended on this council as far back as 2006 was general purposes,
way back in Mulberry and we had a full room of people sitting in there including council
officers, the legal department and presenting officers. In terms of the school governorship
it wasn't one, there used to be a team of two or three of them used to come along to
talk us through it and I just feel that this is a disappointment and I don't think the
Oh officer corps of the council. I'm sorry. I'm I've raised this about other bodies
I've raised it the chief executive and with the end boys and I should do so again
Thank You council happen and council accord I'm sure just now we make a note of what you've just mentioned and
So, can we agree to dominate the applicants to the available positions as set out in the report
Thank you. Apologies, I missed an agenda, which is agenda four is the work plan.
Yeah, so we're coming back on that. As this is the first meeting of the municipal year,
do members wish to add any items for discussion to the work plan?
the work plan and going forward.
Just to say, I think we've got a constitution update quite regularly, but when we close
tonight we'll have a quick chat about how the committee wants to manage constitution
and there's other bits you'd like to do on that.
I'll try to get the
Chair, I think it would be good, I mean we've got some new councillors here and we've got
some councillors who may not have been in the general purposes committee for a long
time or never been in this particular committee.
If we could have some kind of a training session or anything in terms of, because I mean traditionally
a lot of things get spundled into the general purpose committee, any sort of governance
structures that falls doesn't fall into a specific line such as order or
Kind of the quasi judicial bodies or the mayor's kind of governance route
So it is a very important committee that picks up a lot of different things
So those strands because for us to have an effective work plan
We need to know what goes in there as well as a committee
So I think it would be wise for us to maybe have a training session around that and just explore what kind of things will go in
to support members in that development.
Thank you, Councillor Kabira. So just you know that will be added to the work plan. Thank you very much.
Thank you members. Anyone else? Councillor Shafi.
Yeah, thank you. I just want to acknowledge the good work the
the constitution group actually done.
And Peter Gold is here to acknowledge that yourself
and Abu Talha Chaudhry who was very active
in ensuring that we've worked on the constitution.
And I think there's many things that have come out
through the discussion, through the dialogue.
And I think going forward that needs to continue
because it's a ever evolving council.
So we've got new members, new protocols, new different ways of working.
So I think working together and bringing out the best outcome for members and residents of Ta 'amis is paramount.
And it's important that we continue this constitution group. Thank you.
Thank you, Councillor. Councillor Gough.
Yeah, Chair, I think there is a point here of both members and officers.
Actually, the constitution working is not as dry as it sounds.
It's a living document and we've had in recent years, Matthew has done a tremendous job in working as officers feel it should do.
But you then get a team of members who discuss it with other members and see what we can do for the best.
And therefore we can find out that members can feed into the officers to produce, as I call, a living document that is the best for the borough.
And sometimes you hear, well, perhaps a council should do this or do that, but we have to find reasons to do it within our constitutional framework.
For example, when Kabir suddenly said, hang on, we shouldn't be discussing the pink papers with somebody on a television screen.
That's in the constitution. And it's our back up.
But all I would say, we put it there and it's not quite the dry and uninteresting subject as people think,
Particularly as we go through the parts that is members member office of protocol what offices do what members do?
And what the council does and how it interfaces so it actually as it comes forward each each
Cycle it becomes very interesting. It becomes a point that we can all get involved. We can take a big party
Thank you anyone else
We have a lot of work to do, so we are very happy to have you here.
Thank you all.
The work plan has been noted.
Thank you.
Our next agenda item is 5 .3, is the election update report.
So unfortunately we don't have any report, we don't have any officer here.
Unfortunately Rob Curtis has not been able to attend today, he was hoping to give an
update on the election.
I mean we can report the election did happen and we did have a result which was announced
but a bit like the previous discussion I think probably rather than have something jumped
on you at the last minute we'll push this back to the next meeting I think and hopefully
then it's a bit longer to reflect on it rather than it can be a little bit too early sometimes
I think to present everything.
So we'll ask Rob to come back and I'm sure it'll be a very interesting presentation when
he gives it.
Thank you.
Do members have any other business they wish to discuss?
I would like to say something on the election, Chair.
Once again, we want to make sure that the agenda is published and we know what we are
talking about and whether if it is going to be dropped earlier on so we know that we are
not preparing any papers coming through.
Although I must say on record, Robert Curtis and his team delivered an excellent election
and I think his team worked tirelessly.
So we need to appreciate that and we can forgive him for not being here today.
But overall, hopefully we're looking forward to the next one. Thank you.
Thank you. I'll pass it on. Yes, I would concur. I think they did an excellent job.
and I suspect he's probably hiding under a rock with a towel over his head at the moment to recover.
But yes, we'll hear from him soon, I'm sure.
Absolutely, we'll hear from him soon and of course he done a good job to conduct the election in a manner which is appreciated by the people of Tahel Hamlets and the whole council.
I don't think any other business we have for today and thank you all for your time.
That concludes the business for this meeting.
The next meeting will take place on 8 September 2026.
Thank you.