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GAZETTE
AUGUST 1976
A MEETING OF A LOCAL AUTHORITY
Part 1
Paper delivered by T. S. Smyth Esq., B.L., former Assistant
Secretary of the Society, to the Society of Local Authority
Solicitors in May 1975.
Beginning with the assumption of entitlement and
obligations of a local authority to hold meetings, I
treat of "a local authority" as a municipal authority.
BEFORE THE MEETING
The Notice
The statutory position is that by virtue of Section 92
of the Municipal Corporations Ireland Act, 1840
notice is required (which I will refer to as "the Public
Notice") of the time and place of a meeting; but does
not require that there be any notice of the business
of the meeting. This is so where the meeting is sum-
moned in the ordinary way. The Public Notice is to be
signed by the Mayor Chairman and to be fixed on or
near the door of the City or Town Hall at least three
clear days before the meeting.
The Section provides for an alternative summoning
of a meeting on requisition of five members, and in
the case of such a meeting, if the Authority refuses
or fails to call the meeting and the five members
exercise their own right to call the meeting, in such
circumstances they must give public notice of the
business proposed.
The section further requires that a Summons to
attend the Council or Board be delivered to each
member, and such Summons shall specify the business
of the meeting (to wit, the Agenda).
Section 61 (1) of the Local Government Act, 1955
(No. 9 of 1955) provides that the Minister may by
regulations make provision in relation to all or any
local authorities with respect to (inter alia) the sum-
moning and holding of meetings. However, regulations
or standing orders (of which more anon) are limited
in that they must be made pursuant to and for the
purposes of the Act or Acts and they must (a) not be
repugnant to any statutory provision in the Act or any
Act incorporated by reference and (b) they must not
be repugnant to the general law — whether Statute
Law or Common Law or particularly Constitutional
Law.
THE AGENDA
In relation to the Agenda, the only business a
member has an actual legal right to set down is a
motion in relation to business concerned with the
purposes, duties and powers of the local authority as
conferred or imposed on it by law. The only notice
of motion which the Manager (Secretary or Town
Clerk) is obliged to accept is a motion relating to a
matter in respect of which a member has an actual
legal right to set down. The use of a local authority
meeting as a forum of debate for matters of public
interest, however grave, urgent or praiseworthy which
is completely dissociated from the purposes, duties
and powers of the particular local authority is not
compellable business. Neither Bye-Laws, Regulations,
direction or Standing Orders can enlarge the duties of
publication so as to confer protection outside the
obligations of the Statute. When considering the legal
position as to defamation the recognition of these
limits is all important.
Generally where there is a legal duty imposed by
Statute to publish certain matters, then the publication
is privileged. In relation to any publication made
pursuant to a legal duty, whether the duty be imposed
by Statute or by some person exercising a legal power
to impose it, the law of privilege applies (subject to
the absence of malice on the part of the person pub-
lishing it).
There are three cases which illustrate the matters
which have already been mentioned:—
Andrews v. Nott Bower (1895) I Q.B. 888.
The magistrates of a Borough, for the purpose of
facilitating the business of the General Annual Licen-
sing Meeting, ordered the defendant, who was Head
Constable of the Borough, to issue to persons having
business before the meeting copies of a Report made
by him to the Magistrates stating the grounds of
objections taken to the renewal of licences.
Held, that publication by him of the Report in
pursuance of the Magistrates' order was upon a privi-
leged occasion, and therefore that, in the absence of
actual malice on his part, an action was not main-
tainable against him in respect of grounds of objection
so published, which the plaintiffs alleged to be a libel
upon them.
De Buse & Ors. v. McCarthy & Ors. (1942) 1 K.B. 156
The defendants in this case were the Town Clerk of
Stepney and the Borough Council. They had pub-
lished a report, which was tabled for consideration at
a forthcoming meeting of the Borough Council and
they had, as was normal practice, circulated the
Agenda and the business to be considered, including
a copy of a Report, to the Public Libraries in their
jurisdiction. It was found by the Court that their
mandatory public duty was limited to giving notice
by posting it on or near the door of the Town Hall
and transmitting it by post to the members. Lord
Greene, Master of the Rolls, pointed out that the
mandatory duty did not include any obligation to
post the notices of business in the public libraries. He
further stated that the defence of a public duty did
not bear examination so far as circulation to the
public libraries was concerned since the material
statutes imposed no obligation to do so.
The defence of privilege of statutory obligation to
publish is available, therefore only in respect of:—
(i) Motions concerned with purposes, duties and
powers of the local authority, and
(ii) The limited publication of the Public Notice
affixed to the City or Town Hall and the
sending by Summons to the members.
Adam v. Ward (1917) A.C. 309.
This is a case that is invoked with regularity in a
great variety of cases of defamation both of libel and
slander. It treats of that element of privilege, said to
protect him who, on a privileged occasion publishes
defamatory matter in a situation where the person
who publishes the defamatory matter has an interest
or duty, legal, social or moral to make it to the person
to whom it is made, and the person to whom it is
made has a corresponding duty to receive it. This
reciprocity is essential. The question as to whether
the defence of privilege applies or not involves two
considerations, (a) the subject matter of the motion,
and (b) the persons to whom it is addressed, i.e. the
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