COULD face-to-face meetings at the Vale of Glamorgan Council be coming to an end?

Tomorrow, Thursday July 18, the Vale Council’s Cabinet will vote on a recommendation suggesting “scrutiny committee meetings be held on a remote basis only”.

The Cabinet meeting is being held at 2pm, and item four on the agenda sees report ‘Hybrid Meeting Platform Updates’ discussed.

In the report, recommendation number four states “all scrutiny committee meetings be held on a remote basis only unless a matter of county wide interest has been determined by the chair of the scrutiny committee in conjunction with the chief executive.”

On February 22, a planning meeting hosted to decide two of the Vale’s biggest proposed developments – the huge housing development in Cosmeston, as well as whether Barry’s biomass burner was to be sparked into life fell into chaos due to technical issues after councillors were logging in from home.

The meeting was adjourned due to technical issues and wouldn’t reconvene until March 18, some three weeks later.

At the time, the sorry state of affairs left councillor Nic Hodges - who was one of just three out of 17 planning committee members who attended the meeting in person - saying: “May I suggest councillors actively attend in person. There are three of us in the chamber which are voting members of the committee.”

However, Vale Council defended the decision to postpone the meeting, with a council spokesperson saying: "The chair of the planning committee took the decision to adjourn the meeting because technical issues meant some members were unable to take part.

“This was absolutely the correct action as, when discussing important planning matters, it is vital that everyone who sits on the committee can fully participate.”