To boldly go - Skype for local government

I had quite a lot of interest in a tweet I sent recently after being at a PC meeting where some of the councillors who were away were contributing by Skype. I should stress that all the people present and in cyberspace were aware of sections 12 and 13 of the Local Government Act 1972, viz.

12Subject to paragraph 45 below, no business shall be transacted at a meeting of a parish council unless at least one-third of the whole number of members of the council are present at the meeting; but, notwithstanding anything in that paragraph, in no case shall the quorum be less than three.

13(1)Unless otherwise provided by the council’s standing orders the manner of voting at meetings of a parish council shall be by a show of hands.

But it did get me thinking - why shouldn't there be more of this? If a parish council wants to have people on it who are still working, and maybe sometimes are away, then the odd skype call in makes a lot of sense. And at a district and county council level, do all meetings have to involve driving to Cambourne or Shire Hall?

 Of course you couldn't replace the cut and thrust of the Full Council with a row of laptops, nor decision-making meetings, but say for an information sharing meeting why not set up a webinar so that councillors who might be at work or whatever could plug in - as well as members of the public  too?

I went to a briefing on alternative transport initiatives recently which I could equally well have run on the ipad, and an update on the boundary changes falls into the same category. 

But the system would have to have the supporting technology - you couldn't have a lot of "has joined the conference - has left the conference" interruptions. And the governance would need to be very clear - in terms of voting rights and control of the meeting itself.