A CONTROVERSIAL incident in which a camera was confiscated when a delegation from Ludlow went to a meeting at Shirehall has resulted in a u-turn and change of rules.

Shropshire Council is to take a softer line after a row following a visit by a party of 50 people from the Ludlow Campaign for Fairness to attend a meeting about the authority’s private company ip&e.

The meeting in May had a delayed start after cameras were taken from one of the Ludlow group on the basis that they had not got proper permission.

Andy Boddington, one of the councillors who represents Ludlow on Shropshire Council, slammed the move at the time as an action ‘worthy of a totalitarian state.’

At the time Councillor Boddington described the confiscation of the cameras as ‘the most totalitarian action I have witnessed in more than 40 years of attending council meetings.’

In a further development Councillor Vivienne Parry, who also sits on Shropshire Council for Ludlow, had posted a question about the rules to go before the meeting scheduled for today (Thursday, July 23).

But in a written answer Shropshire Council has backed down and changed the rules to bring them into line with national guidelines.

Under the previous guidelines the use of still cameras could only take place in the first five minutes of the meeting and required two days notice ahead of the meeting.

Now all forms of recording and social media reporting are allowed and although two days notice is requested it is not a requirement.

There is no notice needed for the use of Twitter, blogging or micro-blogging from meetings provided it does not disrupt the meeting.

However, Cllr Boddington, says that he is not happy about a requirement that any reporting must be a ‘true and accurate representation’ which he believes is open to interpretation and impossible to enforce.

“Nevertheless the new guidelines rather belatedly bring Shropshire Council into a modern world which at times it seems rather reluctant to embrace,” said Cllr Boddington.

“A meeting held in public is exactly that. It does not matter if the public is watching a You Tube video, reading an account on a blog, receiving status updates on Facebook, reading a stream of tweets or sitting in the audience.

“Councils exist to use public money to deliver public services for the public good and they must do this in a public way.”

Keith Barrow, the leader of Shropshire Council, has confirmed that the rules have been changed.

However, he points out that the chairman of a meeting has the power to make sure that the meeting is conducted in a way that does not interfere with its integrity or is disruptive.

The council claims that at the meeting in May people from the delegation from Ludlow were asked to leave their cameras at the desk where the minute takers sit in order to calm the meeting as ‘the atmosphere was beginning to get quite tense.’