How to get involved

Adopted by Council 3 March 2022  - Amended on 12.10.23 and 8.5.25 

1.     Introduction

Pembrokeshire County Council welcomes petitions and recognises that they are one way in which people can let us know their concerns.

Other ways to resolve an issue or to make your views known are to:

• write to the relevant Cabinet Member or appropriate officer directly
• contact your local Councillor (Details are available on the Council’s website)
• contact the relevant Cabinet Member
• ask a scrutiny committee to look into the matter
• respond to a consultation
• ask a question at Council
• make a complaint to us

This petition scheme explains the rules that the Council will apply to any petition it receives.

Anyone who lives, works, owns a business, owns land or studies in the Pembrokeshire County Council area may sign, organise or submit a petition. This includes anyone under the age of 18. Anyone who lives in the area of an adjoining Council may also sign but not submit a petition If they could reasonably be expected to be affected by the subject matter of the petition. 

Petitions may only be submitted about matters that directly affect Pembrokeshire, and any action being requested by a petition must be an action for which the Council has legal authority to implement in the terms proposed by the petition.

All petitions sent or presented to the Council will receive an acknowledgement from the Council within 10 working days of receipt. This acknowledgement will also say as much as we can at that stage about what we have done, or plan to do, with the petition.

Before organising/submitting a petition, a petition organiser is advised to first check with their local Member, or with the relevant council service, to see if the Council is already acting on the issue that is intended to be the subject of the petition.

 

2.     Who can submit a petition

The following people may submit a petition:

• A Local Government elector for the Pembrokeshire County Council area; and/or
• A person who has resided in the Pembrokeshire County Council area for the whole of the 12 months preceding submission of the petition; and/or
• A resident under 16 years of age, who would otherwise qualify as a local government elector for Pembrokeshire [Date of birth /parental consent to be provided]; and/or
• A person who has been an occupier, owner or tenant of land or premises in the Pembrokeshire County Council area for the whole of the 12 months preceding submission of the petition; and/or
• A person whose employment/place of work has been in the Pembrokeshire County Council area for the whole of the 12 months preceding submission of the petition.

Please note that we will need to see evidence of identity which can include a passport, driving licence or a recent utility bill. A scanned copy is acceptable.

 

3.     Form of petitions

Pembrokeshire County Council will only accept petitions which fulfil the following requirements:

• Petitions must include a clear and concise statement covering the subject of the petition and must state what lawful / specific action the petitioners wish the Council to take, for example:

‘We call on Pembrokeshire County Council to…’

• Petitions may be submitted on paper or electronically using the Council’s online petition system, or a combination of the two. 
• People can only sign a petition once. If they sign the petition online, they will be asked to verify their e-mail address.
• Petitions must include the names and postal addresses of those signing the petition, including postcodes.
• People cannot sign both an online and a paper petition, and may be removed if it is proven that a petitioner has signed twice.
• Petitions will not be accepted from other on-line petition systems.
• Electronic petitions may collect signatures for a maximum period of two months.
• For a paper petition, the petition wording should be set out in full on each sheet (or side of a sheet) where signatures are asked for (see Appendix A for template).

 

The petition must clearly state:

• The name of the petitioner, who may be an individual or an organisation.  This includes anyone under the age of 18.
• The petitioner’s address (including postcode), which must be in the Pembrokeshire County Council area to which all communications concerning the petition should be sent and an email address.

 

4.     Petitions that will not be acceptable

The Council does not accept petitions under this Petition Scheme which fall into the following categories:

• Petitions relating to matters that do not directly affect Pembrokeshire, or which request an action for which the Authority does not have legal authority to implement in the terms proposed by the petition.
• Petitions that are the same, or substantially similar, to a petition which was closed less than six months ago.
• Petitions relating to a matter the Council, Cabinet or one of its committees has formally considered in the last six months and where a decision has been made.
• Petitions relating to planning or licensing applications, Highway orders[1] and property disposals as these will be dealt with under their respective processes.
• Statutory petitions, or petitions relating to Local Authority Referendums which falls under the Local Authorities (Referendums) (Petitions and Directions) (Wales) Regulations 2001.
• Petitions asking the Council to adjudicate, arbitrate or mediate personal or commercial interests (this is the role of a court or tribunal).
• Petitions on matters that are subject to legal proceedings in the courts.
• Petitions on matters that are already subject to determination by an ombudsman (or person with similar powers).
• Petitions relating to confidential staffing matters.
• Petitions that are essentially FOI requests, comments, compliments or complaints.  
• Petitions which raise issues of possible councillor misconduct.
• Petitions relating to a matter where there is already an existing recourse to a review or right of appeal, such as Council tax banding and non-domestic rates.
• In the period immediately before an election or referendum we may need to deal with petitions differently. If this is the case, we will explain the reasons and discuss the revised timescale which may apply.

The Council reserves the right to verify signatories as required. Petitioners should ensure that a valid address and postcode is included for all Petitioners that relates to a home address (if living in the Pembrokeshire County Council area) or work address (if working or run a business in the Pembrokeshire County Council area). These details will be taken into account when identifying if there are enough signatories from people who live or work in the Council area to trigger a debate.

The decision to reject a petition will be determined by the Head of Democratic Services. If the petition organiser disagrees with the decision, he/she has the right to request that the Chief Executive, in consultation with the Monitoring Officer, reviews the decision.

 

5.     Petitions must not contain

• Language which is offensive, intemperate or provocative. This not only includes obvious profanities, swear words and insults, but any language which a reasonable person would regard as offensive;
• Potentially false or potentially defamatory statements. (We may ask you to prove the veracity of factual statements);
• Information which is prohibited from being published by an order of a court or a body or person with similar power;
• Material which is potentially confidential, commercially sensitive, or which may cause personal distress or loss;
• Any commercial endorsement, promotion of any product, service or publication or statements that amount to advertisements;
• The names of officials of public bodies, unless they are part of the senior management of those organisations;
• The names of family members of elected representatives or officials of public bodies;
• The names of individuals, or information where they may be identified, in relation to criminal charges;
• Issues for which a petition is not the appropriate channel (for example, correspondence about a personal issue).

Petitions which do contain the above (with the exception of the last bullet point) will be rejected but may be resubmitted with the offending information removed.

 

Guidance on submitting a petition

 

What happens when a petition is submitted to the Council?

The various stages in the process of submitting a petition to the Council are set out below, together with details of possible outcomes and what happens if the petition organiser is not happy with Council’s response to the petition.

 

Stage 1 - Submitting a petition

Electronic petition

The Council’s online petition system can be accessed here: Current e-petitions

The petition organiser will be asked to input the following information:

 

a)    Title and the text of the petition
b)    Name
c)    Address – postal and/or email
d)    Contact telephone number
e)    A date for the petition to stop collecting signatures. Petitions may collect signatures for a maximum period of two months. It might be worth bearing in mind that the Council will not consider a petition until after it has finished collecting signatures. 

 

Paper petition

We also accept petitions in paper format.

The petition organiser is advised to contact the Head of Democratic Services in order to ensure that the petition meets the criteria set out above, prior to commencement of collecting signatures, as only acceptable petitions can be considered by the Council.

The petition wording should be set out in full on each sheet (or side of a sheet) where signatures are asked for. Paper petitions should also contain the names and addresses, including postcodes of anyone supporting the petition.  

 

Paper petitions can be sent to:

The Head of Democratic Services

Democratic Services Section

County Hall, Haverfordwest, SA61 1TP

or contact the Democratic Services Section on 01437 775719 to make arrangements to hand in a petition.

 

Stage 2 - Receipt of petition

Once a petition has been submitted, the petition organiser will receive an e-mail confirming that it has been received within 10 working days.

The Head of Democratic Services will then consider it against the rules for petitioning the Council and will get in touch as soon as possible to confirm whether or not the petition is acceptable and what will happen next.

If the Council is able to do what a petition asks, the acknowledgement to the petition organiser may confirm that the Council has taken the action requested and the petition will be closed.

Details of any petitions received which relate to matters in a particular electoral ward will be sent to the local Member(s) concerned. In addition, copies will also be provided to the Leader. Local Member(s) will be kept informed on the progress/outcomes of such petitions.

If the petition is acceptable as worded, we will arrange for it to be translated into Welsh or English as appropriate. It will then be published on our website and can begin to collect signatures. We will send the website link to the petition organiser and we will make basic information about it available on social media.

If the petition is acceptable in principle, but there are some aspects of the wording which fall outside the rules, the Head of Democratic Services will contact the petition organiser to suggest ways in which the wording can be changed so that it complies fully with the rules. Once the petition organiser is happy with the final wording, the petition will be published and can begin collecting signatures.

If the petition cannot be accepted or falls outside the criteria for acceptance, we will let the petition organiser know and explain the reason that it cannot go forward. The title and text of the petition will be published online as part of the list of unaccepted petitions, along with an explanation about why it was not acceptable.

Petitions that fall outside of the criteria of the scheme will be treated as correspondence and sent to the relevant service area for a response. The relevant Director will have discretion and flexibility to decide how to reply to this correspondence so that they are able to take appropriate action to respond to the request.