Therefore, the chair’s signature shows that minutes have been agreed to be a true and accurate record of the meeting by the governing body as a whole, not by the chair of governors alone. Both the law and model articles say minutes are signed “subject to the approval of” either the board of governors or the board of trustees. Minutes can be signed by whoever is chairing the current meeting, whether or not they personally attended the previous meeting. Can the chair sign minutes of a meeting they did not attend? The acting chair should not be an academy employee because the overall chair of trustees cannot be an academy employee. If the vice- chair was the only person apart from the overall chair of governors who could ever chair meetings, there would be no need for the law to specify “ provided that such person is a governor” because the vice-chair must always be a governor.įor academies, model articles of association (June 2021) include the same wording as the 1999 regulations for maintained schools: minutes of a meeting of trustees shall be signed at the meeting “by the person acting as chair thereof”. This regulation says that a casting (second) vote can be made either by the overall chair of governors or “the person who is acting as chair for the purposes of the meeting ( provided that such person is a governor)”. One further clue that minutes can be signed by whoever is chairing the meeting is from the law regarding casting votes in the event of a tied decision. All of this suggests that whoever is chairing the meeting can sign the minutes. The 1999 law also explicitly stated that when both the chair and vice-chair are absent “the governing body shall elect one of their number to act as a chairman for the purposes of that meeting, provided that the governor elected shall not be a person who is employed to work at the school”. Law from 1999 explicitly stated that minutes could be signed at a meeting “by the person acting as chairman thereof”. Law from 2003 referred to “the chair of the next meeting”, which definitely implied an acting chair could sign the minutes. To analyse the rules a little further, the current law says minutes should be signed “by the chair at the next meeting” which could mean either the overall chair of governors or the person acting as chair of that meeting. The acting chair should not be a school employee because the overall chair of governors can never be a school employee. In maintained schools the current law does not say what should happen if both the chair and vice-chair are absent, but it is reasonable to assume that a governor should be chosen to act as chair and that person can sign the minutes. “The constitution, membership and proceedings of any committee shall be determined by the trustees.” Model Articles of Association (June 2021) Can minutes be signed by anyone acting as chair? “Where the chair is absent from any meeting or there is at the time a vacancy in the office of the chair, the vice-chair shall act as the chair for the purposes of the meeting.” Model Articles of Association (June 2021)Īcademy trusts can set their own rules for committee procedures so check your own articles and terms of reference for details, but usual procedure would be that the vice-chair of any committee can sign minutes in the absence of the committee chair. ![]() ![]() Model articles for academies (June 2021) also say that if the chair of trustees is absent from a full board meeting or there is currently no chair of trustees in post then the vice-chair can act as chair for that meeting and sign the minutes. In practice it is still a good idea to elect a vice-chair for any committee and if the committee chair is absent the committee vice-chair should sign the minutes. ![]() The situation is a little more complicated for committees because you may be surprised to learn that the law does not require maintained schools to have committee vice-chairs at all, just committee chairs. All purposes would clearly include signing off the minutes at a full board meeting. The law for maintained schools says that if the chair of governors cannot attend a meeting or there is currently no chair of governors, the vice-chair “is to act as chair for all purposes”. ![]() Model Articles of Association (June 2021) Can minutes be signed by the vice-chair?
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