The role of councillors

What do councillors do?

Our councillors:

• champion the interests of the communities, businesses and residents in their ward
• oversee the successful, lawful and effective management of the council’s public resources
• oversee the delivery of public services in the best interests of the local community and council tax payers
• help residents on specific council-related issues (casework)
• are responsible for the democratic decision-making at Dorset Council
• make specific decisions on a range of issues (e.g. decide certain planning applications)
• meet with council officers
• explain council policy to local people and their networks
• attend local meetings
• attend political group meetings
• gather evidence in respect of scrutiny reviews
• engage with learning and development opportunities
• attend parish or town council meetings

Wards and committees

Councillors represent a particular ward.

Wards often follow historic and current parish or neighbourhood boundaries and consist of similar ratios of electors per councillor.

Due to the size of some wards, they are represented by more than one councillor. Dorset Council has 52 wards.

Political parties

Councillors can represent a political party such as Conservative, Labour, Liberal Democrat, Green and UKIP. However, they don’t have to and some are independents instead.

An officer’s role with members

All officers should provide councillors with non-political, impartial advice on their area of expertise when required to do so.