7.—(1) Subject to paragraph (7), a meeting of a local access forum shall be open to the public.
(2) A person exercising the right of admission conferred by paragraph (1) may be excluded from a meeting in order to suppress or prevent disorderly conduct or other misbehaviour at the meeting.
(3) Copies of the agenda for a meeting of a local access forum and copies of any report for the meeting shall be open to inspection by members of the public at the offices of the appointing authority in accordance with paragraph (4).
(4) Any such document must be open to inspection at least three clear days before the meeting, except that—
(a)where the meeting is convened at shorter notice, the copies of the agenda and reports must be open to inspection from the time the meeting is convened; and
(b)where an item is added to an agenda, copies of the document adding the item to the agenda (or copies of the revised agenda), and the copies of any report for the meeting relating to the item, must be open to inspection from the time the item is added to the agenda.
(5) Nothing in paragraph (4) requires copies of any agenda, document or report to be open to inspection by the public until copies are available to members of the local access forum.
(6) An item of business may not be considered at a meeting of a local access forum unless either—
(a)paragraph (4) has been complied with; or
(b)by reason of special circumstances, which must be specified in the minutes, the chairman of the meeting is of the opinion that the item should be considered at the meeting as a matter of urgency.
(7) Where, pursuant to any provision specified in regulation 9(2), a relevant authority or the Secretary of State (as the case may be) has decided not to publish a notice of a kind mentioned in that provision on the grounds that it is not in the public or defence interest that the information contained in it should be disclosed, any part of a meeting of a local access forum that relates to such information shall not be open to the public.
(8) In paragraph (7) and in regulation 9(1) “relevant authority” has the meaning given by section 21(5) and (6).