The leader of Harrow Council defended his decision to cut off questions from opposition councillors at last week’s cabinet meeting, despite their protests.

Members of Harrow Conservatives put forward 16 questions to portfolio holders, but there was only time to answer 11.

Cllr Graham Henson reminded councillors wishing to quiz the cabinet that there is an allotted time slot of 15 minutes and noted that, in this instance, they had gone way past this.

He said: “The Labour administration gave the opposition more than double the allotted time for councillor questions.

“While we recognise that councillor questions play an important function in local democracy, we also have a responsibility to officers and members of the public to ensure that cabinet meetings last an appropriate amount of time and adhere to the guidelines of the council’s constitution.”

Traditionally, there has been flexibility to the guidelines and the leader frequently gives questioners the chance to run over the time limit.

In this case, councillors spoke for around 38 minutes, covering subjects such as public safety, tree felling and regeneration.

But they had hoped for even more leeway, given that, in their eyes, the rest of the meeting’s agenda was, seemingly, relatively short.

Cllr Marilyn Ashton, deputy leader of Harrow Conservatives, said: “It was a real shame – why couldn’t they have let Chris Mote, [who put forward the 16th request], ask his question?

“I left after councillor questions and everyone else came out about ten minutes afterwards.

“I think it runs deeper than this, though, and shows that this administration doesn’t want to make the sort of decisions it should be making.”