Well I am not sure, however from my point of view, if the EC didn’t have to hold meetings to make decisions, then the SSMA wouldn’t mention that you must give the OC 72 hour’s notice for EC meetings with an agenda posted on a notice board or sent out to all owners etc.
Also if the EC is able to make decisions freely outside of EC meetings it would defeat the purpose of the following clause in the SSMA 1996:
11 Decisions of executive committee
(2) A decision of an executive committee has no force or effect if, before that decision is made, notice in writing is given to the secretary of the executive committee by one or more owners, the sum of whose unit entitlements exceeds one-third of the aggregate unit entitlement, that the making of the decision is opposed by those owners.
Owners would not be aware of any upcoming decisions, hence would not be given the chance to object to motions on the agenda as shown above.
Another point to add to the debate is that the SSMA says that even though EC meetings can be held in writing, the EC is still bound by the same processes as if holding a ‘regular’ EC meeting in person:
10 Voting in writing by members of executive committee
(1) A resolution is taken to have been validly passed even though the meeting at which the motion for the resolution was proposed to be submitted was not held if:
(a) notice was given in accordance with clause 6 of the intended meeting, and
(b) a copy of the motion for the resolution was served on each member of the executive committee, and
(c) the resolution was approved in writing by a majority of members of the executive committee.
(2) This clause is subject to clause 11 (2).
I guess the one of the main purposes of holding EC meetings is for transparency to the rest of the OC. If decisions were just made at will outside of EC meetings, then the rest of the OC would not be aware of what decisions are being made within the scheme they are living in and what their money is being spent on. Also it would make for a dysfunctional EC if certain members got together and excluded other members of EC and starting making decisions in little groups; spending the OCs funds as they wished.
There is no such thing as ‘general business’. I guess some schemes can add their odds and ends here, however from my point of view, ‘general business’ should only include a discussion, not decision making. Again the reason for this is transparency. If you have a title on the agenda saying ‘General Business’ and no motions listed under it, then it can be taken that no other decisions are going to made at the EC meeting, hence as above the OC would not be given a chance to object to any decisions made through ‘general business’. I am guessing this would also apply equally to all General Meetings.
The only exception that I can think of where the EC would NOT have to hold a meeting to make a decision would be in an emergency. These decisions would be very rare. E.g. A pipe bursts causing significant damage to the rest of the building, the EC simply needs to make a decision to get the repairs done.
This is just my point of view, however I may be wrong, we are all entitled to our opinions and I respect all other opinions on here.