Agenda item

The Standards Committee has statutory responsibility for promoting and maintaining high standards of conduct of councillors. This includes the handling and processing of complaints made against councillors for a breach of the code of conduct.

This report seeks to establish arrangements for undertaking the initial assessment of such complaints.

The Deputy Monitoring Officer presented a report, a copy of which had been circulated to each Member and a copy of which appears as Appendix 'B' to these Minutes in the Minute Book.

The Deputy Monitoring Officer gave a brief overview of the report which highlighted the applicable parts of the constitution and also referred to the appendix which set out the process for reviewing complaints.

Officers responded to Members’ comments and requests for clarification, details included:

·         Guidance and training would be provided to all Councillors and Independent Persons on the Standards Committee in order for them to understand how to address all complaints appropriately.

·         The consultation process would be set at a minimum of five days, although it may be necessary for this period to be longer on occasions where a complaint might be more complex – this process would be led by the Chairman with assistance from the Monitoring Officer.

·         It would be advisable for Members of the Standards Committee to not discuss any complaints about Members with anyone besides the relevant officers and the independent persons as this could put them in a difficult position.

·         Members that had been complained about would be informed and would be permitted to provide an initial response.

·         The Constitution was clear in stating the Chairman was responsible for the initial filtering of complaints in consultation with Members of the Committee including the Independent Persons and with the guidance of the Monitoring Officer or her appointed deputy. This process would need to start by email contact initially but, Paragraph 2 could be amended to state that if after this initial contact, Members felt the need to review in further detail, the Chairman would need to make a decision as to whether or not to facilitate such a request. This method would likely be more efficient in the event of multiple complaints at the same time.

·         May need to review workings of standards process over the course of the next few months which would include a training session booked for mid-September.

·         Timelines included within the appendix were in line with guidance from the ombudsman service, they were discretionary and could be amended or removed if Members wished for this to happen.

·         Complaints would ideally need to be received by online form as it set out a structure for the complainant to utilise which would allow the complaint to be assessed correctly. If an email complaint was received that met the required criteria, this would also be accepted, although complainants would always be encouraged to use the prescribed form to ensure that all elements were covered in their complaint.

·         For any resident without computer access, the Council will post out any forms that are required to make a complaint. Additionally, an article could be placed in the BCP News if Members wished to pursue this as an option.

Following the Officer responses, Members agreed that they would be keen to ensure that there was the option for face to face meetings during the complaint filtering process if it was felt that there was a need to do so and that the Monitoring Officer’s offer to amend Paragraph 2.1 of the appendix would be desirable to enable this provision.

Additionally, Members also agreed that it would be beneficial to publicise the Standards Committee in the BCP news and provide details on how to make a complaint about a councillor.

RESOLVED that:

(a)  the proposed arrangements for initial assessment of allegations of breach of the Code of Conduct for Councillors, as set out in Appendix 1 to this report, be adopted, subject to the amendment of Paragraph 2.1 to include the word “initially” after “…electronically by email”;

(b)  Details of the standards committee and how complaints were handled be published in the next issue of the BCP News.

Voting: Unanimous