Agenda item

To receive the Annual Report of the Monitoring Officer providing the Standards Committee with an overview of the preceding year.

The Committee had before it, and NOTED, a report * from the District Solicitor and Monitoring Officer providing it with an overview of the preceding year.

Consideration was given to:

·         Receiving information in the future regarding the breakdown of complaints, for example, the number of Town and Parish Councillor complaints compared to the number of District Councillor complaints. It was explained that whilst the Monitoring Officer had to be very careful about what information was put into the public domain this sort of information would be useful and would help the Committee to identify trends which could help in providing other Councils with advice.

·         Whether the Council just accepted the findings of investigations or whether there was an opportunity to challenge them? It was explained that the Monitoring Officer’s decision was final. It was also explained that just because a case may not go forward to a formal investigation it didn’t mean the complaint wasn’t looked into. The Monitoring Officer is responsible for drafting decision letters and sending them through to complainants after consultation with the Independent Person. They then had an opportunity to appeal under the judicial review system and take a case through the courts should they wish.

·         The grounds for a case requiring a Hearing were all set out in the Constitution, however, LGA Good Practice stated it was better to try and deal with issues informally wherever possible. A great deal of work was required for a formal investigation.

·         Since current information provided to the Committee was very high level it was suggested that going into Part II would sometimes be very beneficial in order for the Standards Committee to receive more detail. The Monitoring Officer stated that she would be happy to do this if the case warranted it in future and to expand on the information supplied in addition to providing a more in depth breakdown.

·         There was some concern that the Constitution had not been updated since February 2023. It was explained that the delay had been due to some resource issues and there had been a lot of amendments to update the Constitution with. However, these had now been done and the updated Constitution would be uploaded to the website in the very near future.

·         It was suggested that the Committee may find it helpful to receive information regarding the ‘Thresholds for Intervention’ so that more could be learned about the difference types of response and action needed as a result of a complaint depending on its nature.

·         An industry expert in the Standards field had recently complimented the Council on the robustness of its procedures in dealing with complaints.

RESOLVED that the Annual Report of the Monitoring Officer be NOTED and circulated to all Town and Parish Councils for information.

(Proposed by Cllr S Keable and seconded by Cllr D Wulff)

Note: (i) * Report previously circulated.

(ii) The member of the public asking questions in relation to this item, having listened to the debate, was content not to receive written responses as he felt the issues had been addressed.