Agenda and minutes

Councillor Purdue-Horan declared a non-pecuniary interest in agenda item 4, Cases Update 2017-18.

The Minutes of the meeting held on Monday 30 October 2017 were accepted as a true record.

In respect of the actions from the previous meeting, the DCLG Consultation Questions (Minute No.8 2017/18), the Monitoring Officer advised the Committee that once the report from DCLG was available he would bring the results back to the Committee for comment.

The Monitoring Officer introduced Julian Crowle to the Committee. He had recently joined the Council’s Legal Team and would be working with the current Monitoring Officer in advance of his taking on the role on or before 1 June 2018.

The report of the Monitoring Officer is attached

Councillor Purdue-Horan, who had declared an interest in this item left the room at this point and did not take part in the subsequent discussion.

The Monitoring Officer provided a report to update the Committee on the number of complaints regarding alleged breaches of the Councillors’ Code of Conduct. The report highlighted that since the last Committee meeting on 30 October, 2017 there had been a further three cases received, with each of these cases being dealt with by the Monitoring Officer giving due regard to the Councillor Complaints Procedure, and, where appropriate the Independent Person had been consulted.

The Monitoring Officer noted that cases Ref 7/17, 8/17 and 9/17 reported at the previous meeting of the committee on 30 October 201, were to be progressed through the complaints procedure. A provisional date for the hearing of Thursday 22 February 2018 was agreed.

It was RESOLVED that the report of the Monitoring Officer be noted.

Councillor Purdue-Horan returned to the meeting at this point.

The report of the Monitoring Officer is attached

The Monitoring Officer provided a report for the Committee to consider and comment on the feedback from the workshops held at the Town and Parish Forum on 9 November 2017. The Monitoring Officer reported that he was pleased with the overall attendance of Chairmen and Clerks at the workshops and noted that the group work had been facilitated to ensure that relevant issues had been identified. The Monitoring Officer advised that following the forum workshops the group work had been collated and circulated to the attendees for their confirmation of accuracy and further comment. The Monitoring Officer noted that, as no further comments had been received, the summary contained within the officer’s report accurately reflected the views of the Forum members. It was also noted that there remained a ‘harder to reach’ element of those not attending the Forum and, that in an attempt to address this all Town and Parish Councils would be contacted to request their comments on the draft training programme. The Monitoring Officer advised the committee that the workshops had also covered potential changes to the Code of Conduct and, with regard to this, he would report proposals to the next meeting of the Committee.

The Committee considered what actions were needed to ensure that Town and Parish Council Chairmen and Clerks received the support they required to meet their roles and welcomed the Monitoring Officers proposals. The Committee discussed revising the Code of Conduct and improvements to the training and development and, in particular, planning for the future and the new Town and Parish Councillors that would be elected in 2019. The committee concluded that the proposed programme would help Town and Parish Councils perform their functions more effectively and would generally improve their relationship with the Borough Council.

It was RESOLVED that

a)    the feedback received from the workshops at the Town and Parish Council Forum on 9 November 2017 be noted.

b)    the creation of a Training and Development Programme for Town and Parish councils, incorporating the original proposals as well as the feedback received from the workshops held at Town and Parish Council Forum, be approved.

c)     The Monitoring officer report potential changes to the Code of Conduct to the next meeting.

Action Sheet

STANDARDS COMMITTEE - MONDAY 29 JANUARY 2018