Agenda item

To receive an update on the work of the 3 Priority Groups:

P1 - Adoption of Complaints Process and Media Plan – reports attached
P2 - Discussion of the Code of Conduct
P3 – Discussion of the Officer Code of Conduct

The Chair began by reminding the meeting that the Committee had agreed to consider specific areas and 3 groups had completed deep dive reviews. The group known as P1 had looked to establish the procedure for the Investigation and Hearing process, should the Monitoring Officer decide that a Code of Conduct complaint about a Member of the Somerset Council or a Town/Parish Council merited investigation. The P2 group had looked at how that Code of Conduct, which was the Local Government Association (LGA) model, could be adopted by all the Councils in Somerset (approx. 279) thus helping to ensure all Councils were following the same policy. The P3 Group had been looking at refreshing the Officer Code of Conduct. The Monitoring Officer noted that the papers were all new draft documents that the Committee could recommend for adoption to the new Council. He noted that Paper 1, reflected the work that had been done through one of the Local Government Reorganisation work streams, and this had looked at each of the complaints procedures of the 5 former Councils in Somerset and the P1 Group had sought to develop a new document to capture best practice.

The Monitoring Officer noted that that the P1 Group had considered and deliberated in some detail the ‘How to make a complaint’ guidance notes document (Paper 2); the ‘Complaints about Councillors process – flow chart’ (Paper 3) and the draft ‘Media Protocol’ (Paper 4) to set out how the Council would deal with media enquires about standards matters. Paper 5 was an extract from the Constitution about how Sub-Committees of the Committee would work as Hearing Sub-Committees in determining complaints that had reached that stage.

The Monitoring Officer explained they were being presented for consideration and it would be for Members to decide to recommend them for approval by the Council or if they required further work which they could undertake with the new Monitoring Officer. He noted the new Council's constitution had been agreed last February and the current complaints process and guidance notes were fit for purpose and would remain in place until such time as they were changed.

The Chair suggested that Paper 1 be accepted and considered at the next meeting once the Committee had time to consider and were content with Papers 2 to 4.  There was a brief discussion that included the procedure for establishing if a complainant was vexatious and how the media protocols would work in practice, including publicising a determination of a complaint.

In respect of the P1 group, it was agreed that Papers 1 to 4 would be reviewed and considered again at the next meeting to be held on 28 June. 

Regarding the work of the P2 group the Chair invited Mr Hemsley to provide the Committee with an update and he spoke to a spreadsheet that was displayed visually to the meeting. The spreadsheet provided information to show which Local Community Network (LCN) each Town or Parish Council had been allocated to and the former District Council area and if they had considered and adopted the LGA model Code of Conduct. It was noted that some Councils had adopted the Code but that sometimes the Somerset Association of Local Councils (SALC) had not been informed. All Councils were required to have a Code of Conduct and Somerset Council itself had adopted and had recommended that the LGA model Code of Conduct be adopted by the 279 Town and Parish Councils. The Council could not enforce, oblige or require the Town and Parish Councils to adopt the LGA model Code but was encouraging adoption so all Somerset communities could benefit from having a single Code of Conduct that would be applied to all Councillors across the County.

There was a brief discussion about how best to engage with Town and Parish Councils and it was noted that LCN’s were not the only way of engaging and Somerset Councillors were good ambassadors for their areas. It was suggested and agreed that the P2 group would meet outside of the meeting to progress this issue. It was suggested that a document from Mrs Wellman be circulated to the Committee. 

Regarding the work of the P3 group Cllr Dimery and Mr Hemsley noted they had held a meeting with an Officer in the Council’s HR department to discuss the Officer Code of Conduct and they had identified some potential amendments to the Code that had been adopted by the Council last February. The Monitoring Officer noted that by the next meeting he would be able to report on if those amendments fell within the scope of the delegations that allowed him to make amendments to the Code.

For Cllr Nicholson to have a briefing with the Chair and MO.