Agenda item

5.1

The Director of Legal and Governance submitted a report highlighting the activities of the Committee and providing details of the outcome of the Standards complaints received from January 2018 through to May 2019.

5.2

The combined Audit and Standards Committee had been established in 2017 as the two separate committees of Audit Committee and Standards Committee considered issues that overlapped e.g. complaints, ombudsman and whistleblowing.  The Annual Standards Report would be presented to Full Council and therefore, the Chair may wish add a foreword.  The Committee had two Independent

Persons appointed to assist the Monitoring Officer and their input was highly valued.  The report set out the complaints dealt with by the Monitoring Officer from January 2018 to May 2019.  The Monitoring Officer reported that the majority of the complaints received were either Parish Council or social media related.

5.3

All new Members had received training on the Members Code of Conduct and supplementary training would also be provided to Members on the Planning and Highways, and Licensing Committees.  Members needed to ensure their Register of Interests were up to date.

5.4

The Monitoring Officer reported that the year ahead would see a roll out of Code of conduct refresh training for all elected and Co-Opted Members including training on the ethical framework, decision making, member/officer protocols and the use of social media.

5.5

In addition, the Monitoring Officer brought to the attention of the Committee, The Committee for Standards in Public Life report on Local Government Ethical Standards produced in January 2019.  The Monitoring Officer reported that the whole report was attached for reference, but in particular, drew Members attention to the Executive Summary (Page 10), the list of 26 recommendations (primarily directed at National Government) (Page 14) and the list of Best Practice for Local Authorities (Page 18).  As the report authors recognised that the bulk of their recommendations required a change in legislation, they had also produced best practice recommendations to allow local authorities to act immediately on their findings where possible.  Paragraph 11.1 of the report set out the areas that the Monitoring Officer considered improvements could be made to enable the Council to adopt the recommended best practice.  It was noted that some of the Councils existing practice was already in accordance with the recommended best practice.

5.5

RESOLVED: That the Chair of the Committee and the Monitoring Officer to meet to agree the timing and format for a workshop style session for all of the Committee Members to discuss ethical standards, consider the report in more detail and agree recommendations to Full Council.