Agenda and minutes

Members are asked to declare any interests they may have in the business to be discussed.

Members were asked to declare any interests they might have in the business to be discussed.  No such declarations were made.

The minutes of the meeting of the Standards Committee, held on 9 July 2014, have been previously circulated and Members are asked to confirm that they are correct.

The minutes of the meeting of the Standards Committee, held on 9 July 2014, were confirmed as a correct record.

The Monitoring Officer to submit suggested revisions to the Code of Conduct for Members (Appendix B1) together with revisions to the Arrangements for Dealing With Standards Complaints at Leicester City Council under the Localism Act 2011 (Appendix B2).

The Arrangements now include three Appendices:-

Appendix 1    Vexatious Complaints – Member Misconduct Process

Appendix 2    Protocol on the Role of the Independent Person meeting with Elected Members

Appendix 3    Procedure for Dealing with subject (Elected) Member who fails to act upon an outcome of “informal resolution”

The suggested revisions are highlighted in yellow, and Members are requested to make comments/observations and/or recommendations to the Council, which will be asked to approve the revised revisions at its meeting on 13 November 2014.

The Monitoring Officer submitted a report suggesting revisions to the Code of Conduct for Members together with revisions to the Arrangements for Dealing with Standards Complaints at Leicester City Council under the Localism Act 2011.

The Arrangements now included three Appendices:-

Appendix 1    Vexatious Complaints – Member Misconduct Process

Appendix 2    Protocol on the Role of the Independent Person meeting with Elected Members

Appendix 3    Procedure for Dealing with subject (Elected) Member who fails to act upon an outcome of “informal resolution”

The suggested revisions were highlighted for ease of reference and Members were requested to make comments/observations and/or recommendations to the Council, which would be asked to approve the revised revisions at its meeting on 13 November 2014.

The Monitoring Officer stated that the revisions reflected the comments made by the Standards Committee during the previous year and from lessons learned from dealing with complaints.

The Monitoring Officer also submitted some further minor revisions which had arisen after the report had been written and published.  Members discussed each suggested revision and made the following comments:-

Code of Conduct

a)         There was no benefit in adding Deputy City Mayor or Assistant City Mayors after ‘City Mayor’ in paragraph 1 as they were already covered by the term ‘Member’ earlier in the paragraph.

b)         Add ‘or attempt to confer’ after ‘to improperly confer’ on the first line of paragraph 3 (j) – General Conduct.

c)         Add a new paragraph 4 (a) ‘Declare any and all DPI’s on your Register of Interests.

d)         In paragraph 4 (c) replace ‘at any meeting at which you are present at which an item of business which affects or relates to the subject matter of the interest is under consideration’ with “in a matter to be considered (unless it is already declared on your Register, in which case you must simply comply with point d. below).”

e)         In paragraph 4 (d) after the words ‘by either leaving the room’ on the second line add the words “where the business is being conducted at a meeting”.

f)          Add new bullet point after paragraph 5 B – Prejudicial ODI as follows:-

·         Note that there is a relationship between “bias/predetermination” and “interests”. Sometimes they will be synonymous (e.g. sitting on Planning Committee for a development that could, if approved, lower the value of your home will (i) certainly constitute a prejudicial ODI; (ii) possibly constitute a DPI; (iii) likely amount to “apparent bias” in common law).

However you might be predetermined over a matter in a way which could does not translate into a registerable or a declarable “interest” (e.g. you are a member of Licensing Committee and have an ethical objection to the consumption of alcohol and a closed mind to the granting of any/all Liquor Licensing applications. Whilst this (i) will not constitute a DPI; (ii) may not constitute an ODI; it will (iii) constitute ‘bias’ in law and breach the Nolan principles of objectivity, openness and upholding the law. You could therefore  ...  view the full minutes text for item 12.

The Monitoring Officer submits a report giving feedback on complaints against Councillors reviewed and/or determined since the last meeting and updating the Committee on progress with outstanding complaints against Councillors.  The Committee is recommended to receive and note the report.

Note:  Should the Committee wish to discuss individual circumstances or details of the complaint, the Monitoring Officer may consider it necessary to move into private session and ask the Committee to pass the resolution in agenda item 7 below.

The Monitoring Officer submitted a report giving feedback on complaints against Councillors reviewed and/or determined since the last meeting and updating the Committee on progress with outstanding complaints against Councillors. 

RESOLVED:

                        The report received and noted.

An Independent Member requested that when future meetings of the Standards Advisory Board are summoned members are made aware of all the participants involved in the complaint in case this should give rise to a conflict of interests.  The Monitoring Officer confirmed that a statement drawing members’ attention to the participants would be included in future.

The Chair declared the meeting closed at 6.40 pm.