Doncaster monitoring officer advised council on his own appointment as chief executive, says Audit Commission
Doncaster's former monitoring officer Tim Leader gave advice to the council on his own appointment as interim chief executive despite the council receiving two separate pieces of legal advice advising it that he should have stood aside when it become clear that he was a serious candidate for the post, the Audit Commission said in its report into the local authority’s corporate governance.
Mr Leader joined Doncaster MBC as director of resources and monitoring officer in September 2009 from Breckland District Council, where he was deputy chief executive and monitoring officer.
When the former chief executive resigned in December, Mr Leader played an active part in the process to find his replacement, providing advice to the full council and its Chief Officers Appointments Committee (COAC) long after it was apparent that he was a prime candidate for the role and despite legal advice to the Cabinet from Eversheds that he should withdraw from the process and declare an interest.
The report said: “We have seen no evidence that Mr Leader expressed concern about the fundamental conflict between his ability to advise the Mayor, Cabinet and Council impartially, and his being one of the likely beneficiaries of the process about which he was advising. The evidence we have received makes it clear that Mr Leader continued to advise the Council on the process it should follow to appoint an Interim Chief Executive even after it became clear that he was a leading candidate for that position.”
Following the initial announcement of Mr Leader's appointment on 18 January 2010, the Director of People, Performance and Improvement, Kay Leigh, and the Interim Monitoring Officer, Roger Harvey (who succeeded Tim Leader), received further legal advice from Wragge & Co on 1 February 2010 which said: “The procedural objections can not be lightly discarded. They appear to be serious, honestly held and substantial in terms of the importance of the appointment.”
The legal advice from Wragge & Co also suggested two further defects with the procedure adopted by the Council. It said that council's constitution was defective in not including within the COAC a voting member of the Executive, i.e. the Mayor or a Cabinet member. Secondly, the advice said that “the resolution of the Council on 18 January was not effective because statutory consultation and objection to any proposed appointment had not taken place. Both procedural requirements are contained in the Local Authorities (Standing Orders) (England) Regulations 2001”.
Tim Leader was nevertheless confirmed as interim chief executive at an extraordinary meeting of the council on 3 February, despite the elected mayor's objections to the appointment process and his stated opposition to his appointment. Leader subsequently resigned on 1 April.
The Audit Commission concluded: “The process of appointing the former Interim Chief Executive, Tim Leader, is symptomatic of the fundamental governance failures which afflict the Council. It is a prime example of poor governance processes at work. It also exemplifies the inability of a key officer and some councillors involved in the process to see above their own self-interest and act for the greater good of the people of Doncaster.
“The former Interim Chief Executive, who was previously the Monitoring Officer of the Council, failed to behave in a way that lives up to the required standards of behaviour. He undermined perceptions of the role of Chief Executive as an impartial servant of the Mayor and the Council. The Council failed to live up to minimum governance standards, and persevered with an appointment process they were advised by external legal experts was flawed.”
The District Auditor is currently seeking legal advice and is awaiting the conclusion of this inspection before he decides whether there is any action he needs to take in response to the Corporate Governance Inspection findings in relation to the defects in the appointment process.
