What future for standards?
Peter Keith-Lucas looks at the options open to councils when the present standards regime is replaced by a new duty to promote high standards of conduct next year.
The Localism Bill will place a new duty on principal authorities in England to promote and maintain high standards of conduct among elected and co-opted members of the authority, but remove the present means of discharging this duty by abolishing the General Principles, the Model Code of Conduct, the Standards Board and local authority Standards Committees. In its place will be a new statutory Register of Members’ Interests, with criminal penalties for failure to comply.
Some members have suggested that their authority should do nothing other than implement the new statutory interests regime. But I would suggest that high standards of conduct go beyond mere compliance with a statutory interests regime. The General Principles indicate that Parliament considered that standards covered such issues as honesty and integrity, openness and accountability, respect for others, personal judgement and stewardship, so an authority which simply implemented the statutory interests regime would fail to address substantial areas of standards of member conduct, and so fail to discharge its new duty.
Non-statutory Code of Conduct
The Localism Bill envisages that authorities may wish to adopt their own non-statutory Code of Conduct, and it is hard to see how any authority could claim to promote and maintain high standards of conduct unless it had set out what standards it expected of its members. The simplest course would be simply to re-adopt the general conduct rules in paras. 3-7 of the Model Code, as these are the parts which will not be replaced by the statutory interests regime.
If this non-statutory Code were applied to conduct as a councillor (and not getting into the complications of trying to apply the Code to conduct in private life), it is hard to see what can really be objected to. Does anyone seriously consider that it is appropriate for members to bully, breach confidentiality, misuse their positions for personal advantage, fail to treat people with respect, cause the authority to discriminate unlawfully, intimidate or victimise witnesses, bring their offices as members or their authorities into disrepute, misuse council resources or ignore statutory officers’ advice? Such a non-statutory Code could be supplemented by guidance to members on danger areas such as use of IT and the Internet, planning and lobbying, member- officer relations and gifts and hospitality.
However, the Localism Bill provides that, where a local authority does adopt a non-statutory Code of Conduct, it must then respond to any written complaints that a member or co-opted member has failed to comply with that Code by considering whether the matter should be investigated and, if satisfied by the investigation that a member or co-opted member has failed to comply, decide what action if any to take. This removes the un-lamented review subcommittee, and gives considerable freedom to delegate more of the process, to enable speedier investigation and resolution of simple matters.
Investigation of complaints
It is possible to do all of this between the Monitoring Officer and full Council. But full Council is not a convenient forum for detailed examination of an investigation report so most councils will find it more convenient to set up a committee to advise them on how best to discharge the new duty and to undertake casework on complaints. The Bill removes the rigid bureaucratic process for handling of complaints, so that this committee could allow the Monitoring Officer to seek local resolution and determine that a complaint need go no further if the complainant is satisfied with the member’s response. To speed the process, the committee might say that the consent of the Chair would be required for a decision not to investigate a complaint, but that the Monitoring Officer could take the decision to initiate an investigation. The Monitoring Officer’s investigation report might then go to the Standards Committee for examination, and to give the member an opportunity to respond.
Independent members
That raises the issue of whether such a committee can include co-opted independent members. Section 102(3) of the Local Government Act 1972 enables the co-option of non-councillors onto the committee, but s.13 of the Local Government and Housing Act 1989 prevents them from having a vote on the committee unless it is purely advisory. So, at present, it would be necessary for the committee to recommend any matter on to Council for decision, if the co-opted independent members are to have a vote. This may be positively advantageous on individual complaints, as full Council would have ownership of the matter, could remove the errant member from outside bodies and, with the approval of the member’s Group Leader, remove the member from committees.
But it would be tedious to have to wait for the next Council meeting where the committee was undertaking administrative steps such as trying to arrange member training. It would be welcome if the Government were to indicate a willingness to amend either the Localism Bill or the Committees and Political Groups Regulations 1990 to allow co-opted members full voting rights on non-statutory Standards Committees.
Ability to deal with member misconduct
Some councillors will misbehave. Their conduct can seriously disrupt the ability of an authority to discharge its functions effectively. They can discredit the authority with the public. Repeated leaking of confidential information deters citizens from confiding in the authority. They can drive out good officers and deter good candidates from seeking election to the Council. Breaches of the general conduct rules are rarely visible to the electorate and are rarely resolved through the ballot box, and an authority may need to limit the damage which an errant member can wreak before the next election.
Without the statutory sanctions of suspension, an authority’s ability to deal with serious member misconduct will be strictly circumscribed. It can name and shame. Full Council can remove as Leader or, with the Group Leader’s support it can remove from committees, and the Leader can be persuaded to remove the errant member from Cabinet. Where there is a failure to register interests, it can seek to persuade the Police to take an interest.
Few Standards Committees will mourn the loss of responsibility for parish and town councillors, but where a member is seriously disrupting the ability of the authority to discharge its functions effectively, such new non-statutory committees may feel that they lack the tools to fulfil the new statutory duty to promote and maintain high standards of conduct among members.
Peter Keith-Lucas is a partner at Bevan Brittan.
He can be contacted at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
