Agenda item

Local Government Ethical Standards - Review by the Committee on Standards in Public Life - Jan 2019

Minutes:

The Director of Governance and Assurance introduced a report that informed Members of the outcome of the Committee on Standards in Public Life’s review of Local Government Ethical Standards. The report kept Members abreast of developments with the ethical standards regime and sought approval for immediate actions to be taken in light of the review.

 

It was reported that on 25 May 2010, the coalition government had announced its intention to abolish the Standards Board regime set out in Part 3 of the Local Government Act 2000. The government had accepted that it was important to have safeguards in place to prevent the abuse of power and misuse of public money, given that those who elected Members to office had the right to expect the highest standards of behaviour. However, it had considered that the standards regime under the LGA 2000, under which all local authorities, by law, had to adopt a national code of conduct and a standards committee to oversee the behaviour of Members and receive complaints, regulated by Standards for England, was ineffective, bureaucratic and encouraged petty complaints or harmful accusations. It, therefore, proposed that, through the Localism Act 2011, local authorities would draw up their own local codes of conduct and it would become a criminal offence for Members to deliberately withhold or misrepresent a financial interest.

 

However, concerns had been raised by the Committee on Standards in Public Life (CSPL) in various reports, following the implementation of the Localism Act 2011, on whether the sanctions for breach of standards were adequate and it would, therefore, be monitoring the implementation of the new local government standards regime.

 

The CSPL had taken a review with the following terms of reference:

 

1.   Examine the structures, processes and practices in local government in England for:

  a. Maintaining codes of conduct for local councillors

  b. Investigating alleged breaches fairly and with due process

  c. Enforcing codes and imposing sanctions for misconduct

  d. Declaring interests and managing conflicts of interest

  e. Whistleblowing

 

2.   Assess whether the existing structures, processes and practices are conducive to high standards of conduct in local government.

 

3.   Make any recommendations for how they can be improved.

 

4. Note any evidence of intimidation of councillors, and make recommendations for any measures that could be put in place to prevent and address such intimidation.

 

The review had covered all local authorities in England, of which there were 353 principal authorities, with 18,111 councillors in 2013, and an estimated 10,000 parish councils in England, with around 80,000 parish councillors. The The CSPL had not   taken evidence relating to Combined Authorities, metro mayors, or the Mayor of London.

 

The review report had run to 100 pages and a list of recommendations was set out in a table in the report to assist the Committee in its deliberations.  The CSPL’s review report and conclusions was appended to the report

 

The Committee noted that adopting the best practice recommended in the CSPL report would ensure robust standards arrangements were in place to safeguard local democracy, maintain high standards of conduct, protect ethical practice in local government and would reduce the risk of legal challenge. It would also provide clarity and transparency for the general public.

 

The CSPL had concluded that its recommendations represented a package of reforms to strengthen and clarify the existing framework for local government standards. Whilst many of the recommendations would require primary legislation – whose implementation would be subject to Parliamentary timetabling – they would expect that those recommendations only requiring secondary legislation or amendments to the Local Government Transparency Code could be implemented by government relatively quickly.

 

The best practice that the CSPL believed their recommendations represented a package of reforms to strengthen and clarify the existing framework for local government standards. Whilst many of the recommendations would require primary legislation – whose implementation would be subject to Parliamentary timetabling – they would expect that those recommendations only requiring secondary legislation or amendments to the Local Government Transparency Code could be implemented by government relatively quickly.

 

The Committee noted that the best practice the CSPL had identified was, in most cases, already operating in a number of local authorities. Taken as a whole, this best practice represented a benchmark that any local authority in England could and should implement in its own organisation.  Ultimately, the CSPL believed that, responsibility for ethical standards rested, and should remain, with local authorities. Senior Councillors and officers must show leadership in order to build and maintain an ethical culture in their own authority identified as, in most cases, already operating in a number of local authorities.

 

The Director of Governance and Assurance reported that the CSPL‘s recommendations had mostly accorded with the response that this Committee had put forward when it had submitted its evidence. The CSPL had made recommendations to central government and had also captured what it considered to be best practice.  The CSPL had asked the Local Government Association (LGA) to put together a revised Members’ Code of Conduct.  The LGA had not been keen to take this forward but it was hoped that it would co-ordinate something, again, so that there was a common standard.  Local Authorities were expected to review their Codes of Conduct in the meantime. 

Wirral Council’s Code did contain errors as it had been very much ‘a lift and shift’ from the previous model but when it was moved across there had been little bits left out e.g. some definitions were not carried over into the Code.

 

The Director reported that he had discussed, with colleagues in the Liverpool City Region, how helpful it would be it there was a common Code of Conduct across the region and in a way there was because two years ago when the City Region had been established a Constitution had been put together involving a piece of work that had produced a Code of Conduct for the new Combined Authority.  He had been involved with this himself, whilst in private practice.  He had taken the best bits of all of the six local authorities and put it together into one common Code so those Members, from each local Authority that went along to the Combined Authority meetings thus wearing two hats would see their own Code reflected to some extent in it.  This common Code of Conduct was available for Members to look at, evaluate and consider whether they wanted to change to it.

 

The Director recommended the Committee to request a report that informed it of what the other Councils in the Liverpool City Region’s Standards Committees were doing as the plan was that they would each be considering the outcome of the Committee on Standards in Public Life’s review of Local Government Ethical Standards and deciding whether or not to review their Codes of Conduct. The Committee would then be able to compare the Council’s Code with the common Code, decide on any other changes it wished to make and then hopefully by then it may know what the LGA’s responses were as well.

 

The Director informed that the Council accorded pretty much with all the best practice set out with one exception the commercial confidentiality of local authority companies.

 

A Member drew attention to Best practice 14.and the subsequent comments as detailed in the report as follows:

 

Councils should report on separate bodies they have set up or which they own as part of their annual governance statement, and give a full picture of their relationship with those bodies. Separate bodies created by local authorities should abide by the Nolan principle of openness, and publish their board agendas and minutes and annual reports in an accessible place.

 

·  Comment: Our annual governance statement does include reference to separate bodies wholly owned by the Council. The Council has wholly and jointly owned companies. It is considered that the minutes of the company board meetings contain commercially sensitive information which should not be subject to routine publication. The companies are however, subject to the provision of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

 

·  Recommendation: No further action at this juncture.’

The Member informed that he could not accept that there should be no further action.  He proposed that in principle, given the increase in owned and jointly owned bodies, the Minutes should be published as soon as practicable after each decision-making meeting and that Officers be requested prepare a list of bodies that could potentially have their Minutes published and it be recommended to the Cabinet that it seeks their views on this and they be reported back to this Committee for further consideration.

 

The Director informed that it would not do any harm to ask these bodies to publish what they could and there may be different responses depending on whether or not they were wholly owned bodies.  They were not always the same like companies for example.

 

A Member asked how many bodies this involved and the Director informed her that there were a dozen or so companies in which the Council had share holdings, there may be others that were dormant but in terms of active companies there were three or four limited by guarantee e.g. the Mersey Maritime Group and there were bodies in respect of the Council’s activities with the Chamber of Commerce.  There were two active trading companies, trading in the market place (Edsential and Wirral Evolutions) and there was also the Wirral Growth Company Partnership, a body that would be active in the market place. The Council also had interests in two charities.

 

Another Member asked the Director to provide and circulate to each member of the Committee a complete list of these wholly owned, jointly owned bodies and charities etc. The Director informed that he would provide the information as part of a formal Committee report.

 

The Member also queried whether there could be one Standards Committee established consisting of Members drawn from each of the local authorities within the Liverpool City Region instead of each authority have their own Standards Committee.  The Director reported that it was not uncommon to have joint Standards Committees or rather a separation of the Constitutional and Overseeing provision.  However, being judged by a Councillor from another authority did not always sit well with some Members. The Director informed that he was happy to include this on the agenda for consideration at the next meeting of the Liverpool City Region’s Monitoring Officers.

 

RESOLVED: That

 

(1)  the report and the contents of the review be noted;

 

(2)  the actions contained within paragraph 3.6 of the report in relation to the Best Practice recommendations with the exception of Best Practice 14, be endorsed;

 

(3)  the Committee receive, at a future meeting, a report that informs it of what the other Councils in the Liverpool City Region’s Standards Committees have decided to do in respect of their Codes of Conduct, having considering the outcome of the Committee on the Standards in Public Life’s review of Local Government Ethical Standards and on progress with the piece of work being carried out at Liverpool City Region level following the review;

 

(4)  Officers be requested to prepare a list of those separate bodies that could potentially have their Minutes published and it be the subject of a report to the next meeting of the Committee; and

 

(5)  the Cabinet be recommended to seek the views of those separate bodies on the list (at (4) above) on publishing their Minutes and report back to a future meeting of the Committee for further consideration.

Supporting documents: