Standards Committee – 28 January 2010

Chair: Mr W Harvie
Venue: Function Room 1, Pittwood House, Scunthorpe
Time: 2 pm

AGENDA

  1. Substitutions (if any)
  2. Declarations of Personal or Personal and Prejudicial Interests, if any.
  3. To take the minutes of the meeting held on 26 November 2009as a correct record and authorise the chair to sign.
  4. Complaints under the Code of Conduct.
  5. Role and Working Arrangements
  6. Assessing the impact of Standards Committee.
  7. Standards for England Information Guides: –
    1. Notifications to parish and town councils concerning complaints about their members and the Standards Committee (England) Regulations 2008;
    2. Charitable Trustees and declarations of interest under the Code, and
    3. Freemasons and the Code of Conduct.
  8. Any other items, which the chair decides are urgent by reason of special circumstances, which must be specified.

MINUTES

PRESENT: Mr W Harvie (Chair), Councillor Swift (Vice-Chair) Councillors Armitage, Davison, England, Poole and Whiteley.

Mrs Y Aubrey and Messrs D Cuckson, P Kelly and J Kitwood.

212 DECLARATIONS OF PERSONAL OR PERSONAL AND PREJUDICIAL INTERESTS – There were no declarations of interests.

213 MINUTES – Resolved – That the minutes of the meeting of this committee held on 26 November, 2009, having been printed and circulated amongst the members, be taken as read and correctly recorded and be signed by the chair.

214 (12) COMPLAINTS UNDER THE CODE OF CONDUCT – The Monitoring Officer submitted a schedule showing progress on complaints received since the delegation of responsibility for dealing with these to the Standards Committee in May 2008.

Resolved -That the report be noted.

215 TRAINING – The Monitoring Officer reported that all parish clerks had been written to regarding a training event and around 20 responses had been received. A session would now be convened. to which all members of this committee would be invited. It was hoped that, in addition to providing training, this would help to forge relationships between the Standards Committee and town and parish councils.

216 (13) ROLE AND WORKING ARRANGEMENTS – Further to Minute 210, the Monitoring Officer submitted a report inviting the committee to determine the means to be pursued in enhancing the role and working arrangements of the Standards Committee.

Resolved – (a) That the report be noted; (b) that officers meet with the chair and vice-chair with a view to producing a formal work plan for the committee; (c) that further consideration be given to (i) sharing information on assessments and determinations made more widely; (ii) publication of the register of members’ interests on the council website and enhancing the contents of the website (iii) the committee taking an advisory role in respect of various codes and protocols, and (iv) the chair meeting the Chief Executive , Leader and Whips of the two political groups on a 6 monthly basis in addition to addressing council with an annual report and (d) that a further report be submitted to the next meeting in relation to the foregoing.

217 (14) ASSESSING THE IMPACT OF STANDARDS COMMITTEES – The Monitoring Officer submitted a copy of a document entitled “Assessing the impact of standards committees” which had been produced for Standards for England.

The document contained nine case studies of “notable practice” by Standards Committees in a number of different areas of work.

Resolved – (a) That the report be noted, and (b) that the website of South Cambridgeshire District Council be looked at and, as part of developing links with representative bodies (Herefordshire Council), consideration be given to inviting a representative of the East Riding and Northern Lincolnshire Local Councils Association to a future meeting.

218 (15) STANDARDS FOR ENGLAND INFORMATION GUIDES – The Monitoring officer submitted three information guides produced by Standards for England relating to notifications to parish and town councils concerning complaints about their members, charitable trustees and declarations of interest and freemasons and the code of conduct.

Resolved – That the information guides be noted.