Memorandum by Surrey Heath Borough Council
(STA 04)
As an authority that has had considerable dealings
with the Standards Board for England I would like to submit the
following written evidence to the Parliamentary Inquiry:
1. TIME TAKEN
FOR INVESTIGATIONS
Most of the investigations into Surrey Heath
Borough Councillors have taken well in excess of one year for
relatively straightforward matters of declaration of interest
reviews. The SBE's own standard is five months and this is not
being achieved: moreover, this should be seen as the longest and
not the standard or average time taken. It is quite unacceptable
to have investigations hanging over Members' heads for this length
of time. The Board's claim that it was swamped with allegations
when first it was set up does not hold water: its own business
plan assumed a level slightly greater than those actually received.
It would appear that it was mismanaged internally and that insufficient
resources had been allocated to meet the demand.
2. EXCESSIVE
SECRECY
All items to and from the Board are headed "Strictly
Private and Confidential". This is quite unnecessary. There
are very few items that need to be so confidential and it gives
totally the wrong impression, namely that of being a closed and
secret society. If confidence is to be gained in the ethical standards
of public service then matters should be conducted openly and
transparently.
3. MANAGEMENT
PROCESSES
The Board claims that the Act means that when
a case has been passed to an Ethical Standards Officer for investigation
then no-one, including the Board's Chief Executive, has any control
over the time taken, the standards worked to, or the style and
content of an investigation. Whilst a degree of autonomy is necessary
for conducting investigations it is wholly wrong for senior officers
within the Board to have no reporting line and no accountability.
4. COMPLAINTS
PROCESS
Following delays in receipt of final reports
of some five months in the spring of 2003 I wished to make a formal
complaint to the Board. An appointment was made with a senior
Ethical Standards Officer, Lisa Klein, who clearly was ignorant
of the fact that the Board should have a complaints process and
admitted that no such process had been laid down. Clearly this
should have been done in advance of setting up the Board, and,
again, is yet more evidence of its poor management.
5. INCONSISTENT
DECISIONS
During the course of investigation of various
Surrey Heath Borough Councillors the Board concluded that, at
a meeting of the Council's Planning Committee, certain members
of that Committee had breached the Code of Conduct by overturning
an officer's recommendation without sufficient planning reasons
having been minuted. Other members of that Committee had voted
the same way but were deemed not to have breached the Code of
Conduct. This inconsistency is quite unacceptable.
6. USE OF
PRECEDENTS
Throughout the drawn-out period of the first
four investigations into Surrey Heath Borough Councillors the
Board had concluded other very similar allegations and published
these on their website. This did not short-circuit the process,
and, although some seven or eight months later the fresh draft
reports came to the same conclusion, I contend that use of precedents
within their own organisation should be common practice so that
matters can be cleared up quickly and, most importantly, consistently.
7. ARROGANCE
Throughout the many investigations at Surrey
Heath Borough Council the attitude of the Board, and in particular
that of its Ethical Standards Officer, has been one of arrogance
and intolerance. In order to win the confidence of the public
in public standards the Board should view working with the Monitoring
Officer and local authority concerned as a partnership arrangement
and not the master-servant arrangement that they clearly perceive
it to be.
8. GATEKEEPING
PROCESSES
The Board have no arrangement in place for Monitoring
Officers, or for that matter any other Council officer, to make
an informal check on the position with regard to allegations.
Some investigations were begun at Surrey Heath in respect of action
taken on non-declarations of interest on the part of certain Members
at a particular committee, but an initial check would have shown
that the Members in question were in fact not present at that
committee. Such rudimentary checks would save time and indeed
speed the process for those being complained against.
9. NON-DISCLOSURE
OF COMPLAINANTS
It seems to be the Board's policy not to advise
those against whom allegations have been made of the names of
those making the allegations. Again, this is not good for an ethical
system in trying to gain the confidence of those involved and
is totally devoid of openness and transparency. In Surrey Heath's
experience the Ethical Standards Officer has hidden behind an
extension of their investigation, which evidence shows cannot
be the case.
10. APPEALS PROCESS
Whilst the Ethical Standards Officer does issue
a draft report, once he has received comments thereon the final
report is issued, and there appears not to be an appeals process.
That said, however, given that Chief Executives are excluded from
the process this is how it has been put to me and I am therefore
reporting it at second hand.
11. INVESTIGATIONS
OUTSIDE THE
BOARD'S
REMIT
It has been the experience of Surrey Heath that
one of the inordinately delayed investigations delved quite deeply
into officer matters. It is clear from the Board's remit that
it is set up to investigate breaches of the Members' Code of Conduct,
and, whilst it is accepted that occasionally there may need to
be some information required of officers, a detailed investigation
and, initially, reports on how a Council's officers ought to change
their procedures, are outside the Board's remit and should not
be entered into.
12. USE OF
MATERIAL WITHOUT
THE PRIOR
KNOWLEDGE OR
INVOLVEMENT OF
OFFICERS
In one of the investigations undertaken I learned
at the very end of the investigation that the Ethical Standards
Officer had been reviewing material that I had initiated and yet
had not advised me of this. Furthermore, it would appear that
he had come to a conclusion about my role in the situation without
first having discussed it with me. My initial reaction is as stated
above, in that I am concerned that officers are being investigated
by the Ethical Standards Officer, but, excepting that in certain
circumstances this is necessary in order to clarify the Member's
role, it should be never be done without first having interviewed
the officer concerned, as had happened in my case.
13. TRAINING
OF BOARD
PERSONNEL
As stated above, when a complaint was lodged
it was obvious that the Senior Ethical Standards Officer had no
idea what should have been done with regard to dealing with it.
Furthermore, following a reference from me on a Member to the
Board, it was decided not to investigate, and I was advised by
letter that that was the end of the matter: however, at that time
I discovered from the website that I was able to have that decision
reviewed, and, when I challenged the Board on this, they then
accepted that that was indeed the situation. Either they did not
train their staff to know their processes or their processes have
been organised in such a way as to deter appeals. In either case,
the position is not acceptable.
14. PERCEIVED
LINKS
At Surrey Heath, some of the very early cases
which took 16 months to be resolved were delayed, in the view
of the Ethical Standards Officer, as a result of his having to
review other related matters. In the event, when the final report
was issued towards the end of 2003 I understand from my Monitoring
Officer that it differed only marginally from the draft report
issued in November 2002 and that there was no reference whatsoever
to any further material. In fact, when the Monitoring Officer
looked at information about subsequent investigations it is quite
clear that the initial investigation should have been based upon
specific matters of a non-declaration of interest nature in respect
of particular individuals, whilst other matters should then have
been considered as separate cases. This would have concluded the
initial investigation more speedily, albeit outside of the five-month
period, and would have given a clear indication to the Members
involved that fresh cases were being raised as opposed to there
being further extensions of the original case, which turned out
not to be the case.
15. UPDATING
OF CASE
PROGRESS
As previously stated, the time taken for investigations
at Surrey Heath is quite unacceptable, but, even where delays
may occur for genuine reasons, the Board seems to have no process
whatsoever in place to update the Council, Monitoring Officer,
or indeed those Members complained against, about the progress
being made. The Council routinely went many months without hearing
from the Board, and, when prompted for information, they gave
little or no information back and were clearly irritated by requests
for progress. A typical example of this was the issuing of a draft
report into an investigation in November 2002 when no contact
whatsoever was made until early May 2003, at which time a fresh
batch of allegations was forwarded and the Monitoring Officer
advised that the previous report could not be concluded as a result.
In the intervening months no proactive contact was made by the
Board to explain the position to those being complained against.
16. CHIEF EXECUTIVE'S
INVOLVEMENT
The SBE holds that the legislation excludes
involvement with Chief Executives directly and therefore the Board
only deals with Monitoring Officers. As a result, I as Chief Executive
of the Authority do not see any of the detailed reports, and this
goes for both draft and final reports. This means that I have
only seen the very skimpy summary reports which appear on the
Board's website, which does not give me a good feel for the issues
involved when discussing and advising Members on future actions.
The Chief Executive is the senior policy officer of any Council
and should not be excluded from the process.
I hope that the foregoing brief comments are
of use to the Inquiry: as stated at the outset, Surrey Heath Borough
Councillors have been the subject of a significant number of investigations
and I therefore felt that it was important for comments to come
from those with detailed front-line experience of the processes.
Please feel free to contact me should you require
clarification on any aspect of the matter.
Barry R Catchpole
Chief Executive
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