---

Local Government Standards Boards

You will be aware, Mr. Key, that I applied for this debate before the recess, so I had a chance to prepare a Castro-like peroration, which I have had to condense to a mere 20 minutes or so. How we handle complaints about councillors—their reputation and integrity—is a big subject. I think we all agree that there was probably never a time when there were no complaints, every elected representative was considered to be a pillar of the community and integrity was presupposed, but there have been eras with less scrutiny and transparency than today. In Southport, we had our own council for many decades, but even that council had unfortunate episodes featuring a certain Mr. Poulson and prominent councillors, some of whom I am sad to say were Liberals and got themselves into trouble. Some of them went to jail. I was a councillor for 13 years, party leader and eventually council leader. I can honestly say that during my time on Sefton council, which now covers Southport, I detected no corruption and was genuinely impressed by the rigorous checks and balances, particularly when finance and contracts were involved. During that period there were plenty of development and contestable planning applications, but that may not have been the pattern elsewhere, although I believe that it was the general pattern throughout the UK. It was probably less obviously the pattern where councils were a one-party state, and decisions were not necessarily made in the open, and transfers of political power were not seriously contested or were a foregone conclusion. I do not deny that during that period there was a litany of sad cases in journals such as Private Eye, which detailed some of the things that went wrong, but my view was that councillors are genuinely people of integrity by and large, and that councils are generally free of corruption. Notwithstanding that, I have encountered—and still encounter—members of the public who assure me that corruption is the norm and seem not to think it insulting to say so volubly, even in the presence of public servants who administer public affairs. The reality for most councillors is that there is not much glory or respect at the moment, but a lot of hard work, many complaints and sometimes little recognition for addressing those complaints and dealing with them. They accept, by and large, that the ultimate judge of their worth is the electorate, who hire and fire them. For years, that assessment has been thought to be sufficient. Councillors have been subject to criminal, constitutional, civil and administrative law, and ultimately the electorate's verdict. For many years, that recipe stood councillors in good stead and ensured that they were good citizens and that councils were run openly, transparently and legitimately. However, it was thought, as much by the Labour Government as anyone else, not to work too well when elections were uncontested or a foregone conclusion. Some people believed that the Labour Government did not do enough in such circumstances to raise the standards and calibre of councillors. Without being too blunt about it, it was thought that drunks, thugs and venial people were sometimes elected notwithstanding the system. The idea of a standards board moved up the agenda and eventually became law. An alternative might have been to make the electoral system more vital and elections more contested in areas where corruption had set in or was more apparent. The basic idea of a standards board is to have a code of conduct and a set of desirable principles and qualities for public life that can be modestly stated, agreed and observed by all. That was accepted, at least initially, as a rational solution. When I first became an MP, I was surprised to receive, as I am sure did other hon. Members, a huge bundle of forms for my surgery from the Standards Board for England inciting people to lodge formal complaints. I could not imagine their all being used legitimately or being required. That annoyed me a little because my observation is that very few councillors merit a formal complaint, although I can think of a few members of the public who could use the whole package and still ask for more. I raised that experience at the Select Committee on Communities and Local Government when the hon. Member for Oldham, East and Saddleworth (Mr. Woolas) was the Minister in charge. By and large, he agreed that such touting for custom was not the way to proceed because it was a heavy-handed approach and led to complaints being used as an electoral and political tool, with complaints often being made just prior to or during elections, and so on. It also led to overload of the Standards Board and had a lack of clarity, particularly about whether complaints were legitimate because they involved a councillor's public role, or were simply applied to a councillor as a person. Councillors do not have to be saints, but there was lack of clarity about whether they should be judged on their public performance as a councillor or their behaviour as a private individual, and those two aspects of their lives were not always significantly differentiated. I supported the change in law that suggested that local determination and local committees provided a better process for the less serious complaints. The reasons struck me as persuasive at the time. First, local committees had a better understanding of local government issues, and some of the original members of the Standards Board had an almost unworldly character. Secondly, politically motivated complaints were likely to be scented out fairly early and seen for what they were. I am questioning now whether local determination is leading to an unacceptable variation in practice, whether the rules, legislation and statutory instruments circumscribing it allow for that, and whether the Government and the Standards Board, which still has an overall watching brief, recognise that and are prepared to tolerate it or wish to redress the balance and deal with the matter. The best way to illustrate that is to refer again to my local borough, Sefton, as an example. Its references to the local standards committee have reached almost epidemic proportions. Having served on that council, I regard that with bemusement because the vast majority of councillors are decent and some are almost saintly, although I must add that an ex-mayor recently went to jail for a criminal offence, but that is not typical in Sefton. The worst Standards Board case that I recall in Sefton in recent times is of one councillor threatening to ““get”” another after a meeting. During the poll tax period when the atmosphere on many councils could be fairly abrasive, I remember a senior councillor threatening to rip the arm from a colleague of mine during a policy and resources meeting, which continued unfazed with no one commenting because the event was not imminent. The stricture in this case and the Standards Board's activities may be a sign of genuine progress if it persuades councillors to behave more politely and rationally. However, most cases in Sefton never get as far as having a verdict determined or a positive finding reached, usually on the permitted ground that complaints as stated do not justify the expense of investigating them. That is a kind of catch-all clause because it can apply irrespective of the complexity of the case. In other words, a complaint might be quite trivial and easy to bottom out, but because it is quite trivial it might be discarded on the grounds that the expense simply is not worth it, even though the expense might be relatively trivial. Complaints have sometimes been rejected on the grounds that defamatory comment is robust debate, which leaves councillors genuinely uncertain about what the limitations of robust debate are. Occasionally, a formal complaint has been dismissed simply on the grounds that it is political, without mentioning the substance of the complaint itself. The common thread through many of these cases is the avoidance of a finding of fact, which is a crucial element of the decisions to be made. That leaves a twofold level of uncertainty for members: whether the conduct as described took place or whether it is simply an allegation, and even if the allegation took place, if such a verdict is arrived at, whether it would be a breach of the code. I find that somewhat unsatisfactory. At the end of the day, if the rulings do not leave councillors more certain about where they stand and what to do, the system is not working as well as it could. This situation has not stopped decision notices failing to make it clear that no finding of fact has taken place. I would like to mention one case. A charge or allegation was made against an experienced and respected councillor, for which there was no finding of fact. In effect, the complaint was thrown out, but the offences that he might have been guilty of, if he had been guilty, were listed at length. In addition, there was a suggestion that he went on a course that might or might not have been appropriate to the issue. There was no verdict or finding of fact, but the person concerned found he could not appeal against what was obviously an acquittal and the political opposition had a feast day in the press at his expense. That is a grotesque failure of natural justice. I suspect that all that case illustrates is that the local standards committees in Sefton and other places are under pressure, and that is not helped if frivolous complaints emerge or a tit-for-tat culture prevails. I suspect that the experiences of those in Sefton are not particularly unique and that such problems are occurring elsewhere. The foibles of the local committees can be as various and arbitrary as premier league referees are considered to be by football teams, in relation to which the same uncertainty and difficulties prevail. However, there is one important difference, and this is a very serious thing: the reputation of councillors is at stake. That is very important to councillors, not just because of their electoral prospects, but because of how they feel about themselves and how their families feel about them. My plea is essentially that the Government should assess, monitor and record this demonstrably imperfect quasi-judicial system. My suspicion is that the standards boards are not setting the clear standards in performance, practice or outcome that we all desire.