Report by Monitoring Officer

The Monitoring Officer submitted a report on the Minutes of the meeting of the Standards Committee of 28 June 2018, which were attached at Appendix A.

The report advised that Chapter 7 of the Localism Act 2011 had ended the statutory standards regime set up by the Local Government Act 2000, and introduced in its place a duty on local authorities to promote and maintain high standards of conduct by Councillors and Co-opted Members, including adopting a local Member code of conduct. The Act also required local authorities to adopt arrangements to deal with allegations that Members had not complied with their local Code of Conduct, and allowed local authorities to establish a local Standards Committee, and to make Standing Orders relating to aspects of the standards process. The local Standards Committee had been first established at the Annual Council Meeting on 23 May 2012.

The following motion was moved by Councillor Brock and seconded by Councillor Gavin and CARRIED:

Resolved -

(1)            That the Minutes of the Standards Committee held on 28 June 2018, as attached at Appendix A to the report, be received;

(2)            That, in the interests of completeness, the Monitoring Officer’s delegated authority, under Section 33 of the Localism Act 2011, to grant a dispensation from the restrictions in Section 31(4) of the Act, which would allow members of the authority with a disclosable pecuniary interest to take part and vote on decisions in certain prescribed circumstances as set out in paragraph 1.3 of the report be included in the Members’ Code of Conduct at paragraph 7.7.4.