Agenda item

The Council noted a report of the Head of Legal and Democratic Services which informed of the work of the Standards Committee during 2015/2016 and set out the future direction which the Committee intended to take during 2016/2017 (for copy see file of Minutes).

Councillor K Shaw, Chairman of the Standards Committee informed the Council that the report advised of the work of the Committee during the previous year and also set out the proposed direction for the current year.  Whilst there was no requirement for Standards Committees to produce an annual report, it was felt that doing so demonstrated good practice.

The report set out the Code of Conduct complaints which had been dealt with during the previous two years. There had been an increase in the number of complaints received in 2015/16, however this was partly due to groups of complainants submitting the same complaint. The Code of Conduct was intended to govern serious issues of misconduct.

On 18 November 2015 the Chairman of the Committee and the Monitoring Officer had hosted refresher training on the Code of Conduct for delegates from all Parish and Town Councils. With elections to the County Council and Parish and Town Councils to be held in May 2017 training on the Code of Conduct would be arranged for new members.

Councillor Shaw thanked the Monitoring Officer and her staff for their support during the year, and Councillor Williams, the outgoing Chairman of the Committee.