Report of the Standards Committee

Report: 12
Date: 25 March 2004
By: Clerk

Summary

This report updates the Authority on the work of the Standards Committee.

A. Recommendation

That the Authority notes this report.

B. Supporting information

Background

1. The last meeting of the Standards Committee, on 27 February, received a report from the Audit Commission on a review of ethical standards in the Authority. One of the issues addressed in the review was the Standards Committee’s responsibility ‘to promote and maintain high standards of conduct by members of the Authority’. The Audit Commission is looking for greater proactivity in this regard and the officers will develop an action plan for the Committee to consider at its next meeting.

2. In the meantime, the Committee discussed some ways in which it can make sure that all members have the opportunity to keep abreast of ethical standards and conduct issues. It was agreed that, as a starting point, there should be a report to the full Authority after each meeting of the Committee, so that there is a formal recognition of the importance of conduct issues, and also to give all members the opportunity to discuss them. This paper is the first such report.

Setting high ethical standards

3. As mentioned above the Committee received a draft version of the Audit Commission’s review of ethical standards in the MPA. This assessed the extent to which the Authority has met and responded to the requirements for those in public life to meet high standards of conduct.

4. The main conclusions of this review are as follows:

“The MPA has established a standards committee in line with the requirements of the Local Government Act 2000. External independent members were appointed following an open and transparent appointments process. All members have signed up to the code of conduct and a register of interests has been established.

The Standards Committee meets reasonably regularly and has full agendas when it does. However, activity in respect of raising standards and promoting good conduct has to date been confined to this committee. The challenge now is to ensure that this is shared with members across the authority, and employees of the Authority. There is a commitment to undertake a baseline assessment of standards and understanding, and it is important that this happens so that resources can be focused on addressing the areas of greatest need.

The forthcoming GLA elections and possible appointment of new independent members to the Authority provides the committee with an opportunity to ensuring members are giving a good grounding in the issues through the members’ induction process. Some consideration has been given to how the committee should approach any investigations referred to it by the Standards Board. This is positive, but it is important that formal procedures are introduced, and that the terms of reference of the committee are expanded to include this. Consideration also needs to be given to the role of the monitoring officer in any investigation so that potential conflicts of interest are avoided.”

5. The officers will now prepare a response to the review’s recommendations. This will be agreed with members of the committee and the final Audit Commission report will be circulated to all Authority members.

Reviews of members’ expenses

6. The Committee received draft reports from both External and Internal Audit on their reviews of the processes and procedures for the payment of members’ expenses. Neither review identified any major weaknesses but pointed to a number of areas where improvements can be made or procedures tightened up. The main findings can be summarised as:

• the need to ensure that all pages of all claims are authorised and that no space is left on the forms for additional claims to be added
• expenses must be backed up by receipts and a fuller description of the expense claimed
• where exceptional action has been taken (e.g. to agree an unreceipted claim or to purchase airline tickets direct because of a price advantage), then this action must be documented to provide an audit trail
• that claims were not always submitted on a timely basis and some were significantly late

7. The Committee noted the following responses to the review recommendations:

• a cover sheet has been introduced summarising each claim and stating how many pages are included in the claim. This is signed by the manager and the administrator
• every page of each claim will be signed by the manager and the administrator and any unused lines in the claim forms will be crossed off
• members will be asked to provide better information of the reason for the claim and the journey involved
• receipts are now required and an unreceipted claim will not be paid unless the Clerk has, in exceptional circumstances, authorised it. The Committee supported the view that it would be impractical to require receipts for public transport
• in future, documentation will be kept on file to demonstrate any action or decisions taken out of the ordinary, such as the Clerk authorising unreceipted claims, or the direct purchase of an airline ticket referred to by Internal Audit
• in January the full Authority agreed to introduce a three month deadline for the submission of claims during the year and a 30 April deadline at the end of the financial year
• continued efforts will be made to ensure that payments made are accurate and are in respect of valid expenses claims

Protocol on member / officer relations

8. This is the subject of a separate report on the agenda for this full Authority meeting.

Third Annual Assembly of Standards Committees

9. This event is arranged by the Standards Board for England as a forum for monitoring officers, standards committee members and other local authority professionals to consider and discuss issues of mutual concern. The Authority was represented at the first two conferences and the committee has agreed that, subject to their availability, the two independent members should attend on its behalf.

Local investigation and determination of misconduct allegations

10. Initially, any allegations of member misconduct investigated by an Ethical Standards Officer (ESO) on behalf of the Standards Board for England were reported to a (national) Adjudication Panel for decision. Last year a local element was introduced which enabled ESOs to report their findings to local standards committees for determination, depending on the seriousness of the case. The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is now consulting on draft regulations which will enable investigations to be carried out locally by monitoring officers or their appointees and determined by standards committees. The main points are:

• ESOs will be able to refer an allegation for local investigation at any point before they complete their investigation. Circumstances when this might be done include where the matter does not require the heavier penalties available to the Adjudication Panel; when the matter is an isolated occurrence; where the allegation is of an entirely local nature and does not raise matters of principle
• monitoring officers can appoint someone else to conduct the investigation, so that they can continue to advise the standards committee
• it is open to monitoring officers to refer an allegation back to the ESO, for instance if their local investigations uncover evidence of a more serious nature
• on completing their investigations, monitoring officers (or their appointees) can conclude either that there has been no breach of the code of conduct (and therefore no action required) or that there has. In both instances the monitoring officer must report findings to the standards committee for decision – in the latter case a hearing would result, on the same basis as for hearings following a report by an ESO
• under the existing regulations, the deliberations of standards committees on a case referred by an ESO are regarded as exempt information. It is proposed that this should also apply to cases investigated by the monitoring officer

11. As these draft regulations had only just been published the Standards Committee did not have the opportunity to consider a response. The officers will draft a response to be cleared with committee members by the mid-May consultation deadline.

Next meeting and membership

12. It was agreed that the next meeting of the committee should be held on Friday, 23 July. Committee members gave a vote of thanks to Cecile Wright who has been the committee’s Chair since its establishment and who is standing down as an MPA member at the end of the current four-year term. Thanks were also given to Nicholas Long who, although a more recent member of the committee, had made a valuable contribution to its work.

C. Equality and diversity implications

Any implications were addressed in the individual reports to the Standards Committee.

D. Financial implications

None.

E. Background papers

• Reports to the Standards Committee, 27 February 2004

F. Contact details

Report author: Simon Vile, MPA.

For more information contact:

MPA general: 020 7202 0202
Media enquiries: 020 7202 0217/18

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