Report of the MPA Standards Committee

Report: 12
Date: 26 July 2007
By: Chief Executive

Summary

This report outlines matters considered at the meeting of the Authority’s Standards Committee held on 21 June 2007.

A. Recommendation

That the Authority receives the report of the Standards Committee.

B. Supporting information

1. The MPA’s Standards Committee met on 21 June 2007. This report summarises the main issues considered at that meeting. The agenda and reports of that meeting are available on the MPA website.

Model Code of Conduct

2. The Committee considered the Government’s new Model Code of Conduct for members. The Committee recommended that the Authority should adopt the Code and this was the subject of a report to the Authority meeting on 28 June, when the new Code was adopted.

3. The Committee asked the officers to ensure that members are given clear guidance on their obligations under the new Code, for instance on the requirement that gifts and hospitality worth more than £25 now count as a registerable interest that has to be declared as relevant for a period of three years after receipt.

Benefits for members

4. The Committee considered whether MPA members should be able to apply for benefits that can be obtained by MPS and MPA officers and staff. Like other public services – such as local authorities or teachers – there are a range of benefits that are available to MPS police officers and staff. For instance, someone showing a warrant card or police staff pass at certain shops or restaurants can obtain a discount. There is also a company that officers and staff can join through which a range of discounts can be obtained by purchasing vouchers for those outlets at discounted rates. These discounts are generally also available to MPA staff by virtue of having a security pass and therefore being part of the “police family”.

5. The Standards Committee considered whether access to these discounts should extend to MPA members. It was recognised that the outlets offering such discounts do so on a commercial basis. The benefit was not specific to a member but available to the “police family” in general, so it could not be said that a member was in receipt of a gift or hospitality that s/he should declare under the Authority’s Code of Conduct. Some experience from elsewhere suggested that it was unusual to extend staff benefits to Board members, although it was noted that London Assembly members can, for instance, obtain gym membership at corporate rates.

6. A member’s overriding duty is to conduct themselves properly in their office. For instance the general principles advise that “you should not place yourselves in situations where your honesty and integrity may be questioned, should not behave improperly and should on all occasions avoid the appearance of such behaviour.”

7. Similarly there are provisions in the Code which may touch on this:

• Paragraph 5 states “you must not conduct yourself in a manner which could reasonably be regarded as bringing your office or authority into disrepute” and
• Paragraph 6 (a) states that “you must not use your position as a member improperly to confer on or secure for yourself or any other person, an advantage or disadvantage.”

8. Although benefits such as discounted meals or shop/leisure vouchers relate to a members’ private, rather than official, life it may be considered that the production of their official pass means that they are presenting themselves in some way in an official capacity.

9. The Committee considered that it is not unreasonable that an MPA member should be able to access those benefits available to the “police family”, but that the Monitoring Officer should issue advice to all members to ensure that in doing so they do not place themselves in a position where they might breach the Code of Conduct.

10. The general principles of this advice are probably:

1. That members can apply for benefits that are advertised as available to MPS officers and staff
2. that they must abide by any conditions of receipt of those benefits
3. that they should not seek to extend those benefits to others where, for instance, a benefit is only available to a member of the “police family”
4. that they should not seek a benefit where none is advertised or clearly already available to the “police family”
5. that if there is any uncertainty about whether a benefit is open to them – for instance some benefits may only be available to police officers – members should not seek to gain that benefit.

11. The Committee agreed that the position should be reviewed in a year’s time and that the guidance should be aligned as closely as possible with any guidance given to the rest of the GLA family.

Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Bill

12. This Bill is currently at Committee stage in the House of Lords. It is the vehicle for taking forward the Government’s proposals for changes to the ethical standards regime. The proposals are aimed at devolving most decision-making on the conduct regime from the Standards Board for England (SBE) to local standards committees, with a revised, regulatory role provided for the SBE. Once the Bill becomes law, therefore, local standards committees will assume the SBE’s role of receiving and assessing complaints against members. The options open to standards committees will be either to refer the allegation to the authority's monitoring officer for consideration; to refer the allegation to the Standards Board; or to take no action in respect of the complaint. The other provision of note is that standards committees will have to be chaired by a person who is neither a member nor officer of the authority, i.e. an Independent Member of the committee.

13. The Greater London Authority are acting as a pilot to assess the implications of this significant change to the role of standards committees. MPA Standards Committee members and officers will be taking part in this pilot.

Standards indicators

14. At each meeting the Committee considers a set of indicators that give some measure of what can broadly be described as ethical/good practice standards in the MPA. These are presented on a quarterly basis so that over time the Committee can see if there are any trends or areas of concern. On this occasion the Committee identified no areas of concern although members did ask for the data to be presented in a way that made comparison between years easier.

C. Race and equality impact

Equalities issues were addressed in the individual reports to the Standards Committee.

D. Financial implications

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

D. Background papers

None

E. Contact details

Report author: Simon Vile, MPA

For information contact:

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

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