Agenda item

To submit the report of the Propriety and Elections Manager.

To approve the Action Plan, which includes the three following elements of support that can be offered to community council members and clerks on matters related to the Code of Conduct:-

1. Advice on specific matters - Continue to contact the Monitoring Officer or the Deputy Monitoring Officer. 

2. Cyngor Gwynedd Website - Standards Committee page to include information and guidelines along with links to other useful websites.

3.Training - Hold a virtual training session in the form of a 'webinar'.

Submitted – the report of the Propriety and Elections Manager inviting the committee to approve the action plan to meet the matters raised in the Report of the Chair and the Community Committee Member following their consultation with a selection of clerks regarding the ethical framework.

The Chair thanked the former Chair, and the Community Committee Member for all the work that was happening in the background.

The Community Committee Member was invited to present his observations on the action plan.  He noted:-

·         That he welcomed the report, and that there was an understanding of the duties of the County Council and the Standards Committee, and that the duty of the committee was to look after, and try and raise the standards of the community councils.

·         That he agreed with the recommendations in the report, but wished to add that a letter was being sent to all the town and community councils noting the decision of the committee so the clerks and chairs were aware that it was possible for them to contact the Council's Legal Department for advice on specific matters.

·         That the virtual training session in a 'webinar' style would protect us if people claimed that the hadn't had the opportunity to attend training. Bearing this in mind, it was very important that this training was offered.

·         That the other matters raised were administrative issues for the County Council to consider and were totally separate to the work of the Standards Committee.

In response to the Community Committee Member’s observations, the Monitoring Officer noted:-

·         That the clerks had previously contacted the Legal Department for advice on specific matters.

·         He had passed the report for the attention of the Corporate Services so that there was an  awareness of the matters raised regarding how the Council generally responds to enquiries.

During the ensuing discussion, the following matters were raised:-

·         It was suggested, once the virtual training session was available on the Council website, that Unllais Cymru could ask every town and community council to include it as an item in their next annual meetings, so everyone could see this. It was also suggested that around 20 minutes of training would be sufficient.  In response, the Monitoring Officer noted that the training would be around an hour long, and would portray the main points in terms of the Code of Conduct.  He also noted, once the training was on the website, that it would be possible for councils to use it, whether this was before, or during the meeting of the Council when everyone was together.

·         It was suggested that there would be no need for the town and community councils to include the training annually and that maybe once following every election would be sufficient, unless new members join the council.  In terms of getting the message across to the chairs and clerks, it was suggested that this was included in the letter that would be sent out, at the request of the Community Committee Member, noting the decision of this committee.

·         It was noted that the biggest problem was declaring an interest, and that people did not understand that they needed to leave the meeting when discussing the matter they had declared an interest in.  In response, the Monitoring Officer noted that the declaring an interest arrangement was complicated as it was trying to prepare for every possibility. Generally, the main matters that they came across when declaring an interest were comparatively simple, and there was a short leaflet available to guide members through the process step by step. Sometimes it was a matter of equipping the clerk to be more robust. The more ambiguous interests were at a town and community council level, and maybe the challenge in terms of the training was removing the complexity and keep it fairly simple. More complicated matters did not crop up very often in the system, and it was important to get the basics correct, and worry less about the more esoteric ones.

·         It was noted that the idea of presenting the training as an item in the council’s annual meetings was agreed, but it was suggested that an hour-long presentation was too long, and that messages would be lost. Rather, a 15–20-minute video would be sufficient, with around an hour of more detailed training tailored for clerks.  It was also suggested that it would be beneficial to include 3-4 case studies as a way of highlighting the principles behind declaring an interest and to support people to concentrate the mind, but those cases should be very simple ones where the situations are obvious and clear.  In response, the Monitoring Officer noted that he fully understood the observation in terms of watching an hour-long video, but that compacting training on the Code of Conduct to an hour, including case studies, was quite a challenge in itself. He explained, that if there is a complaint to the Ombudsman, the member is asked if he/she has received training, and that it would be hard to leave that down to the Clerks, as there was a variety of clerks in terms of experience across the county.  It was agreed that there was a need to include the interactive element to keep the training alive and interesting, and it was proposed to look at the format, with the possibility of running a pilot before the committee if time and the work programme of the committee allowed.

RESOLVED

To approve the Action Plan, which includes the three following elements of support that could be offered to community council members and clerks on matters related to the Code of Conduct:-

1.       Advice on specific matters - Continue to contact the Monitoring Officer or the Deputy Monitoring Officer. 

2.       Cyngor Gwynedd Website - Standards Committee page to include information an guidelines along with links to other useful websites.

3.       Training - Hold a virtual training session in a 'webinar' style.