Slough Borough Council: Complaints on a councillor's conduct

Complaints on a councillor's conduct

All councillors should behave with the utmost integrity and propriety. They are required to give a written undertaking to abide by a code of conduct which sets out how they should behave when acting in their capacity as a member of the council.

The code of conduct is set out in Part 5 of the council’s constitution. The constitution can be found below.

If you want to complain about the conduct of a member of Slough Borough Council or a member of one of our parish councils, you must submit your complaint to the Chair of the Standards (Assessment) Sub-Committee. Before 8 May 2008 all complaints about possible breaches of the code were dealt with by the Standards Board for England.

Below you will find:

Guidance on the policy
Guidance notes on how to complete the complaint form
An online complaint form

The Standards (Assessment) Sub-Committee can only deal with complaints about the behaviour of a Member. It will not deal with complaints about things that are not covered by the Members’ Code of Conduct.

If you make a complaint to the Standards (Assessment) Sub-Committee it must be about why you think a Member has not followed the Code of Conduct.

A breach of the code may include:

bullying
disclosing confidential information
disreputable conduct
improper use of their position
misuse of Council facilities or resources
failure to declare a personal or prejudicial interest
accepting inappropriate gifts or hospitality or failing to declare gifts and hospitality

The Standards (Assessment) Sub-Committee can decide to:

refer your complaint for investigation
take other action
decide that no further action should be taken and a reason for this decision will be given

Where the decision of the Sub-Committee is to take no further action, the complainant has the right to ask for a review of the decision. Where the complainant exercises this right the review will be conducted by the Standards (Review) Sub-Committee. The Review Sub-Committee will apply the same criteria used for the initial assessment and consider the complaint with 'fresh eyes'.

Both the Standards (Assessment) Sub-Committee and Standards (Review) Sub-Committee must explain the reasons for their decisions.

Copies of the Standards (Assessment) and Standards (Review) Sub-Committees’ decision notices are available for inspection by application to June Cook, Member Services Manager, Town Hall, Bath Road, Slough or call: 01753 875019.

All complaints referred for investigation or other action will be managed by the council’s monitoring officer, Steven Quayle, Borough Secretary and Solicitor.

The results of investigations and any action against a councillor will be determined by the Standards (Local Determination) Sub-Committee, which like the Standards (Assessment) and Standards (Review) Sub-Committees comprises independent and elected members.