January council meeting, part II

The headline news in last week’s Rye Observer was that Rye Town Council had decided not to increase next year’s local tax. Well done, Rye!
Across the border, residents will be paying 20% more to Icklesham Parish Council (more than quadrupling the parish tax since the first of us became a councillor in 2003). Ironically, one of the councillors who voted for next year’s tax hike lives in Rye!
Last week, we promised to report on the secret discussion at Icklesham Parish Council in January. Councillors were told that they were not even allowed to mention the subject of the discussion. However, the published agenda stated “staff matters”, which rather blew the gaff. It is also public knowledge that the parish clerk, who joined in May, resigned in November and that the parish council is advertising for a replacement. So, it is fairly obvious what the “staff matter” was about!
We were told that the reason for keeping the matter secret from voters was the right of council employees to confidentiality about the terms of their employment. However, the former parish clerk does not have a problem about discussion of the way the matter was handled.
First, it needs to be made clear that council employees such as clerks are employed by the council as a whole. No individual councillor or group of councillors has the authority to take an employment (or any other) decision on their own. This includes the chairman of the parish council, who has no executive powers and whose function is purely to moderate council meetings. All decisions must be made by the full council or by a committee to whom the full council has specifically delegated powers.
Second, it also needs to be made clear that the vice chairman of a parish council has absolutely no status unless and until the chairman is absent. Otherwise, the vice chairman is just another councillor.
Given this situation, the fact that the events which led to the resignation of the clerk involved the chairman and vice chairman acting alone and without the authority of the council is clearly a matter of concern. But if the clerk was unfairly dismissed, it is the council as a whole and tax-payers who would be penalised. When pressed in December, the chairman of Icklesham Parish Council refused to answer questions from councillors, even in secret session. He claimed that he had been advised by the Sussex Association of Local Councils (SALC) not to discuss the matter, even with councillors and despite the fact that councillors acting collectively as the council are legally the clerk’s employer. He failed to reveal to the council that the clerk had written a resignation letter setting out her side of events until he was specifically asked. He then agreed to copy the letter to all councillors and, when pressed, agreed to copy the advice he claimed to have received from SALC. It should be noted that it is council policy that all such external advice should be requested and taken in written form.
Following the December meeting, we informed the chairman that, unless the council was allowed to discuss the resignation of the clerk at the next meeting, we would use our power to call a special meeting to do just that. It was reluctantly agreed to include the matter in the January agenda.
By the time of the January meeting, councillors had still not been sent a copy of the clerk’s resignation letter nor a copy of the SALC advice as promised. The resignation letter was distributed at the meeting, leaving no time to read and absorb. The SALC advice continued to be withheld. After turning off the council’s expensive recording system, the chairman read a long and detailed statement justifying the actions of himself and the vice chairman. He then refused to answer questions from councillors or provide the council with copies of his statement.
Subsequently, the chairman has supplied copies of e-mails between himself and SALC. They contain no substantive advice.
So, the situation is that an employment problem may have been created by the unauthorised action of the chairman and vice chairman, who usurped the authority of the council, and that the council may as a consequence have been exposed unwittingly to a charge of unfair dismissal. However, the elected councillors are not permitted to know all the facts about the management of an employee for whom they collectively bear the legal responsibility as employer.

Secrecy in government, particularly at local level, is rarely justifiable, even if cloaked in terms of employee confidentiality, but can never justify withholding information from elected representatives. It can too easily be used to hide incompetence, indolence and dishonesty from the public, and avoid the scrutiny that is one of the fundamental safeguards of democracy.

What’s going on at Icklesham Parish Council? How would we know? We’re just elected councillors.
Cllrs Chishick, Comotto and Terry

Secret meeting

On 17 August 2009, Icklesham Parish Council held its out-of-term summer meeting. A meeting in August meeting was originally introduced expressly for the purpose of signing cheques that could not wait until September and, it was agreed that no other items should be tabled, given that August is a traditional holiday month and not all councillors would be able to attend.
This year, however, an extra item was, at the last minute, added to the agenda, "Matters relating to winchelsea.net website". Moreover, it was decided that the precise nature of these matters and the discussion of them would be confidential.
It was puzzling as to why the issue was regarded as so urgent that it could not wait just four weeks, until the resumption of normal Council business in September. Was it coincidental that Winchelsea ward councillors had earlier indicated that they would not be able to attend?
As it was, all three Winchelsea ward councillors were able to attend. One made a statement outlining the law surrounding the issue under discussion. It was clear that other councillors were totally unaware of the relevant law, despite being asked to make a decision with potentially dire financial consequences for the Council. The statement caused some consternation in the Council and subsequently one councillor complained that Winchelsea councillors "had been prepared". It transpired that members of the Council had sought external advice on the issue. However, neither the request for advice, nor the advice itself, were in writing. Indeed, the advisors concerned reportedly did not wish to give their advice in writing. With no text to consult and without the advisors being present, the Council was unable to answer fairly fundamental questions on whether the advice had addressed certain material points of law.
With the Council refusing to pass on the points raised by the Winchelsea councillors to its advisors, the issue has petered out, but serious issues of principle remain to be answered. Was the Council attempting an "ambush" of Winchelsea councillors by bringing, at the eleventh-hour, an item, supposedly of great import but not of any urgency, to the agenda of a meeting which is not intended for substantive business, which some Winchelsea councillors were expected to be able to attend and for which it was hoped Winchelsea councillors would be unprepared? Should advice on matters claimed to be so serious be sought and accepted verbally? Why were the Council's advisors not asked to attend? Should councillors make a decision on such matters when they do not understand the legal issues and financial consequences? Why did Council consider exposing itself to such a serious financial risk, instead of trying first to resolve the matter by a phone call?
Unsurprisingly, the meeting satisified no one. An unfortunate remark by the Chairman after the closing of  the meeting sparked a heated exchange (and more) between councillors. Fortunately, no members of the public were in attendance or the Council would have brought itself into utter disrepute.