Agenda item

To consider the attached Motion.

The Chair commenced by reminding Council that this was a Censure Motion and not a vote of no confidence as reported in the press and invited the Leader of the Labour Group to present the Censure Motion at this juncture.

The Leader of the Labour Group commenced by stating that this was a technical issue and the Motion needed debating.  Given the statement made by the Chair, he asked the Monitoring Officer to confirm whether this was correct because his understanding was that the Motion needed to be signed by at least 7 Members which included Members from at least two political groups to be valid and, therefore, did not require the support of two-thirds of Council.

The Head of Legal and Corporate Compliance advised that the Council’s Constitution did not make reference to a ‘vote of no confidence’.  There was, however, reference to a Motion to remove the Leader of the Council which may have been construed as a vote of no confidence and in order to achieve the removal of the Leader, the Constitution stipulated that two-thirds of the Members present must support the Motion.  This Motion had been defined as a ‘Censure Motion’ and said that in her opinion as the Monitoring Officer, this was the appropriate label for this Motion.  

The Leader of the Labour Group said that motions of no confidence were common place across the country and they could take place and were allowed to be considered.  These motions were not required to meet the two-thirds threshold for removal of the Leader, so in essence this was a motion of no confidence and a motion to debate.  The Leader of the Labour Group continued by presenting the Censure Motion as follows:

The recent Council meeting of 7th February 2022 dealt with the long-awaited report by Audit Wales into, ‘Deficiencies in Blaenau Gwent County Borough Council’s governance and oversight of Silent Valley Waste Services.’ 

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When questioned on 7th February, the Managing Director, Michelle Morris, revealed that Councillor Daniels had been a recipient of the original whistleblowing letter where the officer was named and other parties who had received this letter included the Lead officer, Trade Unions and Deputy Leader.

The officer named in the report was working for the Council and this meant that on 22nd March 2018, Councillor Daniels had known that the recipient of the proposed flexible retirement was amongst those being investigated by both Gwent Police and Audit Wales for seven months before that meeting took place. Councillor Daniels had deliberately withheld this information from his Council colleagues, who were completely ignorant of those involved in the investigation. 34 Members had been present at this meeting, 32 of whom had no idea that this officer was involved in the on-going investigations.  The Leader of the Labour Group believed that if Members had been made aware of this information, he felt that this unsafe report would not have been supported.

For the reasons outlined above the Members who had signed the Censure Motion had no confidence in the Council Leader, Councillor Nigel Daniels.

The Leader of the Council commenced by stating he would respond by way of a statement but said the one question that no-one had ever asked him was did he or had he had sight of the whistle-blower’s correspondence complaint and the answer was that no he didn’t and no had not been sighted on this letter.  The fact that he recently learned that his name was included on a copy circulation list was not proof that he had received a copy of the letter.

He, thereupon, provided the following response to the Censure Motion by outlining the chronological facts:

Council had received the whistle-blower’s correspondence in August 2017 which had made a number of unsubstantiated allegations against 13 former and serving officers of the Council. It was only when Audit Wale informed Council that he was aware that 13 officers were originally under investigation.   The correspondence had been dealt with properly under the appropriate procedure and referred to Audit Wales for investigation in 2017.  Importantly the whistleblowing procedure provided confidentiality and anonymity for any complainant and therefore, any sharing of the letter or information included in that letter would breach that confidentiality and the Whistleblowing Policy.  Even if he had had sight of the complaint and clearly if any officer or Member had shared it, they would have breached that confidentiality and the Council’s Code of Conduct for both Members and officers. Therefore, to give the benefit of doubt to the officer who had been the primary recipient of the complaint that may have been the reason why the Leader had probably had not been provided with a copy that was intended for him.

The Leader of the Council confirmed that he had been briefed about the complaint by a senior officer without any names or details being shared with him but he had been told to keep it confidential and not discuss or share the fact that any such complaint had been received and when he had asked about the detail, he had been told it was not appropriate for that information to be shared with him due to the very nature of the whistleblowing procedure. Therefore, the accusations contained in the Motion and in the press release accusing him of hiding details of the police inquiry from Councillors was absolutely wrong.  In addition, for accuracy the Managing Director had been quoted in the Motion and press release that as stating he had been the recipient of the whistleblowing complaint, in actual fact the Managing Director had only confirmed that his name was on the copy circulation and being shown as copied into correspondence and this was far from proof of actually receiving that correspondence. 

With regard to the Senior Management Review, the outcome of the review had recommended that the officer in question be granted flexible retirement and this had been dealt with correctly under the Flexible Retirement Policy and the officer had moved to a more junior position in the finance service as allowed under the policy.  The Leader said that the Managing Director or Head of Legal and Corporate Compliance may wish to confirm at some point, the fact that there would have been no justification for not granting flexible retirement for that officer who at the time was subject to allegations that were unsubstantiated and unfounded and it was not until the draft Audit Wales report was received in November 2021 that the seriousness of the allegations against the officer were confirmed.   The Leader stressed at that point in time he still had no knowledge of who was named in that report, who the complaints had been directed at or what the nature of the complaints were.  He also stated that only 6 out of the 13 officers named in the original letter were named and criticised in the final Audit Wales report.

With regard to the police investigation, Audit Wales had referred the whistle-blowing complaint to Gwent Police in January 2018 and Gwent Police had only confirmed they would investigate this complaint in July 2018, some 4 months after the Senior Management Review had been agreed by Council and during that time of the review, the officer in question had not been under police investigation.  The Leader advised that he was now given to understand that mindful in July 2018 there were 2 current officers were under police investigation, the Managing Director had taken external legal advice to ascertain whether the officers who were part of that police investigation could remain in work or whether suspension should be considered.  This legal advice had confirmed that suspension was not appropriate simply because an investigation was underway and no action should be undertaken by the Council which could be seen to pre-empt the outcome of any investigation and for this reason both officers remained in work during the police investigation.  The Leader stated that again perhaps the Managing Director may wish to confirm this that the advice was clear and that consideration of formal action should only be considered once the outcome of the Gwent Police and Audit Wales investigations were known. In September 2019 Gwent Police confirmed they would be closing the investigation and that no action would be taken against any former or serving officers.

Audit Wales published its report on 27^th January, 2022 and this was accepted on 7^th February, 2022 by Council at which it was also agreed that an internal investigation should take place with further legal advice being sought to confirm the scope of this investigation.  The Leader of the Council said he hoped that this explanation provided a factual account of events and more importantly demonstrated that he had not deliberatively or otherwise withheld information from Council or Members.

The Leader continued by briefly addressing the accusations made regarding lack of transparency, inclusion, respect and deliberately withholding information.  He said that the vast majority of people who knew him be it politically, professionally or a member of the public knew that these were traits that were alien to him and completely opposite to what he was about and he certainly would not have withheld any information that could have willingly been shared with Council if he had been aware of it. Subject to confirmation from the Managing Director and Head of Legal and Corporate Compliance he clarified the following:

-      The Leader had never been sighted on the whistleblowing correspondence and even if he had been sighted then the Whistleblowing Policy and the Members Code of Conduct would have prevented him from disclosing any details pertinent to the issue.

-      The Managing Director had only stated the Leader had been on the copy circulation and had not said he was a recipient of that correspondence.

-      There was no justification not to grant flexible retirement in accordance with Council policy to the officer in question. 

-      The Gwent Police investigation did commence in July 2018, 4 months after the Senior Management Review had been considered and agreed and legal external advice had been sought which, clearly confirmed that formal action should not be pursued against the officers until the outcome of the Audit Wales work and police investigation were known. 

-      Gwent Police closed their investigations in September 2019 with no further action being taken. 

-      Council agreed the Audit Wales report in February 2022 and also agreed that an internal investigation should take place following further legal advice being sought to scope out the investigation.

The Leader of the Council concluded by stating that he had attempted to keep the response measured as possible to address what he considered an unnecessary and unwarranted motion.

The Leader of the Labour Group pointed out that not only the Leader was on the circulation of the original whistleblowing letter but also had been included on the circulation of the response.   He pointed out that the formal police investigation had commenced in July 2018 but a prior investigation had taken place in August 2017 before the police confirmed that a formal investigation would take place. He could not accept that the Leader had not had sight of this correspondence and said that surely in the discussions between the Leader and Chief Executive that the fact that these officers had been involved in serious allegations would have been mentioned.  He concluded by stating that this on-going investigation had prevented the Council’s accounts being published for a number of years.

At this juncture, the Managing Director confirmed the following points of factual accuracy:

-       At Special Council on 7^th February, 2022 the Managing Director had confirmed that the Leader and Deputy Leader had been copied in at the bottom of the whistleblowing correspondence.  As she had not been in post at that point in time, she was unable to contest either way if they had received a copy of the letter.

-      The chronology outlined by the Leader was correct. It was the case that the police investigation was confirmed and commenced in July 2018.  External legal advice had been sought in July 2018 which had confirmed that although allegations had been made against the two officers, these were unfounded and unproven so for that reason no action was taken at that point in order not to pre-empt the outcome of the Audit Wales work or the police investigation.

The Head of Legal and Corporate Compliance clarified the following points of accuracy:

-      The Leader of the Labour Group had stated that there were only two officers named in the whistleblowing letter who at that time were currently employed by the Council.  In fact, this was not correct and there were a number of officers employed by the Council at that time that had been named in the correspondence.

-      Whilst the Head of Legal and Corporate Compliance had not provided legal advice to the Lead Director or the Leader when the letter had been received in 2017, her advice would have been that the contents of the letter containing those bare allegations should not be shared with anyone because that would be contrary to the both the Whistleblowing Policy and the Members Code of Conduct.

-      The Head of Legal and Corporate Compliance advised Members that in British law a person was ‘innocent until proven guilty’ and until the process had been followed whether that was a criminal or civil process or an audit undertaken by a regulator, everyone was innocent of charges until properly proven and on-one should  be subjected to any detriment by virtue of a mere allegation being made.

Following a lengthy discussion, a recorded vote was then taken on the Motion as follows:

In Support of the Motion – Councillors  P. Baldwin, D. Bevan, M. Cross, P. Edwards, L. Elias, K. Hayden,
H. McCarthy, J. Millard, J. C. Morgan, K. Pritchard, T. Sharrem, T. Smith, S. Thomas, H. Trollope, D. Wilkshire, B. Willis and L. Winnett.

Against the Motion – Councillors J. Collins, M. Cook, N. Daniels, D. Davies, G. A. Davies, G. L. Davies, M. Day, D. Hancock, S. Healy, J. Hill, W. Hodgins, J. Holt, J. Mason, C. Meredith, M. Moore, J. P. Morgan, L. Parsons, G. Paulsen, K. Rowson, B. Summers, G. Thomas, J. Wilkins.

The Motion was, therefore, not carried.

RESOLVED, subject to the foregoing, that the above-named Censure Motion be not supported.