Minutes:
Preamble
A complaint was received from Michael Booley (the Complainant) regarding the conduct of Councillor Marliyn Ty (the Subject Member), a Member of Box Parish Council.
The complaint was centred around the publication of a Facebook post to a community site, which had been uploaded by the Complainant and detailed a photo of a Beefeater with a reference to ‘taking the knee’. The Complainant stated that the Subject Member breached the Box Parish Council Code of Conduct when she removed the post from the site and thereafter not responded to messages.
It was alleged that as a result the Subject Member had breached the principles of selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty and leadership has also breached the relevant code under paragraphs 1, 2, 3 and4.
The Subject Member contended that they were not acting in their capacity of a Parish Councillor, but instead as the administrator of a community run Facebook group, which was not political or affiliated with the parish council.
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Discussion
The Sub-Committee were satisfied that although the complaint had been received beyond the 20 day period from when the complainant first became aware of the matters giving rise to complaint, as this was the result of approaches to other parties for resolution and to technological issues not the fault of the complainant, the complaint should be considered under Protocol 11.
It was not considered, however, that the initial tests of the assessment criteria had been met, in that the Sub-Committee considered that on the available evidence the Subject Member had not been acting in her capacity as a member of Box Parish Council at the time of the alleged actions, but as a member of the community in her capacity as an administrator of the Facebook site mentioned.
The Facebook site in question was an open community site, set up by the Box Parish Discussion Group, as opposed to a restricted site which a Parish Council or parish councillor might operate. It was identified that followers of the site were able to upload posts initially without any restrictions or control and that whilst members of the Parish Council had used the site on occasion in the past to comment on local matters as the complainant had noted, the site was not managed on behalf of the Parish Council, which had been further clarified on the site.
Accordingly, whilst the Subject Member might act in her capacity as a parish councillor on the site occasionally, this did not mean that every action as a site administrator was itself taken in that capacity.
The Sub-Committee therefore decided that as the Subject Member was not acting in her capacity as a Member of Box Parish Council in this instance, the Code of Conduct could not be applied, and therefore the Complaint was dismissed.
They did not consider the allegation of a failure to respond to communications, would itself rise to a level of a breach of the Code.
In reaching its decision, the Sub-Committee took into account the original complaint and supporting information, the response of the Subject Member, and the report of the Monitoring Officer.
The Sub-Committee also considered a written statement from the Complainant provided prior to the Assessment Sub-Committee meeting on 11 February 2021. Neither party was in attendance.
Conclusion
The Sub-Committee was not persuaded, on the basis of the submissions, that the alleged actions of the Subject Member were carried out in her capacity as a Parish Councillor and as such the Code of Conduct could not be applied.
Therefore, it was,
Resolved:
In accordance with the approved arrangements for resolving standards complaints adopted by Council on 9 July 2019, which came into effect on 1 January 2020 and after hearing from the Independent Person, the Assessment Sub-Committee determined to take no further action in respect of the complaint.