Agenda item

Joint report of the Comptroller and City Solicitor and the Director of Human Resources.

The Committee considered a joint report of the Comptroller and City Solicitor and the Director of Corporate HR.

A Co-opted Member stated that he had had the benefit of looking at Codes of Conduct for employees for other Local Authorities, particularly around the matter of conflict of interests. He went on to question paragraph 11 of the Code and asked whether it was implying that, if an individual’s interest were to be aligned with that of the City Corporation they would not be conflicted. He suggested that it should be made explicit that, if an Officer were to have a personal, pecuniary interest in any matter, they should not be able to exercise delegated authority in this matter. The Director of Corporate HR undertook to adjust the wording of the Code to adequately reflect this point and to highlight this to the Establishment Committee in their subsequent consideration of the document.

Another Co-opted Member questioned whether, under paragraph 23 of the Code, employees would be barred from lobbying Members on local issues should they also happen to be resident in the City. The Director of HR confirmed that this was not the intention. The Committee asked that it therefore be made clear that this was not an absolute prohibition.

The Chairman stated that both the Employee Code of Conduct and the Protocol of Officer/Member Relations were documents that were property of the Establishment Committee, however, this Committee also reviewed them annually and made recommendations to the Establishment Committee as necessary on their content. The Establishment Committee then took forward to the Court of Common Council if any amendments were necessary.

The Director of HR undertook to highlight the changes requested by this Committee to the Establishment Committee as part of their consideration of the document.

RESOLVED – That Members:

(a)  Note the report;

(b)  Approve the Protocol on Member/Officer Relations, as modified by this Committee in May 2018, for endorsement by the Establishment Committee and onward approval by the Court of Common Council where necessary;

(c)   Subject to the inclusion of the points made above, approve the Employee Code of Conduct for endorsement by the Establishment Committee.