Issue - meetings
Monitoring Officer's Report
Meeting: 19/05/2010 - Standards Committee (this Committee has now been combined wit the Audit, Standrds and Governance Committee and no longer meets) (Item 6)
6 Monitoring Officer's Report 
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[To receive a report from the Monitoring Officer on any matters of relevance to the Committee.]
Additional documents:
Minutes:
The Committee noted the contents of the Monitoring Officer’s (“MO’s”) report and the following issues were raised during the consideration of this:
(i) Member Investigations and Associated Matters
The Deputy Monitoring Officer (“DMO”) highlighted to Members (in regards to Standards Committee Complaint Reference 94/09) this was the first instance whereby a complaint had been referred back to the Assessment Sub-Committee under Regulation 16 (1) of the Standards Committee (England) Regulations 2008, during the course of an investigation. The investigation was still ongoing and once concluded would be referred to the Standards Committee for consideration in the usual manner.
The MO responded to comments from the Committee with regards to Complaint References 95/09 and 106/09 to 110/09 that had been directed back from Standards for England (“SfE”) to the MO. The Committee felt disappointed as an extensive debate had taken place during the Assessment Sub-Committee meeting. The MO accepted the concerns expressed and advised that she had spoken with SfE and explained to the Committee the reasons given and also the need for consistency in decision making. The MO confirmed this would not cause a hold up to the ongoing investigations into the complaints arising from the meeting of the Full Council held on 29th July 2009.
(ii) Member Training
Mrs. G. Bell had undertaken her mandatory standards training with the Monitoring Officer and Deputy Monitoring Officer on 21st April 2010. The MO advised Members that it was proposed that joint training for both the Bromsgrove and Redditch Standards Committees’ would be carried out by an external firm of solicitors before the end of June 2010 in order to comply with the requirement that Members were trained before the end of June 2010. The Ethical Standards Officer would notify Members of the confirmed date, time and venue. Members were requested to notify the Ethical Standards Officer of any dates in June when they would be unavailable for training.
In accordance with the Council’s Constitutional requirements, refresher training for all relevant board/committee Members had been arranged for all Members to be suitably trained in order to carry out their functions on the boards/committees to which they have been appointed. The Learning & Organisational Development Manager would keep a record of refresher training attended which would be policed to ensure that Members had completed the required elements of this. The MO highlighted that extremely positive responses had been received from Members of the Planning Committee who had attended the recent refresher planning training carried out by the Head of Planning Services for Bromsgrove and Redditch. The MO informed Members that Redditch Borough Council was arranging a 2 day planning training session in July 2010 also available to Bromsgrove Members. Bromsgrove District Council would look to run two further ongoing planning training dates in August / September 2010. The MO had requested Officers provide her with details of the compulsory elements they considered relevant for the service area they were responsible for in order to provide Members with support and relevant training during the ... view the full minutes text for item 6