Janet Fasan, Director of Legal and Interim Monitoring Officer introduced the report. She explained that the new Model Code of Conduct from the Local Government Association had been published and the Committee should therefore determine to what extent they wished to adopt the new code or whether any local variations would be appropriate. She noted that, whilst the language did vary, the general scope of the new code was very similar to the existing Tower Hamlets Code of Conduct. However, there were a few differences and these were highlighted in Appendix 2.

It was noted that the Tower Hamlet’s Code had last been reviewed in 2018/19 and it was part of the Committee’s workplan to conduct a yearly review.

The Committee then discussed the report. It reviewed Appendix 2 setting out the key differences between the new Code and the existing Tower Hamlets code.

Points discussed included:

·       When the Code would apply to Members and whether some activities would be considered part of the Member’s private life and therefore exempt.

·       Requirements around general standards of conduct, bullying and harassment.

·       Impartiality of officers and making decisions and appointments on merit.

·       How rules around use of resources, allowances etc were set out.

·       How sanctions for breaching the code were covered.

·       That the model code was proposing to increase the gifts threshold to £50 and the need for clarity over what ‘significant’ meant around declared and rejected gifts. There was some support on the Committee for keeping the declaration limit at £25.

·       A change to the wording around interest types with new Registerable and Non-Registerable interests.

·       The new code referred to the ‘Public Interest’ test which was a useful point to highlight. It was noted that the existing Constitution did not define how the ‘Public Interest’ was determined.

The Committee discussed the report and expressed the view that the new Model Code of Conduct was well written and had also been through a lot of consultation and development work. It therefore made sense to adopt it as the new Tower Hamlets code subject to any specific revisions which were felt appropriate.

It was agreed that a sub-group of the Committee should develop a proposed final code which could then be presented to the Committee for agreement before forwarding to Council for final determination.

RESOLVED

1.    The a sub-group be established to work on a proposed new Code of Conduct, based on the new Model Code of Conduct.