We aim to uphold high ethical standards among Councillors and Co-opted members of the Council. This page explains how you can complain about a Councillor if you feel there has been a failure to uphold the standards.
If you would like a copy of this information in Braille or on audio tape, please phone the Head of Democratic Services on 0191 211 5159.
If you need help understand this information you can also phone the Head of Democratic Services on 0191 211 5159 who will try to help or will arrange for someone to talk to you in your own language.
This information explains how the Council will deal with complaints against Councillors and Co-opted members of Committees and Sub-Committees
A complaint against a Councillor can be:
This procedure will not be used if the matter concerns a Council policy or a Councillor's decision to support or to refuse to support a cause.
This procedure does not replace the Council's Corporate Complaints Procedure. If you are unhappy with something the Council has done or failed to do, you should use the Corporate Complaints Procedure.
You can make a Corporate Complaint:
You can complain to the Council's Standards Committee that a Councillor has not observed the statutory Code of Conduct for Members.
You should send your complaint to:
The Standards Committee
Newcastle City Council
c/o Mr Stuart Ovens
Monitoring Officer and Head of Corporate Law
Civic Centre
Newcastle upon Tyne
NE99 2BN
Any complaint should be made using an appropriate Complaint Form - Alleged Breach of Members' Code of Conduct (pdf, 342Kb) also available from the Council's Head of Corporate Law, or Head of Democratic Services.
If you want to complain that a Councillor has broken one of the Council's local protocols, you should send your complaint to:
The Standards Committee
Newcastle City Council
c/o Mr Stuart Ovens
Monitoring Officer and Head of Corporate Law
Civic Centre
Newcastle upon Tyne NE99 2BN
Phone: 0191 277 7122
Fax: 0191 277 7127
E-mail: stuart.ovens@newcastle.gov.uk
Any complaint should be made using an appropriate Complaint Form - Alleged Breach of a Local Protocol (pdf, 58.5Kb) also available from the Council's Head of Corporate Law, or Head of Democratic Services.
A sub-committee of the Standards Committee will look at your complaint and decide whether to take any action. It may refer the complaint to the Council's Monitoring Officer to investigate or to take some other action. In exceptional cases it may refer it to the Standards Board, now known as Standards for England.
If you complain to us that a Councillor has not observed one of the Council's local protocols, a sub-committee of the Standards Committee will look at your complaint and decide whether to take any action. It may refer the complaint to the Council's Monitoring Officer to investigate or to take some other action.
You can download a copy of:
These are also available from the Customer Service Centres and Libraries.
We currently have six Customer Service Centres:
You can get further advice from the Head of Democratic Services at the Civic Centre. Phone: 0191 211 5159 or e-mail: ian.poll@newcastle.gov.uk
You can contact an independent person or organisation, such as:
The Local Government Ombudsman investigates complaints about councils. It aims to get councils to put things right if they have gone wrong and if this has affected you directly.
You can contact the Local Government Ombudsman about your complaint at any time. You can get leaflets about how to complain to the Local Government Ombudsman from any of our Customer Service Centres, Libraries and Sports Centres. The Ombudsman’s address and telephone number are listed below.
Local Government Ombudsman
PO Box 4771
Coventry
CV4 0EH
Phone: 0845 602 1983 / 0300 061 0614
Text: 0762 480 4323
E-mail: advice@lgo.org.uk
Fax: 0247 682 0001
Website: www.lgo.org.uk
Page last updated: 16 August, 2011
