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Complaint no. LA/E/536 concerning an alleged contravention of the Councillors' Code of Conduct by Councillor Donald Anderson of City of Edinburgh Council

1. Complaint number LA/E/536 alleged a contravention of the Councillors' Code of Conduct ("the Code") by Councillor Donald Anderson ("the respondent").

2. It was alleged that the respondent had contravened the Code, in particular, the provisions of paragraph 3.17 respecting the Use of Council Facilities.

3. The person complaining ("the complainant"), Councillor Alastair Paisley, alleged that the respondent used the Council's computer facilities to circulate a letter containing party political content.

4. During the autumn of 2006 public attention was drawn to the dilapidated state of public playing fields and pavilions by a former Edinburgh Evening News sports reporter. In response to press coverage which he considered to be critical of the Council, the respondent contributed a letter to the Evening News. The letter was drafted by the respondent and typed by council staff. The respondent then instructed council staff to circulate copies of the letter to all those who had contacted him in relation to the concerns. This list included all except 3 of the elected members and 212 other individuals. A short amount of council staff time was expended on typing and distributing the letter.

5. On examination of the text of the letter submitted for publication in the Edinburgh Evening News on 13 October 2006 it was evident that the criticism of Conservative and SNP policy was historic and, indeed, extended to previous poor performance by the Labour Administration when Councillor Cardownie (then a Labour member but now a member of the SNP group) had responsibility for sporting facilities. No exception could be taken to the submission of such a letter for press publication.

6. In practical terms the time expended by the respondent's personal assistant in typing the original letter, and subsequently circulating it to e-mail recipients, was minimal and probably no longer than 30 minutes. The content of the letter could not reasonably be regarded as related either to an imminent Council meeting or an ongoing electoral campaign and thus could not be regarded as having a 'campaigning' purpose or character.

7. The issue in terms of the Code was whether Council staff and facilities should have been employed in the preparation of the letter, its transmission to the Evening News, and its subsequent transmission to e-mail recipients who had expressed an interest in the issue.

8. At interview the respondent distinguished the content of the letter from more overtly political documents which he considered would have breached the prohibitions cited in the Council's own Code of Conduct on the Use of Electronic Communications, the Councillors' Code, and the guidance issued by the Monitoring Officer in his letter of 16 January 2007. In the respondent's judgement his letter to the press was simply a statement of the Labour Group's performance, albeit contrasted with that of opposing political groups, and contained no material that could be regarded as campaigning in the electoral sense. When drafting the letter he had not however applied his mind as to whether it could be considered as being political to the extent that the Code would be breached.

9. The respondent's personal assistant was aware of the prohibition on political content and was clear that she would refer such material to her line manager for advice. She was uncertain however as to what precisely constituted political or campaigning content and it might therefore have been appropriate for the Council to consider whether more detailed guidance, possibly including examples of permitted and prohibited material, was required. The Council might also have wished to consider whether guidance should be contained in a single document rather than the ICT Acceptable Use Policy and separate Code of Conduct on the Use of Electronic Communications.

10. The circulation by individual Councillors of press articles was not normal practice within the Council and raised the question of the respondent's motivation in so doing. While his explanation of simply seeking to advise interested parties of the Labour Group's commitment to continued investment in sporting facilities was reasonable, I also acknowledged as reasonable the inference drawn by the complainant that the letter was self or party promotional.

11. In terms of the Code I considered that while the letter made political points and could be taken as promoting Labour Group policy in making a commitment to improve the condition of sporting facilities, there was no ongoing political debate or impending political decision which the letter, when circulated by e-mail, might reasonably have influenced. In this context I was mindful that the letter was already in the public domain, and that its subsequent circulation was not restricted to elected members. I noted also that the covering note to which the e-mailed letter was attached contained no additional comment and merely sought to draw attention to the attached original letter. With these facts in mind I did not consider that the respondent's actions in using the Council's staff and facilities to prepare and submit the letter, or its subsequent e-mail circulation, were such as could reasonably be taken to breach the Code, and I found accordingly.

12. As already indicated, an inference could reasonably have been drawn that the letter was self or party promotional and, accordingly, I endorsed the guidance issued by the Council's Monitoring Officer on 16 January 2007 with the additional suggestion to consider and monitor its practical implementation by administrative staff in cases where there might be, or appear to be, a party political element involved.

13. Having considered the information that arose from my investigation, I concluded that Councillor Donald Anderson had not contravened the Councillors' Code of Conduct.

D Stuart Allan,
Chief Investigating Officer.
Forsyth House
Innova Campus
Rosyth Europarc
Rosyth
Fife
KY11 2UU
23 March 2007