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Complaint no. LA/Fa/82

Concerning an alleged contravention of The Councillors' Code of Conduct by Councillor David Alexander of Falkirk Council

1. Complaint number LA/Fa/82 alleged a contravention of the Councillors' Code of Conduct ("the Code") by Councillor David Alexander ("the respondent").

2. It was alleged that the respondent had contravened the Code, in particular, section 3.16 relating to the disclosure of confidential information.

3. The person complaining ("the complainant"), Councillor Linda Gow, alleged that the respondent disclosed confidential information of a private nature, which was not yet public or which would not be intended to be public. This information was that a currently serving Member of Parliament had been, in 1999, an unsuccessful applicant for a middle management post in the Education Department of Falkirk Council.

4. It is understood that the Member of Parliament involved in this case has made a number of public remarks in which the respondent believed that the MP had been unfairly critical of the performance of Education Officials in Falkirk Council. The respondent stated that by referring to the MP's unsuccessful job application when being interviewed by a journalist from a local newspaper, he, the respondent, was merely identifying a fact which he claimed was already public knowledge and which he believed provided a motive for the MP's criticisms.

5. The MP concerned has confirmed that he was an unsuccessful candidate for a middle management post with Falkirk Council's Education Department in mid 1999. He was, however, unable to recall the specific title of the job applied for and advised that he did not discuss his job application with other people.

6. In her complaint the complainant wrote "as well as being Leader of the Council, Mr Alexander is Chair of the Appointments Committee. Future applicants for posts within the Council can have no confidence in the fact that their applications will remain confidential" and "I believe Mr Alexander's actions have brought the Council into disrepute but more serious is the loss of faith any applicant, particularly those with connections to (the MP concerned), can have that the Council's job application process if fair, equal and confidential. The respondent is the Chairman of the Council's Appointments Committee and the complainant is a member of that Committee. The Committee appoints Heads of Service and Directors and plays no part in appointments to middle management posts, such as that for which the MP was an unsuccessful applicant in 1999.

7. The respondent stated that he obtained the information about the MP's unsuccessful job application from a member or members of the Labour group and that he obtained this information at the time when the MP was seeking to be adopted as a candidate in the last Parliamentary elections.

8. The complainant and the MP did not believe that a member of the Labour group would have provided the respondent with this information and both suspected that the information was provided by a Council Official. At the request of the complainant, in May and June 2004 the Chief Executive of the Council carried out an investigation into this possibility and found no evidence to suggest that the information was inappropriately disclosed to an elected member by any member of staff.

9. The complainant was of the view that regardless of how the respondent got the information, in his position of Leader of the Council, he was well aware that it was confidential and not available to be used "as part of a political dirty tricks campaign".

10. The respondent's position was that the information was common knowledge within Falkirk Council members and that it could not have come from sources other then internal Labour sources. He argued that he had not contravened the Code as the information was already within the public domain, did not emanate from Falkirk Council sources and was not gleaned from his duties as Leader of the Council. He stated that the information had been obtained by him as an SNP member and not as a Falkirk Councillor.

11. It was found that there was no evidence that the information emanated from a Council Official or Council source. There was no doubt, however, that the respondent when discussing the information with a journalist was doing so in his capacity as a councillor and Leader of the Council.

12. It was found that the source of the information was not relevant to this investigation and that whether or not the information was "public" was debateable. Further that while the respondent's use of the information might have been regarded as having been unwise, there was no evidence that he obtained the information in his capacity as a councillor.

13. Having considered the information arising from my investigation, I concluded that, Councillor David Alexander had not contravened the Councillors' Code of Conduct.

D Stuart Allan,
Chief Investigating Officer.
Forsyth House
Innova Campus
Rosyth Europarc
Rosyth
Fife
KY11 2UU
05 October 2004