NATIONAL CODE OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT CONDUCT (Hansard, 13 June 1989)

§ Mr. Matthew Taylor
I beg to move amendment No. 205, in page 25, line 1, leave out `for the guidance of members of local authorities'.

Mr. Deputy Speaker
With this we will take amendments Nos. 206, in page 32, line 2, leave out `recommended'.
and 207, in page 32, line 29, leave out 'guided' and insert 'bound'.

§ Mr. Taylor
I and my hon. Friends have tabled these amendments because without them, in our view, clause 24 is a worthless piece of bureaucracy designed to do nothing but facilitate the contempt in which many members of both Labour and, particularly, Conservative councils continue to hold the current national code of local government conduct.
As I have said, those councillors—and they are the overwhelming majority from all parties—who are honourable people will naturally accept whatever guidance is given them by the Secretary of State so long as it continues to be in the spirit of the current code. However, if the need is to improve the quality of local government it is not to those people that the Secretary of State needs to be addressing himself. It is to others who do not follow that code in a way that I believe is fitting within local government and who do not accept the guidance contained in the code.
Clearly, Ministers believe that they should follow the code, but when it comes to people such as, for example, the Conservative leader of Kingston council, who, despite having been given several specific opportunities, refuses to endorse the code, we cannot have confidence that they will follow it. Asking such people to be guided by such a code is like asking a kleptomaniac to be guided by the Ten 826 Commandments. It just will not happen. They clearly do not believe that they should be so guided. They will not be so guided and the Ministers should be doing something about it. Any councillor who is not prepared to be bound by the national code of local government conduct should clearly not be a councillor in the first place.
The amendment is designed to ensure that councillors, when elected and working on local authorities, are so bound. If Ministers genuinely believe that they should follow the code there is no reason for them not to accept these amendments. I hope that the hon. Lady who is to reply will accept that this is about controlling those who are determined, despite holding positions of responsibility, not to be bound by the code unless they have to be. Nothing in the Bill will do anything to affect the conduct of those who are determined not to follow the Minister's wishes and what are my wishes and, I suspect, the wishes of the overwhelming majority of the population.

§ Mrs. Virginia Bottomley
I will not disagree with the hon. Gentleman about the importance, the value and indeed the necessity of increasing the code's prominence. That is why we have been busy updating the national code of local government conduct, which will be prescribed by the Secretary of State and approved by Parliament. Councillors will be required, on taking office, to declare that they will abide by the code.
I am not able to accept the hon. Gentleman's amendment because it reflects a misunderstanding of the nature of the code. It is a frame of reference providing broad principles and general guidance to members, but it is not a definitive rule book. It lays down important standards of behaviour, but it deals with matters which, by their nature, are not sufficiently clear-cut to be given statutory force.
The imposition of a requirement of the kind suggested by the hon. Gentleman would require a different approach to the format, style and content of the code and that would risk damaging its value altogether by trying to make it something that it clearly cannot be. To impose the code on members and to alter its advisory status would endanger the acceptability of the code among members and complicate the code.
However, we are strengthening the code, updating it and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will prescribe it. In addition, there is the material difference that the local ombudsman, on investigation of a case, will, if he believes that maladministration has resulted from a breach of the national code, be required to name the individual involved unless he believes that it would be unjust to do so.
I hope that the hon. Gentleman agrees that that represents a significant enhancement of the status of the code and will make all involved realise the weight that the Government attach to it.

§ Mr. Matthew Taylor
I am not satisfied that anything will be done to tackle the abuse of current councillors who say that they do not accept the nature of the code. Simply asking them to agree to be guided by it means little if they do not believe in the principles that it embodies in the first place. Nothing that the Minister has said will do anything to make them follow it.
However, I shall not press the amendment since we are about to debate two amendments which may allow the 827 Minister to modify her position. If she accepts amendment No. 208 it will give the ombudsman the power to take some action against individuals who act in the way that I have suggested. However, I shall come to that matter in a moment. In that respect only, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.