ABOUT
Throughout the sector, there are growing concerns about the impact bullying, harassment, and intimidation are having on local (parish and town) councils, councillors, clerks and council staff and the resulting effectiveness of local councils.
The National Association of Local Councils (NALC), One Voice Wales, the Society of Local Council Clerks (SLCC) and county associations have responded to this by setting up a Civility and Respect Working Group to oversee the Civility and Respect Project.
CIVILITY AND RESPECT PLEDGE
NALC, SLCC, and OVW believe now is the time to put civility and respect at the top of the agenda and start a culture change for the local council sector.
The Civility and Respect Pledge is being introduced because there is no place for bullying, harassment and intimidation within our sector. The pledge is easy for councils to sign up for and it will enable councils to demonstrate that they are committed to standing up to poor behaviour across our sector and to driving through positive changes which support civil and respectful conduct.
We invite all councils to take the Civility and Respect Pledge.
The pledge
By signing the Pledge, your council is agreeing that the council will treat councillors, clerks, employees, members of the public, and representatives of partner organisations and volunteers with civility and respect in their roles and that it:
- Has put in place a training programme for councillors and staff
- Has signed up to the Code of Conduct for councillors
- Has good governance arrangements in place including staff contracts and a dignity at work policy
- Will seek professional help at the early stages should civility and respect issues arise
- Will commit to calling out bullying and harassment if and when it happens
- Will continue to learn from best practices in the sector and aspire to be a role model/champion council through for example the local Local Council Award Scheme
- Supports the continued lobbying for change in legislation to support the Civility and Respect Pledge including sanctions for elected members where appropriate
See who has taken the pledge
MISSION STATEMENT
Civility and respect should be at the heart of public life, and good governance is fundamental to ensuring an effective and well-functioning democracy at all levels.
The intimidation, abuse, bullying and harassment of councillors, clerks and council staff, in person or online, is unacceptable, whether by councillors, clerks, council staff, or public members.
This can prevent councils from functioning effectively, councillors from representing local people, discourage people from getting involved, including standing for election, and undermine public confidence and trust in local democracy.
NALC, county associations and OVW, as the membership organisations representing the first tier of local government in England and Wales, and the SLCC, as the professional body for clerks, are committed to working together to promote civility and respect in public life, good governance, positive debate and supporting the well-being of councillors, professional officers and staff.
To that end, the Civility and Respect Working Group will be working to deliver tangible resources, actions and interventions in four main areas: providing councils with the tools to support good governance; lobbying to strengthen the standards regime and encouraging more people to get involved; training; and processes to intervene to provide support to struggling councils.
PROJECT WORKSTREAMS
The group has identified a significant number of changes and improvements considered vital to provide support to help reduce and manage the issues related to bullying and harassment in the sector. These factors have been organised into six project workstreams that will deliver on the mission statement.
Training
A critical step in creating a safe and inclusive environment for local councils is making all councillors, clerks and council staff aware of the issues, what is — and what is not — acceptable. Knowing how to recognise and address bullying, harassment, discrimination, and inclusion is an essential step in prevention.
Training ensures that councils demonstrate that they do not tolerate these types of behaviour and provide the tools to intervene immediately, consistently, equitably, and appropriately when bullying occurs.
Governance
Bullying can have a detrimental effect on officers and is corrosive to leadership. It could lead to decision-making, not in the public interest and a failure of standards and governance.
Good governance is one of the building blocks of anti-bullying and harassment and is fundamental to ensuring an effective and well-functioning democracy at all levels.
Intervention
Sometimes relations in a council deteriorate beyond the ability to be repaired by the implementation of, and adherence to, good governance and comprehensive training of staff and councillors.
The council may have recognised that it cannot restore effective leadership, functionality and civility without support.
The project team is working on some strategies to support struggling councils.
Legislative
The Committee on Standards in Public Life undertook a review of Local Government Ethical Standards and, in January 2019, produced a report comprising 26 recommendations for legislative changes. The resulting recommendations included:
- The ability for the principal authority to impose sanctions on a parish councillor following a review.
- The ability for a local authority to suspend councillors.
- Mandatory training for clerks.
The lobbying of the government to implement these, and other recommendations, is ongoing within NALC and SLCC. The project will highlight the continuous action taken to progress these and other legislative changes.
Collaboration
The project team is working closely with the Local Government Association (LGA), Lawyers in Local Government (LLG) and other associations navigating their way through similar sector issues.
Enabling
The enabling workstream makes bullying and harassment information and support available to clerks and councils.
E-LEARNING
One of the key aims of the civility and respect project has been to deliver training support for councillors, clerks, and employees who experience difficulties with bullying and harassment and to start to address some of the causes of poor behaviour. NALC recognise that times and dates for webinars and training courses do not always suit the busy schedules of local council members and employees and that a blended approach is often needed to share vital information.
E-learning enables councils to respond quickly to learners’ needs, with flexibility and without having to organise physical training with fixed times and dates. Several county associations already offer a comprehensive range of e-learning options for clerks and councillors, and NALC is now pleased to be able to extend this further.
NALC is working with Nimble, online learning specialists, to enable councils access to a suite of engaging online learning at affordable prices available to everyone across our sector. Clerks and councillors in most areas can enrol and pay for courses online. If you are in South West, East of England, Derbyshire, Northamptonshire, Nottinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Staffordshire, and Warwickshire, you should enrol via your county association.
NALC welcomes any feedback on the e-learning modules and will use this to improve or update the modules to ensure they best meet the needs of our members.
To access the training, please visit the Nimble e-learning website. If you are in South West, East of England, Derbyshire, Northamptonshire, Nottinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Staffordshire, and Warwickshire, you should enrol via your county association.
*If your council is paying for the training, please ensure you have their permission to pay for the training before registering *
Standards in public life
This bespoke e-learning module has been developed by county associations in the South West region. It is primarily designed to support those elected or co-opted and/or working in local councils, to understand the principles of conduct expected of all councillors.
Information is based upon a national model code of conduct produced by The Local Government Association. Still, it recognises that councillors must abide by their own council's code of conduct and provides some generic support for those wishing to understand better the behaviours expected of all councillors.
Respectful and positive social media for councils and councillors
In this introductory e-learning module, we’ll consider the opportunities and risks associated with social media from a civility and respect perspective. We will explore a range of proactive and pre-emptive strategies councils, and councillors can implement to set themselves up for success. We’ll explore what to do if things go wrong and how to manage a range of scenarios from trolling to harassment, and practice what steps you can take.
Leadership in challenging situations for councils and councillors
In this introductory e-learning module, we will consider different leadership styles in the context of your role at the council, exploring which styles we personally ‘default’ to and which can work effectively for different situations. We will also discover how to build, support and get the most from an effective and motivated team.
Personal resilience for councils and councillors
In this introductory e-learning module, we develop a better understanding of where our behaviour comes from. We’ll consider what resilience means for us in the context of our roles within the council. There will be opportunities to explore role-focused scenarios and consider how we might respond to them. We’ll also explore strategies to deal with and manage various situations.
RESOURCES
Bullying and harassment statement
Local councils may wish to add a statement poster to their websites stating that bullying, harassment and intimidation will not be tolerated.
Download poster
Code of Conduct
One of the critical issues already identified by the project is that the Code of Conduct produced by the Local Government Association (LGA) in 2021 has not been widely adopted. The Civility and Respect project has endorsed the LGA model Code of Conduct and the guidance notes aimed to help understanding and consistency of approach towards the code.
The code is a template for councils to adopt in whole and or with amendments to take into account local circumstances.
The code and guidance have been designed to protect our democratic role, encourage good conduct, and safeguard the public’s trust and confidence in the role of councillor in local government.
While it sets out the minimum standards of behaviour expected, together with the guidance, it is designed to encourage councillors to model the high standards expected, to be mutually respectful even if they have personal or political differences, to provide a personal check and balance, and to set out the type of conduct that could lead to complaints being made of behaviour falling below the standards expected of councillors and in breach of the code. It is also to protect councillors, the public, local authority officers and the reputation of the local government.
Download the Model Code of Conduct
Code of Conduct supporting guidance
The Civility and Respect Project team has worked with Hoey Ainscough Associates Ltd to revise the Local Government Association (LGA) Code of Conduct guidance to reflect the needs of our sector better. The revised guidance has been approved for use by NALC and the SLCC and endorsed by LGA.
The LGA produced a revised code of conduct in December 2020, supported by a guidance document they first circulated in July 2021. The supporting guidance was a beneficial document but not tailored to the nuances of local (parish and town) councils. With the support of the LGA, the project team has revised the guidance to precisely reflect the needs of and situations relevant to local councils.
The guidance covers the following:
- The general principles of councillor conduct
- Application of the model councillors' code of conduct
General obligations under the code include:
- Respect
- Bullying
- Harassment
- Discrimination
- Impartiality
- Misuse of position
Protecting the reputation of the council, including:
- Declarations of interest
- Bias and pre-determination
Download the supporting guidance
Civility and Respect Continuum
The Civility and Respect Continuum illustrates how issues escalate over time. Our research has indicated that councils experiencing poor conduct or vexatious demands/complaints often experience problems repeatedly over a significant period of time. The longer an issue is permitted to continue, unaddressed, the more complex, time-consuming, and expensive the resolution becomes. This can eventually result in damage to the reputation of the council and health issues for those involved eventually ending with multiple resignations of both staff and councillors. Councils that have up-to-date policies and procedures, well-trained councillors and employees can often manage and mediate issues with or without advice and support from county associations and/or monitoring officers. Where councils become overwhelmed or fail to draw upon the resources available, matters can escalate and come under significant strain and pressure. In these situations, the solutions are often beyond the existing support offered and invariably best resolved by third parties, a costly and time-consuming challenge.
The project is identifying solutions to support councillors, officers, councils, and county officers at every stage of the civility continuum, however, whilst governance and training solutions may help with minor and moderate issues, the options for support at the major end of the scale become more limited. Support from monitoring officers and county associations may provide resolution in some instances but often issues have become too complex to resolve without costly interventions from specialist third parties. Every attempt should be made to prevent escalation by addressing potential behavioural issues as soon as they arise, calling out bullying and harassment at the earliest opportunity and standing up for civil and respectful behaviour.
If the issues within a council have escalated to critical, then the options for resolution are still further limited, with costly external resolution and legal support often being required to reach resolutions. Potential action/intervention at this stage is being piloted with a town council struggling with chronic issues. It is being overseen by the joint NALC/SLCC Internal Development Board. If the solution proves successful it may be possible to expand the support programme but much depends on the councils' willingness to make a positive change. Early intervention to head off chronic issues is a far more effective mechanism to handle poor behaviour.
Dignity at Work policy
The Dignity at Work policy is the first of a series of new or revised governance documents which are being developed by the project team. The documents have been reviewed by a focus group made up of clerks, councillors, monitoring officers, and county associations.
The Dignity at Work policy will replace any previous bullying and harassment policy. It encompasses behaviours beyond bullying and harassment and zero-tolerance to deal with concerns before they escalate. It has been produced with supporting guidance because it is essential that any commitment to the policy is applied in practice.
The wording has been suggested to demonstrate a council’s commitment to promoting dignity and respect where they have signed up to the Civility and Respect Pledge. Councils who have not signed up for this are requested to consider making this pledge which is based on basic behaviours and expectations of all council representatives to create workplaces that allow people to maintain their dignity at all times.
Download the Dignity at Work policy
The Dignity at Work policy refers to an Equality and Diversity policy. To access the template, please log in to the NALC website and visit the templates section.
Early Day Motion for Sanctions
Following the expiry of the first Early Day Motion (EDM), Dr Julian Lewis, MP for New Forest East, has tabled another EDM calling on the government to re-visit its response to the Committee on Standards in Public Life report on local government ethical standards including the introduction of tougher sanctions to deal with poor behaviour in local councils.
Members are urged to contact their local MPs and encourage them to sign this EDM
What are EDMs?
EDMs are motions submitted for debate in the House of Commons for which no day has been fixed. Whilst few are debated, many attract a great deal of public interest and media coverage.
They are used to record individual MPs' views or draw attention to specific events or campaigns. By attracting the signatures of other MPs, they can demonstrate the level of parliamentary support for a particular cause or point of view.
What can you do?
The more MPs who support this EDM, the more likely it is to get discussed in parliament. Please either table an agenda item to pass a resolution for your council to write to the local MP asking that they back this motion and have it discussed in parliament or write to your MP as an individual.
We’ve designed template letters which you can use to contact your MP on this issue. You may like to amend or personalise it with an introduction and sign-off; if appropriate, the inclusion of any personal experiences will help add context and influence.
Download the template letter for councils to MP
Download the template letter for clerks to MP
Please take the time to support us with this very important and worthwhile campaign so that we can start to make a change.
HR podcasts
One critical area that challenges relationships between councillors and clerks is the council’s responsibility as an employer for the clerk. Councils that support and value their staff can better deliver their objectives and adapt to changing needs or priorities. Whether the council employs a single member of staff for a few hours a week, or a large and varied team of individuals, good employment practice from recruitment to support and development is key to achieving the best outcomes for your communities.
The Civility and Respect Project team have worked with Chris Moses, managing director of Personnel Advice and Solutions Ltd, to deliver a series of podcasts explaining councils' responsibilities as employers.
Podcast #1 — Building an effective personnel committee
In this first podcast, Chris Moses explains the importance of ensuring local councils have an effective personnel committee, what the responsibilities of the committee are and gives an overview of the critical issues, including:
- Who is best suited to be on the committee?
- Effective terms of reference
- Having the right contacts
- Statutory requirements for effective line management
Watch the podcast
Podcast #2 — Recruitment
In this second podcast, Chris Moses covers the critical considerations for councils about recruitment, including:
- Deciding who in the council is responsible for recruitment
- Drafting the person's specification
- Designing the job advert around the needs of the council
- Objective/non-discriminatory selection criteria
- Asking the right questions in the right place at the right time
- Using objective and measurable methods to select the right person
- Entitlement to work in the UK and Inductions
Watch the podcast
Podcast #3 — Handling grievances
In this podcast, Chris Moses covers the critical considerations for councils about handling grievances, including:
- Who do employees complain to, and who has the authority to deal with these situations?
- Investigating complaints informally
- Deciding whether the council can resolve the complaint
- Code of Conduct complaints against councillors
- Conducting a formal grievance and appeal hearing
This is an introduction to the subject and should be viewed alongside current grievance policies. In any grievance process, it is so essential that the review panel is made up of impartial and independent councillors, and sometimes it is necessary to seek additional advice or to outsource the case to an HR service provider with specialist local council knowledge.
Watch the podcast
Podcast #4 — Handling disciplinary situations
In this podcast, Chris Moses covers some of the critical considerations for councils about handling disciplinary situations, including:
- Who has the right within the council to discipline staff?
- Conducting informal investigatory meetings
- Deciding how to support and encourage employees to improve and overcome their conduct/performance issues fairly and reasonably
- What if they don’t improve – formal disciplinary action?
- Getting the formal process and the paperwork right, including dismissals
This is an introduction to the subject and should be viewed alongside current grievance policies. In any grievance process, it is so essential that the review panel is made up of impartial and independent councillors, and sometimes it is necessary to seek additional advice or to outsource the case to an HR service provider with specialist local council knowledge.
Watch the podcast
Podcast #5 — Appraisals
In this podcast, Chris Moses covers some of the critical considerations for councils about appraisals, including:
- The purpose of appraisals
- Picking the correct appraisal form for your council
- How to prepare for the appraisal
- Asking the right questions in the right place and at the right time
- Action plans following appraisals
- Confidentiality
This is an introduction to the subject. More information and training may be available from your county association, and sometimes it is necessary to seek additional advice from an HR service provider with specialist local council knowledge.
Watch the podcast
Podcast #6 — Sickness and absence
In this podcast, Chris Moses covers some of the critical considerations for councils concerning sickness and absence management, including:
- Understanding the legal position
- Objectively measuring absences.
- Conducting reasonable investigations into chronic health issues
- Formal procedures to address the absences
- Making reasonable adjustments to accommodate people with disabilities at work.
- Terminating employment through the Capability procedure.
This is an introduction to the subject. More information and training may be available from your county association, and sometimes it is necessary to seek additional advice from an HR service provider with specialist local council knowledge.
Watch the podcast
Model councillor-officer protocol
A strong, constructive, and trusting relationship between councillors and officers is essential to the effective and efficient working of the council.
The purpose of this protocol is to guide councillors and officers of the council in their relations with one another. The protocol intends to build and maintain good working relationships between councillors and officers as they work together.
The document covers the following:
- The respective roles and responsibilities of the councillors and the officer.
- Relationships between councillors and officers.
- Where/who should a councillor or an officer go to if they have concerns?
- Who is responsible for making decisions?
Read the protocol
Recruitment guide
One key area that challenges relationships between councillors and clerks is the council’s responsibility as an employer for the clerk. Councils that support and value their staff can better deliver their objectives and adapt to changing needs or priorities.
The creation of, and appointment to any post, particularly the most senior job(s) in an organisation, is one of the most critical investments a council will make. The recruitment process presents legal requirements and key challenges in choosing the right person.
Whether the council employs a single staff member for a few hours a week or a large and varied team of individuals, good recruitment practices are the key to fostering good relationships.
Therefore, everyone responsible for or involved in staff recruitment must meet the challenges through a planned and structured process and understand the key issues and best techniques. This guide has been developed to assist you and your local council through all the stages of a successful recruitment campaign.
To access the guide, please visit the Development Tools section of the member's area
Roles and responsibilities guidance
Councillors and officers have different but complementary roles. Councillors, as the democratically-elected representatives of their areas, are there to set the budget and strategic direction of the council and ensure that the community’s priorities are identified and delivered. The responsibility of officers is to advise the council on whether its decisions are lawful and recommend ways to implement them. The council is responsible for decisions, and officers take instructions from the council as a body. They are not answerable to any individual councillor – not even the chair.
The roles and responsibilities document expands on the guidance given in the councillor-officer protocol, gives practical examples and explains some grey areas. It should be read alongside The Good Councillor's guide published by NALC and model councillor-officer protocol.
Read the roles and responsibilities guidance
Social media guide
Social media is a simple, quick and effective way of communicating. It allows a user to reach whole communities at the click of a button, which is perfect for community engagement. Councils and councillors can constructively engage with communities rather than simply broadcasting information. But unfortunately, in a small number of cases, councillors and councils can experience online abuse. Social media can become where individuals resort to abusive behaviour, such as aggressive language, threats, trolling and bullying. Building up your following on social media is more challenging if a small number of angry voices dominate.
The project team has collaborated with Breakthrough Communications to develop a new guide to social media for councils, officers and councillors to actively address the issues of civility and respect on social media. It is designed to guide you through the challenges of social media for local councils, from handling trolling to legitimate challenge and scrutiny, from smear campaigns to politics. The guide will help you use positive language to tone to shape engagement and the conversation, to find common ground and engage with various views.
There is also help on escalating issues, deleting and moderating comments, blocking abusive users, reporting online abuse and legal matters to the police or social media platforms and deciding when it is time to get off social media.
Read the social media guide
Training programme
One of the project's key aims is to deliver training packages to support councillors, clerks, and employees experiencing difficulties with bullying and harassment. We have worked with key partners to create a new series of packages covering local council and councillor communications and engagement.
Breakthrough Communications has created a suite of bespoke workshops and resource packs for local council clerks, officers, and councillors as part of the Civility & Respect Project. Each package comprises helpful guides, custom-designed toolkits, on-demand access, and live virtual training events. We have designed separate packages for clerks/officers and councillors, covering the themes of emotional intelligence and resilience, leadership in challenging situations, and how councils and councillors can avoid negative engagement on social media.
Resilience and Emotional Intelligence — What it means in practice for clerks and council officers by Breakthrough Communications
Delegate fee: £30
The learning content, live workshop, and toolkits will enable participants to develop a better understanding of where our behaviour comes from, consider what resilience means for us in the context of our different local council roles and will provide an opportunity to explore role-focused scenarios and how we might respond to those different scenarios. We'll consider strategies to manage and deal with different situations effectively and provide guidelines and suggestions based on worked-through scenarios. We'll also lead the user through a set of exercises, input and self-reflection and a resource pack for building our own resilience and emotional intelligence.
Register your place
Leadership in Challenging Situations — Dealing with challenging situations and working with others effectively by Breakthrough Communications
Delegate fee: £30
The learning content, live workshop, and toolkits will enable participants to deal with various role-focused challenging situations and explore how we can work with others more effectively. We will consider different leadership styles and approaches in the context of your role, exploring which styles we personally ‘default’ to and which styles can work effectively for different situations. We will explore scenarios of challenging situations we might face in our role and discuss how we might deal with these effectively and appropriately. We'll also consider how to build, support and get the most from an effective and motivated team.
Register your place
Respectful Social Media — How to deal with attacks and negative engagement by Breakthrough Communications
Delegate fee: £30
The learning content, live workshop, and toolkits will enable participants to explore different methods and strategies for dealing with negative attacks on social media and ways in which they can keep control of our social media output. We will consider how we come across on social media as councils, as well as individually, what our personal ‘digital tone of voice’ sounds like, as well as considering our use of language and its role in positive two-way communication and explore the type of content we can post on social media, depending on our role. For councillors, we will provide suggested social media do’s and don’ts: how to be effective on social media, whilst bearing in mind issues around the Code of Conduct, for clerks and officers will explore how the council can de-mystify the role of the council and showcase its people to help pre-emptively deal with negative engagement and attacks.
Register your place
Social media guide
Social media is a simple, quick and effective way of communicating. It allows a user to reach whole communities at the click of a button, which is perfect for community engagement. Councils and councillors can constructively engage with communities rather than simply broadcasting information. But unfortunately, in a small number of cases, councillors and councils can experience online abuse. Social media can become where individuals resort to abusive behaviour, such as aggressive language, threats, trolling and bullying. Building up your following on social media is more challenging if a small number of angry voices dominate.
The project team has collaborated with Breakthrough Communications to develop a new guide to social media for councils, officers and councillors to actively address the issues of civility and respect on social media. It is designed to guide you through the challenges of social media for local councils, from handling trolling to legitimate challenge and scrutiny, from smear campaigns to politics. The guide will help you use positive language to tone to shape engagement and the conversation, to find common ground and engage with various views.
There is also help on escalating issues, deleting and moderating comments, blocking abusive users, reporting online abuse and legal matters to the police or social media platforms and deciding when it is time to get off social media.
Read the social media guide