1 week Ago By [email protected] (Daniel Holland)
An investigation into a bullying claim against a former council leader is taking an “unacceptable” length of time to reach a conclusion, councillors have complained. The Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) revealed last September how senior Newcastle City Council director Michelle Percy had lodged a complaint against the authority’s then leader, Nick Kemp. The Byker ward councillor, who has strenuously denied the allegations, subsequently stepped down as council leader and has since quit the Labour Party.
An external law firm was appointed to carry out the investigation into the complaint in November . But, five months later, the findings of that probe have still not emerged. Members of the council’s audit and standards committee were told on Tuesday that the authority is yet to receive the report back from the investigators and that no timescale for its conclusion has been set – despite previous hopes that it would have been finished by April.
Labour councillor Hazel Stephenson said the lack of a resolution was “totally unacceptable” for all concerned. The long-serving Benwell and Scotswood representative said: “For the person who has made the complaint, for the witnesses who have presumably substantiated it, and for the person being investigated..
. the length of time is something I would not wish to continue, for everybody’s sake. Particularly when people are coming into the building and it must be a difficult situation for all concerned.
” Coun Stephenson also raised concerns about how much money the investigation is costing city taxpayers, with Liberal Democrat Greg Stone adding that costs “tend to go up and up” when lawyers are carrying out more work than originally expected. Les Watson, the committee’s independent chair, added: “We are aware it has been going on for some time. We don’t say it should be hurried or rushed, because it needs to be done properly and freely.
[But] committee are concerned about the length of time and the impact it is having on all parties concerned.” John Softly, the council’s monitoring officer, said that concerns had been raised about the length of time the investigation was taking and that the council wanted the outcome known “as swiftly as is reasonably possible”. He confirmed that a maximum budget for the exercise had not been set, but that the council was currently satisfied that “all of the time being incurred is being properly incurred” and that there had been a “significant amount of evidence and individuals involved".
Mr Softly added: “At the end of the day, the overriding objective has to be that the investigation is carried out correctly. I think it is one of those things where an investigator will not be able to predict from the outset how long it will take, necessarily. It will depend on the evidence and what the witnesses say.
It is difficult to try to impose a deadline for the completion of any investigation.” Join our Breaking News and Top Stories WhatsApp community for all the latest news direct to your phone. To join you need to have WhatsApp on your device.
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