Councillor Rejects Complaint Hearing Findings, Saying: ‘I Have No Regrets’

Published on: 12 Sep, 2017
Updated on: 12 Sep, 2017

Yesterday’s sub-committee hearing of the complaints against Cllr Reeve of the Guildford Greenbelt Party. Cllr Reeve, in white shirtsleeves, can be seen in the centre facing the chairman and council officers. To his right are the other four sub-committee members, in jackets.

Complaints against a Guildford borough councillor were yesterday (September 12) upheld by a sub-committee of fellow councillors. They found that Cllr David Reeve (GGG, Clandon & Horsley) had disclosed confidential information, brought the council into disrepute and had failed to treat others with respect.

Complainants Cllrs Paul Spooner and Caroline Reeves.

The complaints made by Council Leader Paul Spooner (Con, Ash South & Tongham) and the Leader of the Opposition, Cllr Caroline Reeves (Lib Dem, Friary & St Nicolas) were made following the distribution of an analysis by Reeve on the housing figure calculations included in the Strategic Housing Market Assessment (SHMA), an essential component of the Local Plan.

Cllr Reeve claimed to have found a significant flaw in the assessment of housing need resulting from economic growth calculations; the error resulted in an overestimation of Guildford’s housing need of the order of 2,000 or more homes. The analysis was circulated to parish councils and resident associations in the borough.

Sub-committee chairman, Cllr Gordon Jackson hearing evidence of the complaints against Cllr Reeve. To his left is GBC’s deputy monitoring officer, Sarah White.

Reeve admitted that one item of confidential data on Guildford’s economic forecast was used by him but argued that, in this case, he considered the public interest superceded the need for confidentiality.

The hearing, held in Guildford Borough Council’s (GBC) council chamber in Millmead, was well attended by members of the public, most of whom appeared to be Reeve supporters.

Announcing the sub-committee’s decision a sometimes hesitant, nervous looking, sub-committee chairman, Cllr Gordon Jackson (Con, Pirbright), a qualified solicitor, said: “We take account of the very strong arguments you have made in relation to the mitigating circumstances and in particular the extent of the information that was revealed and… we do not think it will have any long-term impact.”

Explaining the sub-commitee’s decisions, Jackson said: “The committee do not accept the [de minimis] argument… and in the opinion of the committee there is no concept of a technical de minimis breach; either confidential information has been released or it hasn’t.

The sub-committee who heard the complaints (from left to right): Cllr Richard Billington (Con, Tillingbourne, Colin Cross, (Lib Dem, Lovelace) Gordon Jackson, chairman, (Con, Pirbright), Nigel Kearse, (Con Ash South & Tongham), Nigel Manning (Con, Ash Vale).

“In determining whether the disclosure was in the public benefit the sub-committee has taken into account [legal precedents] … and we consider that the tests do not apply in this case.”

Cllr Jackson concluded that the sub-committee agreed with the independent investigator’s recommendation that Cllr Reeve be asked to apologise to Laura Howard, the council’s principal planning officer, and to undergo one-to-one training on the councillor code.

It is understood that the decisions of the sub-commitee were not unanimous.

Independent investigator Olwen Dutton presenting her findings.

Reacting to the findings, Cllr Reeve showed little contrition, saying he had no regrets over his action and would do it again. He also refused to agree to one-to-one training on the councillor code but did apologise to Laura Howard: “…to the extent that any offence was taken by her.”

Reeve also said that he was: “…extremely pleased that the sub-committee did not recommend that I apologise to Cllr Spooner because I do not think that there was anything, as you [the sub-committee] agreed, that I need to apologise to him for”.

He continued: “I feel that I have served the people who elected me as well as I possibly could and I have no regrets about what I did and, under the same circumstances, I would do it again.”

The report of the hearing, its outcome and Cllr Reeve’s refusal to undertake the recommended training will now be sent to the full council.

Processing the complaint was reported by GBC, at the end of June this year (2017), to have cost £13,183 up to that time. Cllr Reeve told The Guildford Dragon NEWS that the further cost of the independent investigator to prepare for the hearing and council officer time would probably take the total to about £30,000.

It is understood that final legal advice on whether the proceedings should be held without the complainants present was only received by GBC’s deputy monitoring officer Sarah White shortly before the hearing. The advice, given by a Queen’s Counsel, was that the hearing could proceed.

Cllr Reeve told The Dragon that he may seek further legal advice on the propriety of the hearing. Neither Cllr Spooner or Cllr Reeves attended the hearing and therefore could not be cross examined.

Council Leader Spooner reacted after the hearing yesterday to news of the outcome: “I am pleased that the panel upheld the substantive complaint at today’s hearing although I was disappointed that Cllr Reeve was not asked to apologise to council for his actions.”

Cllr Angela Gunning.

Labour councillor Angela Gunning (Stoke) one of the most experienced councillors at GBC, who did attend the hearing, said today: “Cllr Reeve conducted himself with great dignity and competence. He presented a well argued justification for his actions.

“Although he did indeed admit to revealing some confidential data – it transpired in the hearing that this amounted to one item out of 8,000 and he suggested that it was ‘de minimis’ [a legal term meaning too small or trivial to be meaningful or taken into consideration].

“As for the two further charges of bringing GBC into disrepute, and treating officers and fellow councillors with disrespect – in my opinion the evidence was thin and rather subjective. I was surprised that, of the panel of four councillors, only two asked any questions.

“I came away feeling rather depressed; this has taken 18 months to investigate, and I wonder at what cost?”

Cllr Reeve at yesterday’s hearing.

Today, reflecting on the hearing, Cllr Reeve said: “Despite the council’s head of planning e-mailing me, copied to the council leader, that the council would not enter into negotiations or discussions the SHMA methodology, I was accused of being disrespectful by failing to discuss my report with the council before issuing it, even though I proposed, in writing, a meeting when releasing it and on two subsequent occasions.

“This is an example of Orwellian doublethink of the most disconcerting kind.

“In my opinion, the public interest in understanding the derivation of the housing numbers in the Local Plan completely outweighs my disclosure of confidential material in both extent – one number from a spreadsheet of over 8,000 numbers – and in character – Experian’s assessment of the number of jobs in the borough in 2013, hardly a state secret.

“I also think that the arbiters of whether a councillor has brought the council or his office into disrepute, should be the people he represents rather than a sub-committee of councillors.

“Parish councils within my ward wrote to the council to state in the strongest terms that I had not done so. Why did the hearings panel disagree?”

“I am completely baffled by the verdicts that were reached, and I am sure that the majority of residents – in possession of the full information – would take the same view. Indeed, I have already had many e‑mails, phone calls and statements to that effect.

“If this is justice, something serious needs to change in Guildford.”

The webcast of the hearing can be accessed here.

Responses to Councillor Rejects Complaint Hearing Findings, Saying: ‘I Have No Regrets’

Penny Panman Reply

September 13, 2017 at 8:21 am

I would like to thank David Reeve for the time and effort he dedicated on our behalf in investigating the accuracy of the SHMA. No other councillor showed such commitment.

I believe that Councillor Spooner reacted in a fit of pique and that his accusations were an emotional response to an intellectual problem. For reasons best known to herself, Councillor Reeves backed him despite declaring that she ‘didn’t have the head space’ to understand the issue.

I have known David Reeve for many years, and if you were to ask me who of my acquaintance most personified integrity, he would be the man. His moderate and dignified behaviour throughout this pointless process typifies the man.

In contrast, Cllrs Spooner’s and Reeves’s decisions not to attend the hearing that they brought about beggars belief. Who really brings Guildford Borough Council into disrepute?

Just as one begins to hope that the “Rotten Borough” might be trying to reinvent itself, this happens.
Mike Murphy Reply

September 13, 2017 at 3:25 pm

He is doing a brilliant job in challenging the “Dodgy Dossier” that this dreadful council obtained to allow them to build over our precious green belt.

The only reason they want to build so many thousands of houses is to get the payout of over £7,000 per house from the government.

Virtually none of these proposed houses will be starter homes they will nearly all be in excess of £450,000.
Jean Page Reply

September 13, 2017 at 8:01 pm

When will Guildford Borough Council accept that the electorate is against its plans to cover the green belt with housing?

The planned housing will not benefit those people who cannot afford to buy a home but will be for those who are on a large wage who can afford to buy a house anywhere.

The housing crisis does not affect those who can afford to buy it affects those who need social housing for which there is an enormous queue.

When will the council listen to the people who elected them? I am just disgusted.
Caroline Reeves Reply

September 14, 2017 at 7:47 am

I would like to point out that I did not “take a decision not to attend the hearing,” the agreed date for the hearing was when I would be out of the UK on holiday. There was difficulty in finding a date, and because the matter had gone on for so long I agreed that it was better that it was held on a date that I could not attend rather then let it go on even longer.

My complaint was never about the SHMA figures, as I made clear several times, it was about a breach of confidentiality which all councillors, when sworn in after election, agree to have a duty to respect.

Cllr Reeve and I have worked together on a number of topics through various working groups, and while we obviously don’t agree on this one subject of confidentiality, we have a good working relationship on other things and having discussed this with him yesterday, we will continue to do so.
Valerie Thompson Reply

September 14, 2017 at 10:40 am

Cllr Reeves should have cancelled her holiday.

Her failure and the failure of Cllr Spooner to appear at the hearing is appallingly rude, discourteous, disrespectful…the very words you used to accuse David Reeve, who has done a remarkable job, despite the difficulties put in his way by GBC, to make an accurate assessment of housing needs in Guildford.
David Roberts Reply

September 14, 2017 at 11:57 am

The behaviour of Cllr Reeves is not the behaviour of a “leader of the opposition”.

It’s a bit late to clarify her complaint. If she ever put it in plain English to Cllr Reeve, let’s see it. As far as I know, she was “happy for someone else who we have employed to do it for me”. Did she understand anything at all about the SHMA?

I note the “verdict” was not unanimous. Perhaps Cllr Cross would like to comment?
Jules Cranwell Reply

September 14, 2017 at 3:59 pm

Cllr. Reeves should applaud a fellow councillor who puts the public interest first and foremost.

Put simply, this data should never have been withheld from the public, as the SHMA is required by law to be “reproducible by others”. How can it possibly be reproduced, if the prohibited “black box” method is used?

Concealing important data from the public who paid for it, leads to the conclusion that the Executive has something to hide.

Until such time as the Executive truly embraces openness and transparency, as required by statute, I’m afraid Guildford will remain a fully paid up member of the “Rotten Boroughs” club.
Penny Panman Reply

September 14, 2017 at 4:23 pm

I do apologise to Councillor Reeves for maligning her with regard to her absence at the hearing. It was unfortunate that no mutually convenient date could be found, which would have made for a fairer discussion.
Kes Heffer Reply

September 16, 2017 at 12:19 pm

Others correspondents have already expressed views similar to those below, but the topic is of such importance as to bear repetition.

A section of councillors, led by Councillor Paul Spooner (Conservative), has wilfully caused a significant sum from our council taxes, reasonably estimated as about £30,000, to be spent on an exercise that has been described as “a farce and “a pantomime”.

To couch this in reality, £30,000 means, for example, that about 25 households have paid, quite likely in some cases with a degree of financial difficulty, Band ‘A’ Council Tax for the year for what should be judged a frivolous undertaking by the councillors involved.

Even more damaging than the waste involved was the implicit suspicion that the formal complaints against Cllr David Reeve (Guildford Greenbelt Group), that occasioned the puerile process, was undertaken because of his quest to perform and make public an independent assessment of an important basis of the draft Guildford Local Plan.

For those not familiar with the whole sorry saga, Councillor Reeve had been accused, through formal complaint by Councillor Spooner, supported by Councillor Caroline Reeves (Liberal Democrat), of releasing to the public, back in July 2016, one piece of council-held data.

That piece of data, far from any state secret, or of any personal nature, was this: the historical number of jobs in Guildford in 2013.

Cllr Spooner labelled this “a gross breach of confidentiality”.

Cllr Reeve included that number, and only that number, from a report given to him by a GBC officer on a confidential basis (which he was otherwise very careful to respect), as part of his own calculation of the number of houses required over the period that is covered by the draft Guildford Local Plan.

Seemingly oblivious to democracy or transparency, GBC has kept the housing number formula and supporting data secret from the public. As far as the general public has been told, the numbers might have been divined by palmistry, belomancy or inspection of sheep entrails.

GBC’s excuse for not releasing the data was that its provenance was a report by a contracted consultancy, which was labelled as commercially confidential.

Aside from the issue of why GBC should obtain a fundamental input to our Local Plan from a paid-for consultancy, let alone via confidential means, it should be noted that the parties purported to be injured by the release of the estimate of the number of jobs in Guildford in 2013 were officers of GBC, as well as the consultancy concerned (which, as far as is known, has not taken any action themselves over the release) and the whole institution of GBC itself, which has apparently been brought into disrepute.

On the contrary, as others have claimed, the action taken against Cllr Reeve is much more likely to have brought the council into disrepute.

Neither the investigating officer, a contracted solicitor paid by GBC, nor the councillors sitting in judgement, considered the public interest was an over-riding principle that far outweighed the negligible release of data, the view that Cllr Reeve had rightly taken.

This reveals the lack of importance the adjudicating councillors place on the democratic right of the public to be fully informed about the process of formulating the Local Plan.

It should also be widely recognised that those overseeing Monday’s hearing into Councillor Reeves’ actions, carrying out the mission initiated by their Leaders, were Councillors Gordon Jackson (Conservative), Nigel Manning (Conservative), Nigel Kearse (Conservative), Richard Billington (Conservative) and Councillor Colin Cross (Liberal Democrat).

It has been reported that the verdicts, which found Councillor Reeve culpable over the three allegations against him, were not unanimous. But no-one from the sub-committee has publicly disassociated themselves from the verdicts.

To the audible astonishment of the public attending Monday’s hearing, where I was present, the complainants who set this whole expensive saga in motion, Councillors Spooner and Reeves, were themselves not present to witness its completion, or to answer any cross-examination.

Councillor Reeves has subsequently written that she was, “…out of the UK on holiday. There was difficulty in finding a date, and because the matter had gone on for so long I agreed that it was better that it was held on a date that I could not attend rather than let it go on even longer.”

This implies that it is better to sanction a fellow councillor promptly rather than with all the relevant informants available.

There are tenable arguments for and against the scale of development envisaged in the draft Local Plan: that was not the issue here.

But there is no argument that would support local taxpayers’ money being lavished on disproportionate action that, to my mind, was profligate and of reasonably questionable impartiality.

A more exact figure for the expenditure on the exercise ought to be forthcoming, but the investigating officer, a solicitor contracted to GBC, would naturally not come cheaply, nor the time of GBC officers.

A PR company contracted to GBC, Coverdale Barclay, has also been involved; while Queen’s Council is also believed to have been consulted on the legal basis for the action.

There is also no case for the lack of openness about important data that underlies the Local Plan.

Like Cllr Reeve, I believe that a better forecast is to be obtained if many agents are involved in its making, each able to criticise the others, rather than a handful working in protected isolation.

For those that have the time to view it, a webcast of Monday’s proceedings is available at https://guildford.public-i.tv/core/portal/webcast_interactive/302989 ; you can see for yourselves the restrained, polite, measured and intelligent way in which Cllr Reeve conducted his defence.
Jeff Hills Reply

September 18, 2017 at 12:00 pm

I am afraid the electorate of Guildford Borough did vote for the existing councillors, although some will always get elected regardless.

Cllr Spooner though has acted with childish pique and wasted a lot of money.

Perhaps he should pay the costs out of his own pocket or maybe the Conservative party should pay. Only then might he listen to the electorate.
Jenny Procter Reply

September 18, 2017 at 12:13 pm

I think that the appalling process Cllr Reeve was subjected, at which it was painful to be present, outweighs absolutely the importance of Cllr Reeves’ holiday. The fact that we as taxpayers are paying for this farcical and transparent attempt to maintain the deliberate obscuring of facts the public need to know is ludicrous.

Cllr Reeve had waited an interminable time for the hearing. A little longer may have weighed less. I could not believe this crazy charade with its elastic interpretation of the “Code of Conduct” could actually be real.

I do not know where Cllr Spooner was but his failure to attend is equally discourteous and potentially invalidates the whole procedure.

James Whiteman, managing director of Guildford Borough Council, said: “Cllrs Spooner and Reeves were not required to participate in the Hearings Sub-Committee meeting. The process the council followed was in accordance with the procedures set out in the council’s constitution.”
John Perkins Reply

September 18, 2017 at 12:19 pm

Cllr. Reeves claims she did not, “take a decision not to attend the hearing”. Yet she made the decision that her personal holiday was more important to her than her attendance as a councillor would be to the people of the borough. She had a choice and she made it; what is the difference between that and taking a decision? Witnesses in a court of law who do not attend a hearing because they would rather go on holiday are guilty of contempt.

James Whiteman, managing director of Guildford Borough Council, said: “Cllrs Spooner and Reeves were not required to participate in the Hearings Sub-Committee meeting. The process the council followed was in accordance with the procedures set out in the council’s constitution.”