Two Douglas councillors have been investigated between October and December but their names have not been released.
Standards Committee chairman Raina Chatel said she supported openness but did not believe any names should be made public until all investigations and appeals were complete.
In fact, she said both parties were vindicated. In one instance, there was no case to answer and in the other an investigation was done and the person cleared.
However, she did not want to release a name yet in case any appeal was lodged against the decision.
The council’s standards committee is currently putting together a new set of guidelines on discipline and dealing with complaints against councillors. Confidentiality of matters brought before the committee sparked lively debate.
Council leader David Christian said openness and transparency was important: ‘How do we demonstrate to members of the public that is is all above board? We have to be careful we are not seen just to be paying lip service to this.
‘At the moment it is a voluntary matter: there is no legislation saying we have to have this process. All this does is help to fuel rumours by keeping things behind closed doors.
‘We should be able to demonstrate to the public that everything we do is above board.’
Proposed sanctions for misconduct also came under fire, notably the suggestion of a private reprimand from a council executive. ‘This council will not do that,’ he said
Other proposed sanctions included excluding a councillor from using council facilities or from entering council offices except to attend council meetings.
However, there is no power to remove an elected councillor from office , or suspend them temporarily because they must be free as an elected member to represent constituents.
Councillor Stephen Pitts agreed and added the proposed guidelines were too vague as they stand and the sanctions were too impractical. He also criticised the current lack of transparency in matters under investigation. ‘We are not being told what is being investigated and what the outcome is,’ he said.
He also pointed out there was no definition provided to explain precisely what ‘members’ misconduct’ amounted to.
‘And what if a member who is required to apologise refuses to do so?’ he asked. ‘What is the next step? If there isn’t one, it’s a waste of time. We have sanctions with nothing to back them up.’
Similarly a requirement for a councillor to undergo extra training was in effect unenforceable under the current proposals because no punishment was outlined for anyone who refused to do so.
Council Leader David Christian thought the proposals for sanctions needed further consideration and again stressed the importance of transparency. ‘We all voted for the setting up of this body so matters could be investigated by a proper panel and the results of that published,’ he said.
‘It’s no good wasting paper on this if we are not going to tell the public outside what is going on.’
Councillor David Ashford thought once any investigation was concluded the findings should be made public. He dismissed a suggestion that to reveal names of any councillors who had been investigated could be libellous.
‘There is no parliamentary privilege in this chamber [protecting members from libel charges arising out of comments made during debates],’ he said.
‘Anything we say could potentially be subject to a legal action so in that case why not have everything in private, if that’s the concern? I really can’t see the point of that objection. At the end of the day we are all responsible for ourselves.’
Councillors Colin Cain and Karen Angela also voiced concerns about whether the guidelines were sufficiently open. ‘I can’t believe what is going on.They do not seem to be working towards being open and transparent and I think these matters have to go back to the committee and be reconsidered,’ she said.
The standards committee next meets in March.