How is an investigation conducted?

The Council has adopted a procedure for the investigation of misconduct complaints a summary of which is attached as Appendix 4 to these arrangements. 
 
If the Monitoring Officer decides that a complaint merits further investigation, they will appoint an Investigating Officer, who may be another senior officer of the council, an officer of another authority or an external investigator.  If the Monitoring Officer refers the matter to the Standards Committee to consider whether the complaint merits further investigation, the committee will be provided with the information received from the complainant and the Member. The Committee may also, upon consideration of this early, may decide that the complaint merits no further action or other action.

The Investigating Officer will decide whether they need to meet with or speak to you to understand the nature of your complaint and so that you can explain your understanding of events and suggest what documents needs to be seen, and who needs to be interviewed.

At the end of his/her investigation, the Investigating Officer or Monitoring Officer will produce a draft report (“the Investigation Report”) and will, in all cases, send copies of that draft report, in confidence, to you and to the Member concerned, to give you both an opportunity to identify any matters in that draft report which you disagree with or which you consider requires more consideration. 
 
Having received and taken account of any comments which you, or the Member that is the subject of the complaint, may make on the draft Investigation Report, the report will be finalised.  Where an Investigating Officer has been appointed the Investigating Officer will send his/her final report to the Monitoring Officer.