Complaints against a total of five Liverpool councillors are being assessed following the publication of a report into a controversial matchday car parking company.
Last week, it was confirmed that an investigation had been raised into the conduct of individuals following the publication of a Liverpool Council internal audit report about the Beautiful Ideas company (BICo). It has now been revealed that probe has been extended to assess five members of the local authority.
City solicitor Dan Fenwick told a meeting of the standards and ethics committee on Wednesday night that the probe will now focus on whether the five members “breached the code of conduct or the Nolan principles” rather than alleged fraud or corruption. The change was made following a complaint raised by an unnamed member.
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In 2018, the city council launched an initial assessment into the company that ran car parks for supporters visiting Goodison Park and Anfield on match days, amid allegations of poor practice but the document was never released. That decision was criticised by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) who said the council had incorrectly withheld the report.
In September, ahead of the documents being published, Mayor Joanne Anderson said she would request a “thorough investigation to identify any behaviour in this report which demonstrates a breach of procedures or codes of conduct, and for the appropriate action to be taken.” Mr Fenwick told members he hoped the complaints would be resolved "very quickly" and said the nature of the complaints were "very broad" and differed depending on the subject councillors' involvement.
The city solicitor said he didn’t know if any more complaints would come in, following the expansion of the assessment from four councillors to five. An extraordinary meeting of Liverpool Council is to be held next Wednesday on the audit reports.
A motion has been submitted by members of the Liverpool Community Independents group, calling for an independent and “full and rigorous inquiry into the company and its relationship to Liverpool Council.” Following the publication of the BICo report in October, the city council said the car parks are now closed and the company is in the process of being wound up.
The local authority added that it had complied with the timescale of publishing within 35 days of the ICO’s decision and used that period to redact relevant parts.
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