A meeting to decide whether an unnamed senior officer at Northumberland County Council should face disciplinary action has been pushed back, despite a damning report outlining a "climate of fear and intimidation" at the authority.
Councillors were expected to consider whether the issues raised by the wide-ranging Max Caller report, that slammed governance at the council, would require "further investigation." However, the matter was adjourned at a meeting on Wednesday. A new date has not yet been set.
The Caller report described "harrowing" tales from former council staff who had been treated "extremely poorly" by senior officers at the council, adding there was "little substantial trust in the most senior officer levels of the council, and there exists a climate of fear and intimidation."
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It was noted that many staff look to senior levels of the council and its "dysfunctionality" with "despair and embarrassment", while relationships between senior councillors and some senior officers were described as "broken" and "confrontational."
The discussion was to be held behind closed doors, with the press and public barred from attending under the Local Government Act 1972. The meeting agenda stated that the "public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosure," as the reason behind the exclusion of press and public.
Councillors were set to receive written and oral "representations in respect of the issues raised by the Caller review from the Chief Officer as identified in a report not published to the public," before considering "whether there are disciplinary allegations that require further investigation."
The chief officer is not identified in the agenda, and the council has confirmed that the term does not specifically refer to the CEO of the authority and is more general. It is unknown who the officer or officers identified in the agenda are, or what the specific issues identified from the Caller report are.
Explaining why the press and public were excluded from the meeting, a spokesman for Northumberland County Council said: "The public interest in maintaining this exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosure because of the need for confidentiality when considering matters concerning individual officers and obtaining confidential legal advice."
The spokesman added the meeting would contain: "Information relating to any individual and Information in respect of which a claim to legal professional privilege could be maintained in legal proceedings."
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