Complaints about elected councillors are made to an auspicious body called the Standards Committee. This body is supposed to be unbiased and is chaired by someone with no apparent link to the Council or any political party. It considers any complaints made against councillors and decides whether these complaints should be investigated.

Between May 2008 and December 2009 sixty six complaints were made. Forty six of those were against Independent councillors, the vast majority of these complaints were made by senior councillors and their stooges, a senior council officer and a person in charge of a local news organisation. Six complaints were made against Conservative councillors and fourteen complaints were made against Labour councillors.

The Standards committee (which unlike other committees does not reflect the political balance of the council – because the ruling Labour group does not want it to) saw fit to refer the majority of complaints that needed to be investigated were those made against Independent Alliance councillors!

Most of these complaints are that Independent Alliance councillors did not treat people with respect or that they brought the Council into disrepute. So what did they do? You cannot be told!

The Independent Alliance Councillors asked for all investigations, interviews and hearings to be carried out in public. This request was refused. Instead everything takes place in secret; behind closed doors.

The local Standards Committee referred a number of these complaints about Independent Alliance councillors to a quango set up by the Labour government called Standards for England. This involved multiple trips to South Shields by highly paid civil servants including someone who was believed to be a solicitor; first class rail travel obviously, overnight stays at the Little Haven hotel, taxis to every meeting and naturally subsistence payments. Who pays for this? US!

They can call whoever they like to give evidence but the Independent Alliance councillors were not allowed to call any witnesses. They can ask whatever questions they like. They record the whole proceedings, produce lengthy transcripts and reports. When Independent Alliance councillors suggested they would publish details of these interviews, they were threatened with imprisonment if they revealed any information to the public! 

Do you think this is British justice? No neither do we. We are convinced this is a deliberate attempt to silence any opposition and is a concerted effort by Labour and their stooges to remove Independent Alliance councillors from the Council. Sadly they just can’t accept the will of the electorate; Independent Alliance councillors were elected by the people to oppose the ruling Labour group and it’s time they learned to live with it.

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