We’re told that the Ombudsman has written a letter of apology to Labour and Conservative members of Swansea council. These are the 32 individuals who were cynically grassed up by Lib Dem leader Chris Holley for walking out of a meeting after being refused the chance to debate the costs of a controversial e-government project in public.
The subsequent investigation, which had lasted nearly two years, involved interviews with 50 witnesses and is said to have cost close on £200,000, was abandoned when a successful legal challenge showed the original advice given by the council’s monitoring officer that the meeting had to be held in private was actually flawed. The local government watchdog has now expressed his regret that the first the affected councillors heard that no further action was to be taken was via the local press.
But despite the apology, the councillors are said to be aggrieved that although the Ombudsman acknowledged no breach had been committed, his official decision notice carried a sting which states that the circumstances behind the walk-out will be “taken into account should I have occasion to carry out another investigation into the conduct of the members concerned”.
The lawyers are back on the case.
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