SPSO Individual Decisions

Mrs C complained to the Commissioner for Ethical Standards in Public Life in Scotland (CESPLS) about a member of a public body. CESPLS decided not to investigate, and she complained to us about their handling of her complaint. CESPLS have broad discretion under the Ethical Standards in Public Life etc. (Scotland) Act 2000 to decide whether, when and how to carry out an investigation. We found that CESPLS' investigation procedures allowed them to carry out an initial assessment to decide if a complaint was relevant and admissible. In Mrs  C's case, CESPLS decided that her complaint was neither relevant nor admissible. CESPLS' communication with Mrs C explained their intentions and decisions clearly. We considered that CESPLS acted in line with their investigation procedures, and we did not uphold Mrs C's complaint. Related reading View Decision Report 201609139 as a PDF (10.97 KB) Updated: December 2, 2018

Mr C had complained to a local authority about their services. When they did not investigate his complaint he asked a councillor to review the matter. The councillor felt that this would go beyond his remit and declined to become involved. Mr C complained about the councillor to the Commissioner for Ethical Standards in Public Life in Scotland (the commissioner). Mr C alleged that the councillor's code of conduct had been breached. The commissioner investigated Mr C's complaint and concluded that there had been no breach. Mr C subsequently complained to us that the commissioner had investigated a different complaint to the one he had raised, had accepted evidence that was not relevant to his complaint and had taken an unreasonably narrow interpretation of the code of conduct. We found that, whilst the commissioner's summary of Mr C's complaint was different to the point he had raised, his concerns were addressed fully in the commissioner's decision. We were satisfied that the commissioner reached his decision having followed guidance as to how the code of conduct should be interpreted and that he had carried out the investigation reasonably. Related reading View Decision Report 201406475 as a PDF (11.12 KB) Updated: March 13, 2018

Organisation C complained to the Commissioner about the actions of a councillor who chaired a public design competition initiated by the council. Two members of the organisation were council employees at the time of the competition, and the organisation said that there had been attempts to coerce them to inappropriately influence the competition process. The organisation also alleged the councillor had acted inappropriately in relation to the competition. The Commissioner investigated and made a finding that there had been no breach of the code of conduct for councillors (the code). Organisation C complained to us that the decision was wrong because the Commissioner's view that there was a gap in the evidence for the first allegation and that the second allegation was out of jurisdiction did not justify the conclusions made. They were also concerned about how the evidence of whistleblowers was treated. We did not uphold the first complaint, as the decisions outlined in the Commissioner’s letter were sufficient to justify his view that there had been no breach of the code. However, we were concerned that the note of the decision contained significant additional comments that seemed to make judgements on the actions of the councillor, and on the actions of the council itself. It was not clear what standards the Commissioner was using to judge this, as the actions of the council were clearly not covered by the code and, in the case of the actions of the councillor, the Commissioner had said they were not. We explained that this was confusing and made a recommendation on this point. On the complaint about the way whistleblowing evidence had been handled, we found no evidence that the Commissioner had made errors in his assessment of what weight to put on the evidence or fact-finding. However, we were concerned that staff were named in a public report. This appeared to have been out of line with the Commissioner's standard practice and we were not persuaded by t