CORNWALL Council has officially censured a former Launceston councillor for his ‘entirely inappropriate conduct’.

The council issued a decision notice last week following an external Code of Conduct investigation into a complaint made by the council’s former chief executive Andrew Kerr, about the behaviour of former councillor Alex Folkes.

The council said it ‘has found against Mr Folkes for making misleading statements and failing to behave with the openness and honesty expected of a Cornwall Councillor’.

The council said its deputy monitoring officer therefore concluded that Mr Folkes’ behaviour constituted breaches of the Members’ Code of Conduct.

The council received Mr Folkes’ resignation as a councillor on October 3. He also resigned from Launceston Town Council.

The complaint related to his conduct in discussions he had with officers and other members when questioned about the conduct that led to his arrest in 2006.

The council said the process did not allow the council to make any findings directly relating to the circumstances leading to Mr Folkes’ arrest as this took place in 2006 before he became a member of Cornwall Council.

The Post has previously reported how Mr Folkes stated on his blog that in 2006 he was arrested after being linked by his debit or credit card to a website containing indecent images of children. But he said his card had been cloned and no charges were brought against him.

Mr Folkes has always strongly denied any wrongdoing.

The issues arising from the council’s internal procedures and the handling of the criminal records disclosure relating to Mr Folkes were the subject of a review and report by an external consultant, Alison Lowton, which was received in February 2015 and which made a number of recommendations that the council said it has now addressed.

The investigation into the complaint was carried out by an external lawyer with expertise in code of conduct issues, following the receipt of the Lowton Report, and a report setting out the findings of the Code of Conduct investigation was sent to the council in September.

Following detailed consideration of this report and the views of a Panel of Standards Committee Members, the deputy monitoring officer determined that Mr Folkes had brought his office into disrepute by making misleading statements, including publicly; had failed to treat councillor Jeremy Rowe with respect by not telling him about his arrest in 2006 even though asked a direct question by Cllr Rowe as Mr Folkes’ political group leader at the time; and had acted in way that was contrary to the duty to promote and maintain high standards of conduct.

The actions to respond to the breaches found were determined by a meeting of the full Standards Committee on Monday, October 26. The council said this meeting was held in private session because it required sight of the investigation report and schedule of evidence, both of which are confidential. Given the seriousness of the breaches, members of the Standards Committee have imposed the highest level of sanctions currently available to the council, given his resignation as a councillor on October 3.

These include formally censuring Mr Folkes for ‘making misleading comments and failing to act with openness and honesty’, and requesting him to make a formal apology to Jeremy Rowe for ‘failing to treat him with respect’.

The council said it will not be publishing the investigation report or any of the related papers as they contain confidential personal information.

Standards Committee chairman Loveday Jenkin said: “This was a very serious breach of the Members Code of Conduct. The public expect their elected representatives to act with openness and honesty at all times, and these principles are rightly at the centre of our Code of Conduct.

“All councillors have a duty to maintain and promote standards in public life and any breach of these standards must be dealt with as severely as possible. We already have a policy which requires Cornwall Councillors to complete mandatory Code of Conduct training and we will be looking at this again to ensure that uptake of this training is monitored for all councillors.

“Although members of the Standards Committee were concerned that Mr Folkes’ actions had the potential to have brought the council into disrepute, they were satisfied that the effectiveness of the council’s procedures had prevented this.

“In this case Mr Folkes had already resigned as a Cornwall Councillor by the time the complaint was determined but that does not mean that we should treat these breaches with any less seriousness than had he still been a member of the council. As a result we have imposed the highest level of sanctions which are open to us.

“Unfortunately, following the Government’s changes to the Code of Conduct complaints process, we no longer have the legal power to suspend councillors following breaches of the Code of Conduct being found. Had this sanction been open to us, and Mr Folkes had still been a councillor, we would certainly have considered taking this action.

“This process clearly demonstrates the rigorous nature of the council’s Code of Conduct procedures. Unfortunately, as we have previously stated, we have serious concerns over the effectiveness of the sanctions which are available to councils and this case has reinforced these concerns. We will, once again, be calling on the Government to reconsider this issue and give Cornwall the power to impose sanctions which will act as an effective deterrent and give the public confidence that breaches of the Code of Conduct will be dealt with appropriately.”

Mr Folkes said the report represented ‘another re-hashing of the same false claims which the council continues to deny me the opportunity to properly rebut’.

He said: “The report claims as fact matters which I have proved to be completely untrue and for which I provided documentary evidence ten months ago. People should remember that all of this was fully investigated by the proper authority, the police, who found no evidence to charge me with any wrongdoing.

“As a result of the bullying and culture of deliberate leaks from within the council, my health deteriorated to the extent that I had to resign. Today’s report reinforces my view that I made the right decision.

“I’m now a private citizen. I’m not planning on playing any part in politics again and won’t be doing any interviews.”