A parish council has been described as “like a Wild West show” at a meeting which heard staff had been “hospitalised with anxiety” and their treatment had to be paid for out of council reserves.
A stormy annual parish meeting in Waterbeach on Monday evening (20 May) heard accusations from the former chair of the parish council that the authority was behaving like “a medieval fiefdom” and that there had been “persistent bullying” of some staff.
Clive Rabbett, who resigned as parish council chair last year, alleged that a group of councillors had tried to have the responsible financial officer sacked and that another employee “has had his life made hell for several years”.
He added that the council had never disclosed the amount of money it had spent ”as a consequence of bullying of the staff”.
The council is under pressure as it was served with a Public Interest Report by an external auditor because of its failure to complete the 2022-23 Annual Governance and Accountability Return.
Mr Rabbett told the meeting: “For years and years and years, this parish council has behaved like some sort of medieval fiefdom. Certain people have had authority here and they’re reluctant to give the authority up. They wanted to run the whole village in their own way to their own standard.
“There are lots of things going on. The accounts have been handled badly. There is money that cannot be accounted for. We have had councillors acting as responsible financial officers, which is against section 1.5 of the Local Government Act.
“The Local Government Act stipulates that the council shall appoint officers to manage the finances. That hasn’t been done – the whole thing has been done in house. The problem with doing it in house with councillors is there is very little accountability.
“The Standards Board doesn’t exist now. The monitoring officer is very reluctant to deal with anyone, no matter how badly they behave, as a consequence of which the whole thing is like a Wild West show.
“There has been persistent bullying of staff, officers.”
He said a member of council staff “has had his life made hell for several years”.
He added that the staff member had brought to light certain practices and “as a consequence of that he has been subjected to bullying.”
Mr Rabbett continued: “There’s been huge amounts of money spent on legal cases, on compensation, on having to sort out medical treatment for him, which has been ordered to be paid from parish council funds that members of the public are actually paying for.”
At this point someone shouted that Mr Rabbett should “sit down and shut up”. But the current chair of the parish council, Cllr Jane Williams, pointed out he was a member of the public and therefore allowed to speak.
He said: “Because you haven’t been told, it allows this bad behaviour to continue.”
He claimed that the regulated financial officer had discovered some councillors had contacted another parish council where she worked and “asked for details about her so they can actually try and get rid of her”.
He said: “This is the sort of mafioso-type way that this council has been behaving. There’s no integrity.”
Finally, he claimed that official council reports, known as the Annual Governance and Accountability Return, had for many years contained “fundamental untruths”.
“It’s never been disclosed just how much money has been spent out as a consequence of bullying of the staff. And how much money has been lost to this council because of the bullying of the staff. And until these matters can be dealt with and are out in the open, then there’s a big problem,” he said.
Cllr Nigel Seamarks stated that no councillor had been suspended or found guilty of bullying and that there was no evidence for it.
However, Cllr Williams countered: “We do have the evidence and we’re currently putting that together.”
She added: “If things are alleged, one cannot just bandy the names about. We have said that we should have a confidential meeting of councillors where we can discuss this. Nothing is being hidden.
“But if one is chucking allegations around, it has to be investigated. We do actually have documentation – a file where people have been hospitalised because of anxiety, because of meetings (and) being approached on their way to work.
“This is something that needs addressing and will be addressed.”
The meeting heard that the council was still holding an undisclosed amount of reserves and the precept – its portion of the council tax bill – had been put up by 30 per cent this year because it was no longer using reserves to support the budget.
Meanwhile, large amounts of money in the form of section 106 grants from housing developers to be spent on the village have not been used, the meeting was told.
A member of the public, Sarah Smart, said the council’s finance committee had not held any meetings for several months.
She said: “They met in July 2023 and then did not meet again until the end of April 2024. So, during that time, they cannot have been performing their role as they were not meeting.”
Cllr Williams explained that the council had not had enough “resource” to carry out its work.
It was later explained there were around 40 hours a week of officer work that could currently not be done. She added that they were struggling to recruit administrative staff and now had a locum performing the regulated financial officer role.
The meeting heard that the council’s usual agency was now unwilling to supply any more support staff.
Cllr Williams added: “We’ve recently formed a human resource committee that will be looking at these matters and looking forward to recruit.”
Cllr Michael Williamson told the meeting that he had resigned as chair of the finance committee because he had not been receiving finance reports and that this year’s budget had been set “very much in a vacuum” because of a lack of information being available about the council’s finances.
Cllr Williams explained that after being issued with Public Interest Reports Notice, the council was working with auditors to remedy the situation.
