The Standards Assessment Board of Durham County Council was scheduled to meet on Tuesday 17 February 2026 to consider updates on code of conduct complaints. The meeting agenda indicated that the board would review ongoing complaints and potentially discuss exempt information related to specific case references.

Code of Conduct Complaints Update

The board was scheduled to receive an update on complaints received by Durham County Council under the Code of Conduct for Members. This report, prepared by Helen Bradley, Director of Legal and Democratic Services and Monitoring Officer, was intended to provide the Standards Assessment Board with information on the status of ongoing complaints. The report detailed that as of the previous meeting on 8 January 2026, eleven complaints had been ongoing. Two of these were considered at that meeting, with no further action taken. Five complaints were scheduled for consideration on 30 January 2026, and two were scheduled for the 17 February 2026 meeting. The remaining two complaints received prior to 19 December 2025 had been rejected as they did not engage the Code of Conduct.

Between 19 December 2025 and 21 January 2026, three further complaints were received. Reports were being prepared for two of these, scheduled for consideration on 17 February 2026, while the third remained at the pre-assessment stage. The report highlighted that the Council has a duty under section 27 of the Localism Act 2011¹ to promote and maintain high standards of conduct by its members.

Consideration of Complaint References

In addition to the general update, the board was scheduled to consider specific complaint references in a part of the meeting that was not open to the public. These included cases identified as FS-Case-764985099, FS-Case-767485055, FS-Case-770072560, FS-Case-763200402, and FS-Case-770701488. These matters were to be addressed based on a report from the Deputy Monitoring Officer.