Complaints about conduct

This year brought significant positive changes and new ways of working that have strengthened our operations, enabling us to enhance the efficiency of our existing processes, improve the team’s resilience and investigate complaints in a shorter timeframe. However, we also recognise that there remains room to grow and improve year on year. Key highlights from 2023/24 are set out below.

Enhancing efficiency and resilience

We have reinforced our existing triage process so all complaints are proactively checked for admissibility, shortening the time taken to respond to certain types of complaints. We also introduced a new system of clarifying a complaint or capturing relevant information during triage, so that assessments can proceed faster when an Investigating Officer is allocated.  All cases are now graded for complexity using a carefully considered traffic light system to help ensure that cases are distributed in an even way across the team and handled systematically as they progress to conclusion.  We have worked with the Standards Commission’s input for more flexible reporting, so there is less time taken to report on more straightforward cases. In addition, we have increased the team’s efficiency by expanding to a two-tier, standardised peer review process. This ensures quality control and, by spreading peer review work across the team, also ensures there are no bottlenecks due to limited capacity for such reviews. This more efficient system of delegation also means that cases move through the process more quickly.

The advent of a target operating model, alongside the reinforced triage system, has given us more certainty around our capacity. We are now better equipped to model the effects of high or low demand on the time complaints will take to complete and the effect this may have on our ability to meet stakeholder expectations

Case queue and wait times

By the very nature of how our workload presents, which is entirely demand-led, there will always likely be a queue of cases. However, we are committed to managing this workflow as efficiently and effectively as possible, without compromising on quality of output. Waiting times have improved, particularly at Stage 1 assessment, which are now 20% shorter than in the previous financial year. However, we acknowledge that a waiting period of around 4 months is still too long and will aim to reduce this further during 2024/25. Stage 2 investigation wait times remain similar to last year, despite a doubling of complaints and a 29% increase in active cases compared to 2022/23. The planned expansion of the Standards Team in early 2023/24 has provided the necessary capacity to manage this increased demand in future.

The new operating model and reinforced triage process will help us to continue to tackle waiting times and the raft of linked improvements described above will generate more capacity through more efficient ways of working. Waiting times are a particularly important indicator of system performance and, notwithstanding potential spikes in demand, we hope to limit the time taken to assess and investigate complaints as far as practicable. We will continue to be transparent about our performance by publishing full details of current waiting times on our website.

Quality assurance

We recognise that quality assurance arrangements are vital for maintaining high standards, fostering trust and ensuring that the complaint management process is effective and reliable. Our Investigations Manual, published in March 2023, continues to serve as a codification of our overarching complaint handling framework. It outlines our approach to handling complaints and reassures stakeholders that we maintain robust, transparent processes to ensure fair and trusted outcomes. It is updated every three months to respond to any feedback about our processes and to ensure it remains relevant and up to date, with each revised version being published on our website. The Manual is likely to be published in a revised web-format in the 2024/25 financial year with a view to improving its accessibility for all stakeholders.

Our expanded approach to peer review has also meant that reviewers assess the thoroughness and accuracy of any complaint assessment or proposed report. This ensures that the relevant evidence has been considered and the findings are supported by the facts. The effective introduction and operation of a Scheme of Delegation has also established clear guidelines and protocols for handling complaints and promoting consistency in our responses to them.

Standards Commission for Scotland Directions

One of three Directions issued by the Standards Commission for Scotland, pursuant to sections 10 and 11 of the Ethical Standards in Public Life etc. (Scotland) Act 2000, expired in August 2023 and was not renewed. This Direction related to the admissibility or eligibility criteria for investigation. The Direction was not renewed further to our undertaking to integrate the substantive provisions within it, relating to admissibility, into the Investigations Manual. One of the two remaining Directions has also been rescinded by the Standards Commission, effective from 30 May 2024. That Direction related to updating all parties to an investigation on its progress every three months until its conclusion. This is also permanently integrated into the Manual and forms part of the office’s standard operating procedure. As such, the only Direction that remains live relates to reporting on all investigations’ outcomes to the Standards Commission. This Direction currently has an expiry date of 31 January 2025.

Training

The effectiveness of our team is key to making all this work. We have very consciously intensified efforts to train and develop all our staff as a consequence. Our goal is to enhance our knowledge and abilities both broadly and in specific areas, ensuring solid core skills as well as in-depth expertise in key areas such as the technical aspects of planning and licensing decisions. We have emphasised the importance of consistency in our training, seeking to manage all parties in a fair and reasonable way. Our organisational values are woven into our training and everything we do is rooted in our commitment to transparency, empathy, kindness, and respect.

Stakeholder Engagement

Looking outwards to stakeholders, we actively work to support the Commissioner and foster productive and helpful relations with key partners such as the Standards Commission, COSLA, SOLAR, professional bodies and other public bodies. Ongoing engagement is key to this, and we plan to expand our engagement in the next financial year so the views and ideas of equivalent bodies and key stakeholders inform future ways of working and improvements.

Much has been achieved in the past year but there is room to grow and build on this good work in order to deliver more value in the future.

Our performance

Our objectives

Our strategic objectives during 2023/24 are drawn from the from the Revised Strategic Plan 2021-2024 and summarised here:
 

Our strategic plans are supported by biennial business plans. These detail the actions we will take over a rolling two-year period to achieve our strategic objectives. The Biennial Business Plan for 2023-2025 showing the year end position is available on our website.

A new four-year Strategic Plan for the period April 2024 to March 2028 was launched on 1 April 2024. Both it and the current Biennial Business Plan for 2024-2026 are available on our website. 

Our structure

 

Ethical Standards Commissioner - Ian Bruce

Standards Team

Led by Senior Investigating Officer and Hearings and Investigating Officer*:

• Investigating Officers - 6 full time posts
• Senior Investigations Support Officer
• Investigations Support Officer

Corporate Services Team

Led by Head of Corporate Services:

• Governance and Finance Officers - 2 part time posts
• HR and Facilities Officer
• Information Management and IT Officer
• Corporate Support Officer

Public Appointments Team

Led by Public Appointments Manager:

• Public Appointments Officer
• Public Appointments Support Officer
• Public Appointments Advisers - 12 contractors

*The Senior Investigating Officer (SIO) and Hearings and Investigations Officer (HIO) jointly manage and oversee the work of the Standards Team. Line management for the team is split equally between the SIO and HIO.

Our purpose

The Commissioner’s primary functions are:

• To investigate complaints about the conduct of Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs), local authority councillors and board members of public bodies. Where the Commissioner considers that there has been a breach of the relevant Code of Conduct, they will report 
  • in the case of councillors and members of public bodies, to the Standards Commission for Scotland (SCS)
  • in the case of MSPs, to the Scottish Parliament
     
• to investigate complaints about lobbyists who have failed to register or provide certain information to the Scottish Parliament and, where there has been a contravention, to report to the Scottish Parliament.
   
• to regulate and monitor how people are appointed to the boards of public bodies in Scotland, and to promote diversity in that process. The key functions are:
  • to prepare, publish and, as necessary, revise a Code of Practice for Ministerial Appointments to Public Bodies in Scotland (the Code)
  • to issue guidance on the Code and to promote compliance with its provisions
  • to examine the methods and practices employed by the Scottish Ministers when making appointments
  • to report to the Scottish Parliament instances of material non-compliance with the Code of Practice; the Commissioner may direct the Minister to delay making the appointment until Parliament has considered the report, and
  • to ensure that, as far as possible, appointments are made fairly and openly and allow everyone, where reasonably practicable, the opportunity to be considered for an appointment.

Commissioner’s statement

This is the first annual report and accounts that I have published since my appointment as Commissioner. The year has been characterised by a period of relative stability and gradual improvement, with all areas of the office benefiting from and building on our now strong foundations and governance. At the end of the financial year I published my strategic plan for 2024 to 2028, following extensive consultation with a range of stakeholders. It is unashamedly ambitious about the further improvements that I and all of the staff have committed to making. These include:

• better, more meaningful and more accessible communications with the public and other stakeholders about our role
• improvements in the time taken to assess, investigate and report on the complaints submitted to us
• the further development of our governance, staff and systems to ensure that they fulfil their potential and secure greater levels of efficiency and achieve value for money
• contributing significantly to the maintenance of an effective ethical standards framework through supportive and constructive engagement with equivalent bodies both here and in other administrations. 
• contributing through our regulation to a public appointments system that produces effective and diverse boards that are reflective of the communities that they serve.

We have also made a commitment to reporting publicly on the impact of our work.

It remains a privilege to have been appointed to this role and I, and everyone in the office, look forward to making the improvements to our work that the public has a right to expect during the course of my tenure. 

Public Appointments

The public appointments team is now fully staffed, following the recruitment and induction of a new Public Appointments Support Officer in July 2023. There did remain one Public Appointments Officer post to fill, which I decided should be filled by a contractor instead. That will be over a fixed term which will realise savings for the public purse in the medium to longer term. The contractor will be dedicated to refreshing Diversity Delivers, a strategy which will make recommendations about improving board diversity at a local, regional and national level. 

The three public appointments staff and our team of 12 Public Appointments Advisers, consultants working to Service Level Agreements with us, continued to work alongside the Scottish Government during the year with the intention of improving on appointment practices. The 2022 Code of Practice for Ministerial Appointments, which was effective from October 2022, became fully embedded during 2023/24. We are now seeing those incremental changes and improvements in practices taking effect. This includes panel chairs taking on new responsibilities for activities such as providing reports on good practice to us and appointing ministers at the conclusion of appointment rounds. Due to our increased capacity in the appointments team, we have been able to re-establish:

• surveying applicants about their experiences of applying 
• contacting panel chairs and body chairs for their views on PAA performance at the end of appointment rounds and 
• contacting panel chairs and body chairs for their views on the difference that the successful appointee has made to the board at the end of 12 months and their contribution to the work of the board.  

We have also been pulling all the strands of learning at the end of each round together to identify trends and develop good practice case studies.

The current demographic profile of Scotland’s public body boards continues to be encouraging with boards increasingly reflective of the communities that they serve. I commend everyone involved for this achievement, including the Scottish Government’s Public Appointments Team, as these positive changes would not have occurred without hard work and commitment.

On a less positive note, we had to conduct one examination of appointment practices during the year which resulted in a report of material non-compliance with the Code being made to the Scottish Parliament.  This was the first such report since 2011.    

We also received two complaints and conducted full investigations into both. The reports following both investigations have been published on our website.  One of the complaints involved an allegation that the Scottish Ministers adopted an unwritten policy of progressing applicants who shared protected characteristics over those who did not.  As a result of the complaint we conducted a full and detailed investigation involving 15 different appointment rounds; the most extensive in our office’s history. It was reassuring to find that, following investigation, there was no evidence to support the allegation. All of those who were appointed were appointed on merit, not on the basis of a protected characteristic.

In the coming year we intend to continue to embed the revised Code through the provision of guidance, based on an analysis of all reports made to us about the appointment practices that are most effective.

MSP complaints

We investigate complaints about the conduct of MSPs. No MSP cases were admissible this year, meaning that we did not require to submit any reports on MSP conduct to the Scottish Parliament. This is heartening in comparison with the prior year, although it doesn’t mean that we haven’t had to conduct investigations in response to complaints, the majority of which are submitted by members of the public. 

When we receive several complaints about the same or closely related issues, we combine these complaints together and assess and/or investigate them in what we describe as a single case. We report on both the number of complaints and cases to better reflect the actual volume of work in a given year. We take the same approach for complaints about councillors and board members (see below).  

When we receive a complaint about an MSP, we assess it for admissibility; this is known as Stage 1. Where a complaint is admissible (i.e. accepted), it moves to Stage 2 which we term further investigation.

Details on the volumes of complaints and cases are included later in this report. In summary, we received double the number of complaints this year in comparison with 2022/23 (93 vs. 46) although it was just under a 40% increase in cases (43 vs. 31).

We deal with a wide range of differing complaints about the behaviour of MSPs such as the use of inappropriate language at events and the work of parliamentary committees. We have seen a decline this year in the number of complaints about conduct on social media, which tend not to be admissible because the MSPs are not engaged in their parliamentary duties. Many of the cases received this year related to complaints that MSPs were not engaging with their constituents. Such complaints are specifically excluded from our remit and are dealt with by the Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament. 

Councillor and member complaints

During the 2023/24 financial year, the number of complaints received more than doubled compared to the previous financial year (344 vs. 156) and the number of cases was just under 70% higher (184 vs. 109). The Standards Team successfully completed a total of 141 cases, representing a 12% increase from the previous year. The higher completion rate was achieved despite a 29% rise in the number of active cases under consideration in 2023/24 compared to 2022/23. The expansion of the Standards Team during the course of the year, with the recruitment and induction of a new Hearings and Investigations Officer and two new Investigating Officers, has provided the much-needed additional capacity we required to begin to manage this increased demand.

Roughly 80% of complaints are received from members of the public, with the next most significant tranche of complainers being councillors and members, at approximately 17%, increasing their share from 10% in 2022/23. Councillors and members are complaining about each other’s conduct more frequently.

The vast majority of complaint allegations continue to relate to disrespectful behaviour against council officers, members of the public and other councillors. Such allegations have been on the rise for the last five financial years, with this one being the highest yet, with approximately 55% of cases being related to disrespectful, discourteous or bullying and harassing conduct. Roughly a quarter of these relate to conduct online using social media.

All of this has led to increases in the number of reports submitted to the Standards Commission for Scotland and a concomitant rise in the number of hearings.

This year also brought significant positive changes and new ways of working that have strengthened our operations. For example:

• we have reinforced our existing triage process, shortening the time taken to respond to certain types of complaints
• all cases are now graded for complexity to help ensure that cases are distributed in an even way across the team and handled systematically as they progress to conclusion
• we have adopted more flexible reporting procedures for more straightforward cases 
• we have increased the team’s efficiency by expanding to a two-tier, standardised peer review process which also sees cases progress more quickly. 

The advent of a target operating model, alongside the reinforced triage system, has given us more certainty around our capacity. We are now better equipped to model the effects of high or low demand on the time complaints will take to complete and the effect this may have on our ability to meet stakeholder expectations.

By the very nature of our work, which is demand-led, there will always likely be a queue of cases. However, we are committed to managing this workflow as efficiently and effectively as possible, without compromising on quality of output. Waiting times have improved, particularly at Stage 1 assessment, which are now 20% shorter than in the previous financial year. However, we acknowledge that a waiting period of around 4 months is still too long and will aim to reduce this further during 2024/25. Stage 2 investigation wait times remain similar to last year, despite a doubling of complaints and a 29% increase in active cases compared to 2022/23.

The new operating model and reinforced triage process will help us to continue to tackle waiting times and the raft of linked improvements described above will generate more capacity through more efficient ways of working. We will continue to be transparent about our performance by publishing full details of current waiting times on our website.

Much has been achieved in the past year but we recognise there is room to grow and build on this good work in order to deliver more value in the future. Details on how we intend to do so are included later in this report and in our strategic plan for 2024 to 2028. 
 

Finance and governance

Total funding awarded for the year, including contingency funding, was £1,606,000 (2022/23: £1,228,000). Of the funds awarded £1,554,000 was drawn down (2022/23: £971,000). Including adjustments for accruals and prepayments, expenditure was £1,540,000 (2022/23: £1,014,000). The cash budget was underspent by £74,000 (2022/23: £133,000 overspend). Staff costs were under budget by £72,000. We submitted a bid for additional staff in May 2022, which was approved by the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body (SPCB) in October that year. When submitting the 2023/24 budget bid, we had anticipated having recruited to all of the additional posts by the beginning of April 2023. In the event, these staff members came on board throughout the 2023/24 year, reducing expenditure in this area. In addition, I decided not to make an appointment to one post as I considered that the work could be done by a contractor instead over a fixed term (see above under `public appointments`).

Savings of £15,000 in other areas were used to offset £13,000 of expenditure on rolling replacement of IT equipment, enhancements to the Case Management System as well as updating the operating system and making accessibility improvements to the website.

During the year we continued to operate in accordance with the strategic plan for 2021-24 and our rolling biennial business plan covering all office functions. The business plan continues to also demonstrate progress against each of the external and internal auditors’ recommendations. More detail on progress is included below and later in this report. 

Our performance management systems continue to work well to ensure that section and staff action plans are all aligned to our business and strategic plans.

Our governance and associated transparency reporting are fully embedded and our external auditors had no recommendations for us in the prior year. We continue to publish the minutes of our mostly monthly Senior Management Team (SMT) on our website as well as the minutes from our Advisory Audit Board (AAB) meetings. All of these demonstrate that we are functioning effectively and transparently. We have benefited greatly from the AAB’s advice and will be sorry to see the Chair departing in 2024. His replacement, who is currently the second AAB member, will doubtless continue to be an effective source of advice and guidance for us in the year ahead.

In order to provide assurance that our systems are robust, appropriate and appropriately implemented, we commissioned our internal auditors to conduct a range of reviews into our work this year as well as to review our progress against their previous recommendations. I am delighted to report that they assessed our systems of control as strong – the highest rating – in respect of workforce planning, data management (GDPR) and the follow up review on our governance, our investigations procedures and our risk management. The independent auditor’s conclusions and assurance on our workforce planning exercise were particularly welcome, given that our accepted bid for increased resources was subject to considerable public scrutiny by a parliamentary committee. Our cyber security arrangements were assessed as substantial and we are now working to implement the one medium and one low recommendation that they had for us. On that front, we achieved Cyber Essentials Plus reaccreditation during the year.

Our work is also subject to oversight by the SPCB and a range of parliamentary committees, including the Finance and Public Administration Committee this year for the first time. It is conducting a strategic review into the officeholder landscape and we look forward to seeing it’s report and conclusions. The SPCB, Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee and Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee all provide robust scrutiny of and constructive challenge on the way in which we fulfil our functions, which continues to be helpful and welcome.  

As with all other public sector organisations, we continue to have a range of risks and challenges to address. These include risks relating to our cyber resilience and public and stakeholder confidence in our work. We have plans in place to mitigate all of them, again as set out in our strategic plan for the next four years.

I am very grateful to each and every one of the staff in the office, and to the Senior Management Team in particular, for taking our work onto another level during the preceding year. It wasn’t straightforward to make the changes that we have, given the sharp increase in complaint volumes and the introduction of new staff members over the same period.

I am privileged to lead a team of talented and dedicated professionals who share the office’s values and who see the need for and are committed to making further improvements to the way in which we fulfil our role. We know that day in and day out our work makes a difference to people’s lives and we don’t take that responsibility lightly. 
 

 
Ian Bruce
Ethical Standards Commissioner

03 October 2024

Performance Report

For the Commissioner for Ethical Standards in Public Life in Scotland known as the Ethical Standards Commissioner (ESC).

Annual Report and Accounts 2023–24

This report is available in PDF and alternative formats on request by telephoning 0131 347 3890 or by e-mailing info@ethicalstandards.org.uk.