Independent review taking place into councillors’ expenses

The revelation was made by the Green leader of Brighton and Hove City Council at Hove Town Hall on Thursday evening.

Councillor Phelim Mac Cafferty said that the review was taking place as he answered questions from members of the public.

They concerned expense claims relating to childcare submitted by Green councillor and former Brighton and Hove mayor Alex Phillips, who also served as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP).

She and her husband, fellow Green councillor Tom Druitt, who represent Regency ward, have two young children.

The questions concern expense claims relating to the care of their children while the couple were in France during the coronavirus pandemic and when council meetings were held remotely.

The couple went to France at the start of the Covid pandemic

Nigel Furness asked: “Regarding the unsavoury rumours which are currently circulating in the local media, appertaining to your two missing Regency ward councillors, and your total failure to communicate with the media, plus the fact that one of those two missing councillors is on his way to Ukraine tomorrow on a mission of mercy, could you now please enlighten everybody in this chamber if you will be making a vitally needed statement on this very grave matter directly after these questions conclude?

“Or could it be the case that these councillors are seeking political asylum on the continent?”

And another resident Peter Harland asked why responses to Freedom of Information (FoI) requests about the couple’s expenses had not been published on the council’s website.

Mr Harland said that the FoI disclosure log held only “selected information”.

Cllr Mac Cafferty said the review would be independent

Cllr Mac Cafferty said: “The council is committed to the principles of openness and transparency. We do publish FoI request responses. Anyone can access them by visiting the Freedom of Information disclosure log on the council’s website.

“However, in line with legal requirements and best practice, there are some instances when we don’t publish FoI request and responses … when the information is not held or information cannot be provided because an exemption applies.”

He said that exemptions applied, for example, to personal data and commercially sensitive information.

Cllr Mac Cafferty said: “There is an independent review relating to the queries around expenses … and I’m not at liberty to talk in any more detail about that, not least because it’s going to be handled independently from me.”