Cllr. Muhammed Butt and Cara Davani
(from a Brent Council photograph celebrating International Women’s Day, March 2015)
(from a Brent Council photograph celebrating International Women’s Day, March 2015)
Guest post by Philip Grant (please note as this is a long article it has been posted with a continuation page. Click at the end of the article to read all.
On 5 December 2017, three hours before
the start of an Audit Advisory Committee meeting, Brent Council’s auditor
issued his decision letters on the objections against its 2015/16 accounts over
the payment of £157,610 to its former HR Director, Cara Davani. I will ask Martin
to attach a copy of the decision letter I received, so that it is in the public
domain for anyone to read if they wish to. READ IT HERE
In summary the auditor decided that the
payment was not unlawful and that he would not issue a Public Interest Report
over the issues the objectors had raised. He did, however, say that ‘there are
a number of governance areas that we consider that the Council should
strengthen’, and made several recommendations, mainly over keeping formal
written records of legal advice given and of meetings (a familiar problem at
Brent!).
I am sure that the auditor believes he
exercised his professional judgement properly in coming to his decision.
According to his “progress report” ahead of the 5 December meeting, he had also
submitted his ‘statement of reasons on the objection’ to his Regulator, PSAA
(Public Sector Audit Appointments Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Local
Government Association) for comment.
Maybe I am a “loser” who finds it
difficult to accept that he was wrong. But I can’t help feeling that I, and the
four other local people who objected to the £157k payment, have been let down
by a system which is meant to ensure that local electors can challenge the
potential misuse of funds by their Council through a ‘fair and impartial
process’. I cannot change the auditor’s decision, but I can set out why I think
it was wrong.
At the heart of the objections were two
decisions, both made by the then interim Chief Executive, Christine Gilbert.
One, in May/June 2015, was to make the £157,610 leaving payment to Ms Davani.
The other was not to take disciplinary action against Ms Davani in September
2014, and I will look at how the auditor dealt with that decision first.
Decision not to take
disciplinary action against Cara Davani following the Rosemarie Clarke
Employment Tribunal judgment in September 2014:
In the course of his “Findings”, the
auditor says:
‘I conclude there is nothing to persuade me that this decision was not within the range of broadly reasonable decisions open to the Council.’
In
fact, as all five objectors had pointed out to the auditor, the decision was
not even ‘broadly reasonable’; it was so unreasonable that no reasonable
person, or Council, in possession of the facts could have made it. The auditor
had started his paragraph by saying:
‘Whether or not disciplinary procedures against Cara Davani should have been taken following the Employment Tribunal judgment was a decision for her line manager, Christine Gilbert, having regard to internal policies and guidance and taking account of the facts leading up to, and arising from, the hearing. We have been informed there is no documentation recording the decision on this.’
One
of my fellow objectors, with experience of employment matters, had told the
auditor that the evidence of Ms Davani’s actions in the judgment was
‘sufficient …to justify any reasonable employer to summarily dismiss Ms Davani
for gross misconduct.’ The auditor had been given first hand evidence of
Carolyn Downs, Brent’s current Chief Executive, admitting privately to the
objectors in December 2016, that the Council should have taken disciplinary
action against Ms Davani in September 2014, and that if she had been Chief
Executive in those circumstances, it would have done.
The
auditor had also been shown that Brent’s own Disciplinary Policy and Procedure
documents made it clear that if an employee is found
to have committed "gross misconduct", this will normally result in
dismissal. The types of action by an employee 'which would result in
disciplinary action for gross misconduct', as set out in those documents,
included four examples of actions by Ms Davani, made as findings of fact by the
Tribunal in its judgment.
Because Christine Gilbert had not kept to Brent’s own policies and
guidance when deciding not to take disciplinary action, it was pointed out to
the auditor that she had also shown a number of the examples of actions which
could have resulted in disciplinary action against her for gross misconduct. So
why had she not taken the proper action against Cara Davani, and why was there
‘no documentation recording the decision’?
My submissions to the auditor in August 2017 gave the reasons why,
but his decision letter dismisses these, merely saying: ‘whilst I have noted your
allegations, I have not seen any supporting evidence.’ I had provided evidence,
including text from a written statement made to me in 2016 by a “Civic Centre
insider” who was involved at the time, alleging that Ms Gilbert and Cllr.
Muhammed Butt had considered the matter in isolation, that they were actively
protecting Cara Davani, and that they communicated over it through their
private email accounts so that there would be no documentary evidence in the
Council’s records.
I had to keep the name of the “insider” secret, as that person did
not trust their allegations would be properly investigated, and feared
the possible personal / career consequences of having their identity disclosed.
I accepted that this meant their evidence was only “hearsay”, but in the
absence of any documentary evidence from the Council, their evidence on the
matter was also “hearsay”, so why was their version preferred?
Decision
to pay Cara Davani £157,610 as “compensation for loss of office” in 2015:
The
auditor concludes his “Findings” on this point by saying:
‘There was nothing in the documentation I have seen to indicate that any amounts paid to Cara Davani were unlawful.’
He
had seen the original documentation held by Brent Council from May and June
2015 in relation to this payment, and received representations on it from the
Council, but had not allowed me or the other objectors to see it.
I
have already covered the reasons why this ‘material information’ could and
should have been shared with us, so that we could comment on it fully, in a
previous guest blog LINK . The information included not only
legal advice, but also other correspondence and documents which would have set
out what information was given to the QC, and what was not, on which the advice
the Council relied on justify the payment was based. It was made clear to the
auditor that it was impossible for us to support our objections properly
without sight of that information.
The
auditor’s response to this, in the “Background” section of his decision letter,
was:
‘I am satisfied that the provisional views letter sent to you on 3 August 2017 read with the Audit Committee minutes and Conrad Hall’s letter dated 14 December 2016 gave you sufficient information in order to have provided comments to me, such that there has been no unfairness in not sharing the advice.’
In
effect, he is saying that the primary documents are not ‘material
information’, but that the interpretation of those documents given to him by a
Brent Council officer is, and that it:
‘… contains the material facts on which we have relied upon when reaching our decision. For this reason and given that the Council has not waived its legal professional privilege, I have not shared the actual documents containing or recording the legal advice with you.’
In
other words, the auditor has reached his decision based on what Brent Council
has told him, and has not shared with the objectors any actual documents
related to the payment we objected to because Brent Council did not want him
to. I am sure any reasonable person will understand why I believe that the
process by which the auditor reached his decision was neither fair, nor
impartial.
As
the auditor would not allow us to see the “material documents”, the objectors
had to make their “further comments” on the best information available to them.
In his “Background” section the auditor said:
‘Following the Employment Tribunal above, there was a breakdown in trust and relationships between some Members of the Council and Cara Davani. … This was considered to be an ongoing reputational risk to the Council and that it was difficult to see how Cara Davani could be effective in her role as Human Resources Director, working with Members, going forwards.’
The reputational damage had already been done in September 2014, with the facts
about the appalling treatment of Rosemarie Clarke by the Council and Cara
Davani receiving wide publicity after the Tribunal judgment was published, and
by the failure to take disciplinary action against Ms Davani. Given the
situation described, why was nothing done about it until May 2015? My comments
gave the auditor evidence of why – showing that Ms Davani was being “protected”
by both Christine Gilbert and Cllr. Butt – but that by May 2015 the Council was
selecting a new permanent Chief Executive, so that Ms Davani would soon lose
that joint protection.
The
auditor’s view of the prelude to the “settlement agreement” objected to,
following on from the passage quoted above, is described as follows:
‘Meetings took place between the Leader, Chief Executive and various Members to try and resolve the differences but relationships did not improve. We understand these meetings did not have minutes taken. Following discussions between the Leader and the Chief Executive, it was determined that it would be in the best interests of the Council if Cara Davani and the Council parted company and that legal advice should be sought on possible ways forwards.’
It
does not appear that any documentary record exists of those discussions, but
the next step is set out in the auditor’s “Findings” as follows:
‘Legal advice was sought in May 2015, which concluded the Council did not have a case to conduct a fair dismissal, noting that Cara Davani had informed the Council that she would take the Council to an Employment Tribunal for unfair dismissal if her employment was terminated. Given no disciplinary procedures had previously been taken in respect of the findings from the Employment Tribunal, in these circumstances and given the legal advice obtained, it does not appear unreasonable for the Council to decide to proceed with a settlement.’
The
‘legal advice’ referred to was contained in an undated note, made by the
Council’s Chief Finance Officer (why was the Council’s Chief Legal Officer, a
solicitor, not involved?) about a discussion between Christine Gilbert and a
QC, which he had been the only other party to. It was apparently not checked
for accuracy by the QC who gave the advice, given the auditor’s recommendation
that such advice ‘should be recorded formally immediately after the call and
key issues confirmed with the legal adviser.’
