'Gifts' proposal part of draft internal memo since amended: council

The document which formed the basis for the 'gifts for staff' story in last week's Meath Chronicle was based on a draft internal report "which has since been amended for further discussion", Meath County Council said this week. The council was responding to the article which said that council managers had proposed that council employees be allowed to accept gifts or hospitality to the value of a week's salary in a suggested code of practice governing fraud and corruption. The proposal was made in the document presented by management to its audit committee, made up of three councillors and four others with an accountancy or financial background. It was suggested that council staff should inform line managers if any inappropriate gifts were offered and that a guideline should be that any gifts or hospitality should not exceed the value of one week's pay of the entry level of the employee's grade. It gave an example for a council employee earning €52,000 a year and said that such a person would have a limit of €1,000 by way of gifts or hospitality. The management document had advised employees that the code of conduct for them should be adhered to at all times, including the values of honesty, impartiality, integrity and serving the common good. The council has not commented publicly on the issue but has circulated its councillors setting out its anti-fraud and corruption policy. "The story as reported is based on an internal draft working document prepared as part of an ongoing process of developing an anti-fraud and corruption policy for staff and councillors. "Council management has, to date, made no recommendations in relation to this policy. "Before we jump to conclusions, let's look at the facts. Our staff do not and will not accept inappropriate or excessive gifts. Such practices are strictly prohibited under our own existing internal policies and the Department code of conduct." "Should the matter of token gifts to staff ever arise, for example, at Christmas time, only something of very modest value would ever be appropriate. This again reflects internal and Departmental best practice. The process we are currently engaged in will, once completed, reiterate and strengthen these policies," it said. In a separate briefing to its councillors, the council said it was currently preparing a supporting policy to ethics legislation dealing with protection against possible fraud and corruption. This was being prepared in consultation with the council's statutory audit committee. "One consideration was whether a stated financial limit is appropriate in the context of determining what is or is not acceptable and, if so, whether such a limit might be linked to salary levels. It was decided that such an approach would not be appropriate." "In due course, an agreed draft policy aimed at supporting and strengthening current policies will be recommended by council management. The story, as reported in a local paper, is based on a draft internal working document which has no currency and which has since been amended for further discussion," the council told councillors. The Impact trade union, which represents most of the staff in the council, said that the suggestions made in the internal document "speaks of an old kind of politics. The general mood now would reject that". Its communications officer, Niall Shanahan, said that he had never before heard a proposal of this kind and said that it would not fall within the terms and conditions of employment of council employees. "It is not part and parcel of those conditions and, to my knowledge, the guidelines followed are the ones in the Local Government Act 2001," he said. He added that he would be interested to know the outcome of the consultation process involving the document presented to the audit committee. "We have not been party to discussions on this," Mr Shanahan said. The chairperson of the audit committee, Frank McLoughlin, Ashbourne, was unavailable for comment. The audit committee is made up of Cllrs Nick Killian, Maria Murphy, Niamh McGowan, along with Frank Fitzmaurice, former Meath County Council official and now with NUI Maynooth; John Kelly of Boliden Tara Mines; Kate Williams, chartered certified accountant, and Frank McLoughlin, chartered accountant.