Civility in public life motion

The LGA Executive Advisory Board agree to adopt the Civility in public life motion proposed by Dame Mayor Norma Redfearn DBE and seconder Cllr Amanda Hopgood on behalf of the Association of North East Councils as LGA policy.

Councillors are at the heart of local democracy and communities, representing residents and making pivotal decisions that shape people’s day-to-day lives.  

This Association recognises that this role is both a privilege and a responsibility and that councillors should expect to face challenge and scrutiny.  

However, all too often, councillors have to tolerate extreme abuse, threats, harassment, and intimidation as a part of their role. 

In 2017, the Committee for Standards in Public Life raised concerns that the scale and intensity of intimidation were shaping public life. Seven years on, the LGA’s data shows that abuse of councillors is getting worse, with half of councillors saying it has increased since they were first elected and eight in 10 feeling personally at risk while fulfilling their role. 

Women, people from ethnic minority backgrounds and LGBTQIA+ people appear more likely to experience heightened and more vitriolic abuse than others. This abuse is deterring people from standing for election or pushing them to step down early, impacting councils' ability to achieve their ambitions of truly reflecting the communities they represent. 

Since 2019, this Association has worked to improve public and political discourse, setting high standards of expected councillor conduct and working with councils and the police to improve support for councillors experiencing abuse.  

We welcome the Government’s recent announcement of new police support for elected members, including councillors. Still, significant concerns about personal safety, disruption at council meetings, and pile-on abuse online remain; more action is needed to curtail this negative impact on our democracy and mitigate against emergent risks in the future. 

This Association does not accept that high levels of abuse and harassment should be part of public life; to do so would only help normalise behaviour that threatens representative democracy and the communities that councils serve.  

It is vital that decisions made by councillors remain unfettered by undue pressure and intimidation intended to silence democratic expression and constructive debate.