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30
Nov 2021
£15,000 fund set up to help North Yorkshire councillors who face abuse
North Yorkshire County Council has set up a £15,000 fund to help councillors who have faced violent threats and abuse.
A meeting of the authority's executive approved setting aside the money to which any of its 72 elected members will be able to apply, just weeks after Conservative MP Sir David Amess was killed at a constituency surgery in Essex.
The move also follows some North Yorkshire councillors reporting death threats, abusive letters and emails, being held hostage and having their property vandalised.
Under the initiative, councillors will be able to anonymously apply to the security fund, for which there would be no investigation as to whether there is any evidential support for the councillor’s concerns.
The council’s deputy leader, Cllr Gareth Dadd, whose partner is Darlington MP Peter Gibson, told the meeting no elected representative at whatever level should feel threatened or barred from seeking public office.
He said:
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Cllr Dadd said the fund would mean elected members who felt frightened walking down the street could be provided with low-cost measures such as panic alarms, adding:
He said while the amount of funding given to councillors needed to be proportional and pragmatic, the authority should not set an upper limit on the amount of money that could be spent protecting elected members.
Cllr Dadd said:
Home visit concerns
Councillors also agreed to enable elected members with concerns to contact designated officers to provide information about potentially violent persons before undertaking a home visit.
However, concerns were raised over how that would work as councillors were often unaware of concerns about individuals before they arrived at a property.
Whitby cum Mulgrave division councillor and executive member David Chance said:
Cllr Andrew Lee’s call for the council to take a pro-active approach and offer members who may feel their concerns are too trivial a range of low-cost security measures was also approved.
The safety initiative will also promote the reporting of incidents of abuse so the council can better understand the scale of the issue and what further actions can be taken to reduce risks for councillors.
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