North East Licolnshire Council 1984

Dear Mr Cant,

Re: Recent Correspondence

I am writing with regard to the recent e-mail which you sent to all Councillors. It was dated the 19th March and was headed the Current Financial Fiasco.

This e-mail is inaccurate and entirely inappropriate. The contents are frankly defamatory of Mr Walsh, a very senior officer of the Council. I have a duty of care to the Council’s employees and am not prepared to allow your actions to continue. The comments you have made in this e-mail cannot be seen in isolation, as you have e-mailed or telephoned many times over the last few months criticising the actions of Mr Walsh, and also Mr Madin. Your criticism of these officers does, I suspect, stem from the fact that the Council applied to the County Court for a bankruptcy order with regard to unpaid Council Tax/NNDR, entirely legitimate action on our part. The County Court made such an order. Following this you complained to the Local Government Ombudsman who made no finding of fault against the Council after a thorough investigation. I accept this may be disappointing for you, but it does not justify your behaviour.

In the circumstances I have instructed the Council’s legal services department to consider commencing defamation proceedings and with this in mind would strongly advise that you immediately cease sending any letters or e-mails which are defamatory of council officers or members.

I have decided that as an Authority it is appropriate to control the manner in which you have access to Council staff by telephone and e-mail. The number of requests for information is excessive. Accordingly we have set up a dedicated telephone number for you to ring 01472 324113 and you may leave a message. The messages will be checked twice weekly. Furthermore we have set up an email address you must use to contact us and this is gcantmailbox@nelincs.gov.uk, again e-mails you send will be checked twice weekly. If you telephone or e-mail individual members of staff your calls or e-mails will be directed to these telephone or email accounts. Clearly there may be instances when you need to access council services eg housing benefit in which case you will need to make this clear when calling the switchboard or visiting a customer access point. If you do not keep to these arrangements I will ask the legal services department to consider obtaining an injunction to ensure that you do so.

It is with regret that I have to write to you in these terms, but the manner and frequency of your contact with the Council staff cannot continue.

Yours sincerely

Tony Hunter
Chief Executive