Complaints, Comments and Compliments

This form is only to be used if you are complaining about a (parish or borough) councillor's conduct.

If your complaint is about a County Councillor see Lancashire County Council's complaint about a councillor procedure. 

If your complaint is about the council or its officers see our complaints procedure.

The points listed below will help you decide whether this is the correct form to use when making your complaint. You should speak to the Monitoring Officer, if you are not clear if the Council can consider your complaint. The Council's Accounts and Audit committee will make the decision about what action, if any, to take on your complaint.

• Your complaint must be about conduct that occurred while the member(s) complained about were in office. Conduct of an individual before they were elected, co-opted or appointed to the authority, or after they have resigned or otherwise ceased to be a member, cannot be considered by the assessment sub-committee.

• The current Code of Conduct came into effect on April 2021. If your complaint concerns matters that occurred before that date you should contact the Monitoring Officer before making your complaint to check whether it is within the jurisdiction of the committee to consider.

• Your complaint must be about one or more named members of either a Parish Council within the Ribble Valley or Ribble Valley Borough Council.
• Your complaint must be that the member(s) has, or may have, breached the Code of Conduct for Members. You may also contact Monitoring Officer if you require further information.
• Complaints about dissatisfaction with a decision or action of the authority or one of its committees, a service provided by the authority or the authority's procedures do not fall within the jurisdiction of the Accounts and Audit committee. Complaints about the actions of people employed by the authority do not fall within the jurisdiction of the committee.
• Your complaint must be in writing. If using the form above and a disability prevents you from making your complaint in writing you may contact Monitoring Officer for assistance.

It is important to note that not every complaint that falls within the jurisdiction of the committee will be referred for investigation or other action.

The committee must decide whether this is appropriate. It will make this decision using referral criteria.

If the committee decides not to refer your complaint for investigation or other action it will give you the reasons for this decision. It will also explain any right that you may have to ask for the decision to be reviewed.

How should I set out my complaint?

It is very important that you set your complaint out fully and clearly, and provide all the information at the outset. You should also provide any documents or other material that you wish the committee to consider, where possible. Unless the authority advises you otherwise, you will not be able to attend the meeting of the committee.

We recommend that you use our complaint form, you can also include a covering note summarising what you are complaining about, especially if your complaint includes a lot of supporting documentation. In the summary you should tell us exactly what each person you are complaining about said or did that has caused you to complain. If you are sending supporting documentation please cross-reference it against the summary of your complaint.  The information you send will usually be shared with the Councils Independent Persons and the member complained about.

You should be as detailed as possible and substantiate your complaint where you can. You have to demonstrate that you have reasonable grounds for believing that the member(s) complained about has breached the Code of Conduct.