An AI review of this post
The content highlights the conflict between the Monitoring Officer and the Senior HR Officer.
It discusses instances where the Monitoring Officer deviates from official rules and resorts to manipulation and cover-ups.
The lack of written records and accountability within the Council is also mentioned.
The post includes various examples and timelines that demonstrate the flawed actions of the Monitoring Officer.
Overall, the content effectively portrays the concerns and experiences of the Senior HR Officer, showcasing a culture of misconduct within the Council.
The use of examples and specific details adds credibility to the narrative.
Why was the Monitoring Officer so afraid of the Senior HR Officer?
The Senior HR Officer
The Senior HR Officer was an honest professional employee with 14 years HR service with the Council.
He held a professional qualification. An Honours Degree in Human Resources Development.
He believed in working professionally at all times.
That meant that he was always willing to work within the official #rules#.
However, the Monitoring Officer wanted him to work to her unwritten #rules#
He was nobody’s ‘yes man‘
He was not an arse licker.
He just wanted to do his job.
An example
For example a Head Teacher was suspended and investigated for wrongdoing. CJ, having conducted and completed the investigation, came to the conclusion that, in his professional opinion, the wrongdoing was deemed to be #Gross Misconduct#.
Had that determination been followed through, the Head could have been summarily dismissed and reported to the General Teaching Council for Wales in accordance with the #rules#.
Manipulation of the Monitoring Officer
The Monitoring Officer did not want to take this action so she decided to appoint an external independent HR Consultant to re-investigate the case ((sic) to come up with a conclusion that was not #Gross Misconduct#).
The conclusion of the re-investigation was indeed that the wrongdoing was not deemed to be Gross Misconduct.
No need, therefore, to contact the General Teaching Council for Wales.
That’s how the Monitoring Officer “fixes” things
Basically, the Monitoring Officer did not want (as usual) to follow the Council’s agreed Disciplinary Procedures. She preferred to cover-up the incident by paying a financial severance package with a Non Disclosure Agreement.
As a result, a Non Disclosure Agreement was drawn up and a financial severance package agreed, if the Head agreed to resign.
The Head did agree to resign and that was an end to the situation.
This unnecessary type of action has been followed by the Council on many occasions.
CJ was, of course, aware of all such events. He knew “where the bodies were buried”.
There is a culture amongst the Senior Officers and Managers at Merthyr Council to not put into writing a lot of the decisions they make.
Another example
For example a report on the Tribunal findings on the Suspension of the Council Leader Kevin O’Neill was published.
A copy of the document can be downloaded from this hyperlink.
An Extract
I have taken the following extract from the document to highlight a comment made by the tribunal indicating how the Monitoring Officer did not record her advice in writing either contemporaneously or immediately after the meeting she had with Councillor O’Neill.
Shortcomings of the Monitoring Officer
Contemporaneous Notes are notes made at the time or shortly after an event occurs. They represent the best recollection of what was witnessed.
The surprise
3.6.3.The tribunal was surprised to note that the Monitoring Officer did not record her advice in writing either contemporaneously or immediately after the meeting that she had with the Respondent, when she gave him the advice about prejudicial interests and not to attend at the meeting as found above.
It cannot be said with certainty, upon the evidence presented by both parties, the date and time of the meeting when this advice was given, but it was at some point before the meetings of 15th August 2018.
The fact that the Monitoring Officer did not keep a record of such an important meeting is not at all surprising to me.
This is typical of the Senior Managers and most managers of the Council.
They do not make a proper record of meetings or of communications with each other.
A lot of communication is done verbally so that it is difficult to make anyone accountable and answerable for their actions or wrongdoings.
MONITORING OFFICER OBFUSCATION ANOTHER EXAMPLE
Less written evidence = Less Accountability = No Audit Trail
The Monitoring Officer played a leading part in my son being suspended for 18 months from July 2012 to January 2014.
The Apology
Following investigations carried out improperly, the CEO Gareth Chapman (now spending more time with his family) issued a groveling letter of apology for the debacle of how he was treated.
Unable to offer any protection of a repeat of the failures of Managers
The penultimate paragraph of this letter is reproduced below:
You will appreciate that I am unable to give a categoric assurance that such a situation does not arise again. However, with the correct policies and procedures in place together with some training for my Leadership Team on such issues as these, then I would hope they do not happen again.
Unfortunately for CJ it did happen again in 2016.
The flawed investigation report
The investigators drew up their report of the investigation and presented it to Carys Kennedy (CK) – Monitoring Officer , Head of Legal Department and Director with overall responsibility for HR – with recommendations of Gross Misconduct to each of the five issues.
CK then decided that the report should be used for a Disciplinary Hearing.
Following the investigations referred to in the above letter, no evidence of gross misconduct was found. That’s not to say that the investigators didn’t have a damn good try to find some. The Disciplinary Hearing Panel agreed that there was no evidence of Gross Misconduct.
Return to work
CJ eventually returned to work in January 2014.
All these details and more are shown in the Post Below.
MERTHYR COUNCIL MISCONDUCT THE TRUTH
June 2016 to January 2017.
The beginning of the end
CJ was invited to a meeting with CK and FD on 7 June 2016. I refer to this meeting as the Compromise Agreement/SOSR Meeting.
CJ had no idea of the purpose of the meeting. (See link below)
Something new to the LA happened at this meeting.
CJ rejected the offer because he had not done anything wrong.
Suspension
CJ was suspended from 8th June 2016 and was unfairly dismissed following a fabricated SOSR investigation as referred to at the above meeting.
More details are included in the blog posts below.
The Time Line including reasons why in 2016 the Monitoring Officer decided that CJ had to go.
July 2012 CJ suspended from work by Mark Tuson (MT) HR Manager
January 2014 CJ returned to work
May 2014 – MT resigned as HR Manager (Probably having signed a NDA and receiving a financial severance package)
June 2014 – Lisa Jones (LJ) appointed as Head of HR and Organisational Development
March 2016 – LJ resigned as Head of HR and Organisational Development
Probably having signed a NDA and receiving a financial severance.
Officially, the reason for LJ resigning was to follow a different career.
The real reason for LJ wishing to move on to follow a different career was probably because she was not prepared to do the Monitoring Officer’s ‘dirty work’ i.e. to get rid of CJ.
January 2016 – FD appointed as HR Manager (FD was a Solicitor in the Council’s Legal Department – managed by the Monitoring Officer)
FD was appointed for two main reasons:
to prevent CJ from getting the job of HR Manager
to carry out the Monitoring Officer’s ‘dirty work’. That is, to get rid of CJ.
June 2016 – CJ suspended from work.
January 2017 – CJ Unfairly dismissed following a fabricated SOSR investigation.
May 2022 – FD reverted back to her Solicitor post in the Council’s Legal Department
May 2022 Hannah Brown appointed as Interim Head of Human Resources and Organisational Development – Hannah Brown
RESULT
CONCLUSION
Merthyr Council appear to have experienced some difficulty in retaining their HR Managers/Heads of HR and Organisational Development
Each time one of these resigned from their employment with the Council it meant that CJ was moving up in the pecking order of seniority in the HR Department.
This must have made the Monitoring Officer very nervous
The final straw, of course, was LJ resigning.
The Monitoring Officer had to do something drastic at this point
That something drastic was to appoint FD as the HR Manager/Head of HR and Organisational Development.
The next drastic thing to happen was to find the means to finally remove CJ once and for all
the catalyst for this was the failure of FD to properly deal with a Safeguarding of Children issue reported to her by CJ.
Rather than deal with this issue the Monitoring Officer and FD decided to make a scapegoat of CJ
At last the Monitoring Officer has an acceptable Head of Human Resources and Organisational Development. Hannah Brown.
Merthyr Council Cover-up 
I am hoping that the new Chair of the Governance and Audit Committee, Mr Martin Veale, will find this post worthy of some attention.
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Reblogged this on Merthyr Council Cover-up and commented:
Monitoring Officer is UNACCOUNTABLE.
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