Calls for East Devon District Council chief executive to resign

There are calls for a council chief executive to resign following a report into the council's handling of serious allegations against a councillor.

The report said it was unable to find "reliable evidence" the CEO of East Devon District Council knew about an investigation into John Humphreys.

But the Labour group said the report "proves" Mark Williams was "guilty of serious failings" and should resign.

Mr Williams has been contacted for comment.

Humphreys, a former Mayor of Exmouth and EDDC councillor for 12 years, was convicted in 2021 of three counts of serious sexual assault and seven of indecent assault against two boys in the 1990s and 2000s. He was jailed for 21 years.

The independent report by Verita investigated a line from the minutes of a Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) meeting in March 2016, suggesting Mr Williams had been "alerted to the situation".

This was new evidence presented by Devon and Cornwall Police in March, causing the initial Verita report to be delayed while it investigated.

Verita said in its report this record "appeared to contradict" evidence which Mr Williams and the former monitoring officer of East Devon District Council had provided at an earlier stage in the investigation.

Mr Williams told Verita he had never seen the minutes and had not been told about the criminal investigation at that time.

The report said it could not corroborate the statement from the minutes and concluded "it does not constitute sufficiently reliable evidence that the CEO of EDDC was aware of the Humphreys' situation".

Had Mr Williams been aware he would have had a duty to inform the safeguarding lead, which was not done.

Devon and Cornwall Police gave this statement to the BBC: "The appropriate and agreed route for sharing sensitive information with relevant partners is through the LADO process.

"Once a partner agency has been informed of a risk, it is for them to assess and manage the impact of that risk internally as they see fit."

The Labour group of councillors on EDDC has written to Mr Williams having seen the report, calling for him to resign with immediate effect.

Dan Wilson, the leader of the Labour group, said "the report is completely damning" and the failure to inform the safeguarding lead was "unforgiveable".

He said: "I certainly hope that no children were harmed in the three-year period between the information coming out and his conviction. The problem is that it could have."

He added: "Because safeguarding weren't informed, he could have gone into schools, colleges, he could have been in situations with vulnerable children and as we now know, that would have been extremely dangerous.

"Any harm that was avoided is down to luck when it should have been down to competence."

The Labour group leader told the BBC he would be tabling a vote of no confidence in the chief executive at a council meeting next week unless a resignation was forthcoming before then.

Humphreys was able to continue mixing with children while serving as an EDDC councillor until 2019 and stayed on Exmouth Town Council until he was jailed.

He was nominated for the award of Honorary Alderman which he received from EDDC on 18 December 2019.

It was rescinded weeks after his conviction.

Independent EDDC councillor Jess Bailey said: "There was a situation where a former councillor was awarded a civic honour whilst he was under a criminal investigation, and he went into that trial with that honour as an apparent badge of respectability and I think residents deserve to understand how that happened."

The reports are on the agenda for discussion at an extraordinary meeting of the council on Tuesday.

In June it emerged the council had asked for government help to mend fractious relationships with its staff following its handling of the Humphreys case.

The leader of the council, Liberal Democrat Paul Arnott, said the extraordinary meeting "will be an historic debate for East Devon".

He said: "I must not predetermine it, but members' comments to me already suggest that councillors will seek to clarify senior officer statements about who knew what when, and to understand the reason for the inertia in a process we began in April 2022 which has taken until July 2023 to make the next step. Why?"

He urged everyone involved to remember the victims of Humphreys' crimes, including one from East Devon, saying "members and officers alike owe him the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth".

The Conservative group said its thoughts were with the victims of the "despicable crimes" and it had "nothing further to add until the report can be debated at full council next week".

East Devon District Council said it had no comment to make at this time.

Follow BBC News South West on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Send your story ideas to [email protected].