Tories respond to Labour following Cllr Geary demands.
Milton Keynes Conservatives have responded angrily to the city’s Labour Group call for Councillor Peter Geary to resign following his environmental offence conviction this week.
Cllr Geary pleaded guilty at Milton Keynes Magistrates Court to criminal offences relating to agricultural and livestock management rules and was ordered to pay fines and costs totalling over £5,400.
Following the sentencing, Labour demanded Cllr Geary’s resignation, triggering a fierce response from the Conservative Group.
“Peter Geary is now a convicted criminal and he must resign his seat,” Labour said this week. “His conviction of a criminal offence while sitting as a local councillor is totally incompatible with continuing to be an elected representative.”
But the Tories have hit back saying they do not accept Labour's attempt to turn regulatory failures concerning record keeping into a question about Cllr Geary’s integrity as a councillor, while ‘conveniently forgetting their own record when considerably more serious cases have involved Labour councillors’.
“Peter got his farming records wrong. He has admitted that, pleaded guilty and faced the consequences. I am not going to pretend otherwise,” said Cllr Shazna Muzammil, Milton Keynes Conservative Group Leader.
“Nothing Peter was prosecuted for relates to his conduct as a councillor. Nothing relates to the exercise of public office. Nothing relates to his treatment of residents or his responsibilities at Milton Keynes City Council.”
The Conservatives say that Labour has described a criminal conviction while serving as a councillor as ‘totally incompatible’ with continuing to be an elected representative and adds that Section 80 of the Local Government Act 1972 includes among its disqualification provisions a conviction resulting in imprisonment of at least three months, whether suspended or not, without the option of a fine.
“Cllr Geary received a fine. The fine does not trigger that statutory disqualification,” said Cllr Muzammil.
In a statement the Conservatives list:
Former Labour Councillor Shammi Akter who pleaded guilty to an offence involving the neglect of her four-year-old child. Despite pleading guilty the Labour Group kept her on as councillor until she was sentenced three months later.
Council Leader Pete Marland told a young person attending Full Council to ‘f*** off’, and several standards complaints followed. None of those complaints proceeded to a hearing before the Council's Standards Committee.
Mayor James Lancaster, who faced complaints about his conduct towards a woman and a subsequent police caution.
Labour councillor and magistrate Ansar Hussain, who was suspended following controversy over antisemitic social-media material, apologised and was subsequently allowed back into Labour.
“Labour wants to talk about judgement. Fine. Then let's talk about judgement,” said Cllr Muzammil “I will not be taking instructions from Labour. I stand by my record on standards. But standards without consistency are just political convenience.
“Peter will continue to have our support. I will not be asking him to resign. The council confirmed they were taking him to court in his private capacity not as a councillor.
“The treatment of Peter has now become a political witch hunt. Labour has forgotten very quickly how it dealt with its own councillors. We will continue doing the job residents elected us to do: holding this administration to account, whether they like it or not.”
