York councillor under investigation after complaint by residents

The behaviour of a York councillor is under investigation after an official complaint by two residents of his ward.

Mark Warters, the independent councillor for Osbaldwick and Derwent, is accused of aggressive and discriminatory behaviour in his dealings with two business owners.

Cllr Warters denies the accusations, which are the subject of a standards committee hearing next Tuesday (7 September).

Jason and Keira Moore, who run the York Foot Clinic on Hull Road, contacted their ward councillor Mr Warters after a council contractor started to install fencing on what they said was their land.

When Cllr Warters phoned Mr Moore back, the couple alleged he was “aggressive in his manner”, told them “it’s the council’s land and we will do what we want to do on it” and said he had “fought bigger people than you and stopped bigger issues than this”.

In the letter of complaint, Mr Moore says: “I am deeply saddened that when I needed to discuss matters with him he choose to be aggressive, narrow minded and discriminative against me and my business, rather than take a pragmatic, reasonable approach to this incident.”

‘No aggression or anger’

Cllr Warters denies the accusations, and says he “had no aggression or anger when talking with the complainant”.

A report to the monitoring officer following an investigation states: “Cllr Warters reported that the telephone conversation was ‘perfectly amiable to start with’ and that it was the complainant (Mr Moore) who became increasingly ‘animated and aggressive when realising that I was not going to be a pushover for the complainant to get his way’.”

Cllr Warters said that neighbouring residents had told him that the owners and customers of York Foot Clinic had regularly “parked vehicles in a manner preventing/ hindering neighbouring residents in accessing/ egressing their properties. Parked vehicles on the verge, causing damage to the condition of the verge”.

Mr and Mrs Moore told the investigating officer they “try to get their patients to park their vehicles in a manner that does not inconvenience local residents.

“The complainants said Cllr Warters had not sought their point of view in relation to parking”.

Breach of the code

Also forming part of the investigation is an email sent by Cllr Warters to council officers about the parking situation.

In it he wrote: “The owner of the Foot Clinic is now parking a vehicle on this verge (despite the foot clinic supposedly having parking for four vehicles) just simply to stick two fingers up to the residents in that area.

“This involves driving over a CYC kerb to access the verge – is anyone going to take
any action?

“If not then my advice to residents will be to park their cars on the road to prevent this manoeuvre, parking that is perfectly legal as it’s not in obstruction of a legitimate
dropped crossing.”

The investigating officer said there were no witnesses to the phone conversation between Mr and Mrs Moore and Cllr Warters, which made it “very difficult to reach a
clear unequivocal finding/conclusion regarding what was said”.

He adds: “The email does give me a flavour of perhaps his feelings towards the owners of the Foot Clinic”.

The views contained in it were “not helpful in resolving such a situation and there is a chance that this view could have spilled out during the telephone conversation”.

He found that Cllr Warters did not breach the council code of conduct in relation to the phone call as it was one person’s word against another.

He did find a breach with regard to the email, “namely that Councillor Warters failed to treat the complainants with respect”.

After the report, the council monitoring officer asked whether Cllr Warters would offer an apology to Mr and Mrs Moore to resolve the complaint. He said he was not prepared to do that.

The hearing, on 7 September, will determine whether Cllr Warters has breached the code of conduct and, if so, whether and what sanction to impose.