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Register of Members' interests

If you want to register as a member, here are the rules regarding registering Members’ interests.

In accordance with the Members Code of Conduct, Councillors and co-opted Members are required to register a range of interests the requirements are set out in the Code of Conduct.

Details of these can be found under the individual entry for each Member. 

If you require historic register of interest information not available online please contact [email protected]

Guidance notes to members

This guidance is issued to assist Members and co-opted Members in completion of their notice of Members' interests.  

  • Category 1: Any employment, office, trade, profession or vocation carried out for profit or gain. 
  • Category 2: Any payment or provision of any financial benefit (other than from the City Council) made or provided within the relevant period in respect of any expenses incurred by the Member in the carrying out of your duties as a Member or towards my election expenses. This includes any payment or financial benefit from a Trade Union within the meaning of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. 
  • Category 3: Any contract which is made between you (or a body in which you have a beneficial interest) and the relevant authority: (a) under which goods or services are to be provided or works are to be executed; and (b) which has not been fully discharged. 
  • Category 4: Any beneficial interest in land which is within the area of the City Council. 
  • Category 5: Any licence (alone or jointly with others) to occupy land in the area of the relevant authority for. 
  • Category 6:  Any tenancy where to your knowledge: a) the landlord is the City Council; and b) the tenant is a body in which you have a beneficial interest. 
  • Category 7:  Any beneficial interest in securities of a body where: a) that body to your knowledge has a place of business or land in the area of the City Council; and either (i) The total nominal value of the securities exceeds £25,000 or one hundredth of the total issued share capital of that body; (ii) If the share capital of that body is of more than one class, the total nominal value of the shares of any one class in which you have a beneficial interest which exceeds one hundredth of the total issued share capital of that class. 
  • Category 8: Anybody of which you are a Member or in a position of general control or management and to which you are appointed or nominated by your authority. 
  • Category 9: Any body a) exercising functions of a public nature; b) directed to charitable purposes, or c) one of whose principal purposes includes the influence of public opinion or policy (including any political party or trade union) of which you are a Member or in a position of general control or management. 
  • Category 10: Please list, including dates where possible, all training undertaken to prepare you for your role as Councillor. 

Gifts and Hospitality

You must register, within 28 days of receiving any gifts or hospitality worth £25 or over that you receive in connection with your official duties as a Member, and the source of the gift or hospitality.

Like other interests in your register of interests, you automatically have a personal interest in a matter under consideration if it is likely to affect a person who gave you a gift or hospitality that is registered.

If that is the case, you must declare the existence and nature of the gift or hospitality, the person who gave it to you, how the business under consideration relates to that person and then decide whether that interest is also a prejudicial interest.

Is the gift or hospitality connected to my official duties as a Member?

You should ask yourself, would I have been given this if I was not on the Council? If you are in doubt as to the motive behind a gift or hospitality, the Standards Board recommend that you register it or speak to your monitoring officer.

You do not need to register gifts and hospitality which are not related to your role as a member, such as Christmas gifts from your friends and family, or gifts which you do not accept. However, you should always register a gift or hospitality if it could be perceived as something given to you because of your position or if your authority requires you to.

What if I do not know the value of a gift or hospitality?

Members and co-opted Members must provide an update to the information declared within 28 days of the change.

If you are in doubt as to the value of a gift or hospitality, you should register it, as a matter of good practice and in accordance with the principles of openness and accountability in public life.

You may have to estimate how much a gift or hospitality is worth. Also, an accumulation of small gifts you receive from the same source over a short period that add up to £25 or over should be registered.

Sensitive Information

  1. Where you consider that the information relating to any of your personal interests is sensitive information, and your authority's monitoring officer agrees, you need not include that information when registering that interest, or as the case may be, a change to that interest. 
  2. You must, within 28 days of becoming aware of any change of circumstances which means that information excluded under the previous paragraph is no longer sensitive information, notify the Director of Law asking that the information be included in the authority's register of members' interests. 
  3. "Sensitive information" means information whose availability for inspection by the public creates, or is likely to create, a serious risk that you or a person who lives with you may be subjected to violence or intimidation. 

Further information is available from: [email protected]

Published: 14 January 2021

Last updated: 24 January 2022