How to proceed with a complaint against an individual councillor in relation to breach of conduct?

Question

This question concerns correspondence to an individual councillor from a resident alleging breach of conduct of that councillor.
I understand individual councillors cannot respond to complaints and the normal route would be to refer to the clerk, who in turn would refer to the Monitoring Officer. However, the complainant has marked the correspondence private and confidential. I realise this phrase does not always bind, but given the history of complaints against previous Parish Councils & members, I don't want to be potentially in breach of confidentiality, escalating an already difficult issue.
I'm considering writing to the resident and pointing to the correct procedure via the PC complaint policy, which includes a section on the role of the Monitoring Officer where complaints of breach of conduct are alleged.
Thoughts please on how best to proceed?

Answer 1

Why should the PC be involved in such a procedure at all? A complaint regarding a councillor to the MO is nothing to do with the council and is a personal matter between the complainant, the councillor and the MO. Although in some councils the clerk may be informed of such a complaint against one of their council members it is not for the council to mention discus or comment upon even if the MO calls for relevant documentation offered by parties in the case.The complaints procedure of the pc should merely state how a complainant should  proceed to the MO for decision.The PC has no powers to decide or investigate if a councillor has breached the COC nor implement any "punishment" for doing so.

Comments

My question was more re ethics of how to reply when an individual councillor shouldn't respond to complaints about them. I made the decision to point the complainant to the complaints policy which has details of the MO.

Answer 2

When I was a clerk, I took a simple line with anyone who raised an issue like this with me - "Complaints about the conduct of a councillor are dealt with by the Monitoring Officer - here are his/her contact details".  End of ...

Comments

Thank you. I made the decision y'day evening to do just that. I'm the councillor who received the complaint, so was unsure how to proceed.