Almost half of councillors have had a serious incident of abuse - Early findings from APSE's research on elected members

APSE and De Montfort University research finds "almost half of councillors have had a serious incident of abuse."

Cited in the BBC News piece "Abuse of councillors and staff putting democracy at risk, say local government groups" (5 February), APSE's latest research on elected members finds:

• Only a fifth of councils represented in our survey have not seen any issues of intimidation and harassment from members of the public.
• 45% have had serious issues.
• 22% have had issues that are so serious it required the council to create an action plan to keep councillors and officers safe.

On internal council standards matters, there is a good level of trust from councillors in the system for regulating the behaviour of councillors. This includes significant support amongst respondents for being able to suspend councillors who break the rules. 

The full report is due to be released later this month.

ENDS

• There were 393 respondents to the survey. All respondents are councillors at district/borough (including London councils), unitary, or county councils.
• All councillors in the UK were invited to take part by email to their council email addresses. The invite email was sent out on 14 April 2023.
• The survey was timed to be as close as possible to the end of the election cycle for many councillors (so to run ahead of the May 2023 local elections).