AN ALLIANCE councillor has been suspended for six months from his elected role following a conviction for drink-driving.
Patrick Brown – a representative on Newry, Mourne and Down council – was convicted in July last year for riding his motorbike while under the influence of alcohol.
A hearing of the Northern Ireland Local Government Commissioner for Standards found he had brought both his position as a councillor and his council into disrepute.
In reaching her decision, the commissioner Marie Anderson considered evidence including submissions by Mr Brown, who accepted that his conduct failed to comply with the local government code of conduct.
Mr Brown (26) was riding his motorbike with a pillion passenger when he was stopped and breathalysed by police in the early hours of March 5 2017 – just days after the Stormont assembly election in which he was Alliance's candidate for South Down.
He appeared in July at Laganside courthouse in Belfast where he was fined £250 and banned from driving for a year. This was reduced by three months after he completed a drink-drive offenders' course.
His conviction only emerged in January when he issued an apology after being contacted by The Irish News.
Mr Brown referred himself to the commissioner for investigation in November and a hearing was held in Belfast on Thursday.
In his submissions, Mr Brown set out several mitigating factors for the commissioner to consider, including that he had apologised and had contacted drink-driving charities to express an interest in supporting them in an attempt to correct his wrongdoing.
The commissioner determined that Mr Brown's conduct merited a six-month suspension to begin on May 14.
She was satisfied his actions were likely to have diminished the trust and confidence of the public, and were sufficiently serious to rule out lesser sanctions.
