A charity protecting public sector whistleblowers will continue to receive funding from Swindon Borough Council.

The authority's Standards Committee voted to continue to subscribe to Protect - formerly known at Public Concern at Work.

The charity provides confidential, independent advice to individuals with who feel they need to expose wrong-doing at work, and supports organisations with their

whistleblowing arrangements, and tries to change the law on the subject.

The cost to the council to renew its subscription will be £1,310 this year.

When asked to whether the committee was 'happy' to continue to subscribe by chairman Coun Teresa Page, Coun Vera Tomlinson said: "Well, no, I'm not happy" but did vote to continue supporting the charity.

Earlier in the meeting members of the committee - which is set up to make sure both councillors and officers at Euclid Street behave ethically and legally - asked why there had been such a huge jump in the number of complaints last year.

Whereas there had been one ethics complain so far this year, and one in 2016-17, there were 36 in 2017-18.

Members were told that there had been a somewhat co-ordinated campaign on one issue, with 27 letters all about the same matter. Those complaints had been dismissed, with eight referred for investigation and four referred on for action by the council's monitoring officer.