BOURNEMOUTH council chief executive Pam Donnellan has come in for fresh criticism for her handling of the ex-leader’s computer porn investigation.

A special council meeting will be held on Tuesday to review the way Conservative councillor Stephen MacLoughlin was dealt with after it emerged he had viewed explicit pornography on his council laptop.

The meeting will discuss whether there are any lessons to be learnt for the future and will attempt to draw a line under the protracted saga.

Councillors will be presented with two reports – one from Ms Donnellan in which she defends her controversial decisions and one from Standards Committee chairman Roy Wardle, who is highly critical about some aspects of the investigation.

Mr Wardle, who is not a councillor but an independent person appointed to the Standards Committee, reiterates his disappointment that he was not initially told about the discovery of pornography on Cllr MacLoughlin’s computer and only found out about it nine months on thanks to the Daily Echo.

He criticises the chief executive and monitoring officer for not consulting him before deciding the matter did not warrant referral to the Standards Committee and questions whether Cllr MacLoughlin received special treatment because of his high-profile status at the time as leader of the council.

But his most damning criticism is of the chief executive’s decision to prevent the advance publication of the investigator’s and QC’s reports prior to the hearing.

He said he issued formal written instructions to the council’s democratic services department to send out the reports and was shocked to discover they had received alternative instructions from Ms Donnellan telling them not to.

He calls her failure to inform him of this “at best discourteous and at worst a serious failure in communication” and says it is “unclear” which powers she used to prevent the papers being published.

The meeting on Tuesday is open to the press and public. It will be held at the Town Hall at 9.30am.