Winchester city councillor Susan Cook has been disciplined

Emma Dipper, who moved to Dolphin Hill with her two children in late 2018, submitted a complaint against Cllr Sue Cook.

She accused the ward representative of bullying, harassment and victimisation, breaching data protection policies and failing to treat people with respect.

Following a rare meeting of the standards sub-committee, held in private, Cllr Cook has been told to attend code of conduct training and apologise in writing. It cleared Cllr Cook of bullying.

Ms Dipper said: “The complaints made about me when I moved to the area were silly little things. Apparently I had been stealing bins, and Cllr Cook had a problem with my van.

“She went to the police and the DVLA about it, even though I would only ever park where I was allowed. I was being made to feel unwanted and she would keep on despite it being found that I’d done nothing wrong.”

The mum-of-two had been waiting eight years for a council house.

“It’s absolutely awful,” she added. “I’m a single mum with two young children, which I think has a stigma anyway, but I spend my life working hard trying to be a good role model.”

Ms Dipper added: “Having to go through this is evidence that I was right to think that people were judging me. I want to make sure noone else has to go through it.”

A report on the case has been published on the council website but not publicised.

It found that Cllr Cook failed “to listen to the interests of all parties” and “did not remain objective in the face of repeated neighbour complaints about the complainant despite assurances given by the professional housing officer”.

The report adds there was “failure to represent the needs of residents, putting their interests first (specifically, the complainant’s interests)” and that she “did not deal with representations from residents fairly, appropriately and impartially in encouraging them to carry out surveillance of the complainant’s activities”.

“There is clear written evidence that Cllr Cook had disclosed information to a third party about the complainant’s private and family life despite the complainant explicitly asking that details of her private life should not be shared with other residents of Twyford,” it continues.

In a statement, Cllr Cook said: “I did my best as a ward councillor to mediate between the complainant and her neighbours. There were various issues which troubled the neighbours and I took them up with council officers and went to see the complainant on a number of occasions but only got to speak to her face to face once because of her work commitments.

“ However, we had extensive email correspondence and I hoped that the situation could have been resolved in a timely manner. This was not to be the case and unfortunately she raised a complaint against me.

“The committee found I did not bully, victimise or harass the complainant. I consider these to be the most serious allegations and am pleased that I have been exonerated. I felt I had acted with nothing but care and professionalism and regret that the complainant didn’t see it this way.

“I fell short of some of the standards all councillors must adhere to and it was never my intention to encourage surveillance on the complainant.

“Once again I wish to say how sorry I am for what happened and it was never my intention to deliberately breach data protection.”