THURROCK councillors have been told to behave themselves and refrain from 'embarrassing' outbursts at full council meetings by a leading Labour politician.

Cllr Lynn Worrall, who is no stranger to 'grandstanding' in the chamber and gained a reputation for cross bench caustic comments over many years, gave a withering critique of 'bad behaviour' by councillors.

Cllr Worrall, deputy leader of the council and councillor responsible for change and improvement, spoke out at a corporate overview and scrutiny committee meeting after giving an update on the council progress since being placed under the scrutiny of Government appointed commissioners.

Without giving specific incidents, Ms Worrall said bad behaviour during full council meetings towards other councillors and council officers would not impress commissioners when producing their next report.

Speaking at the meeting on Tuesday (18 March), Cllr Worrall, who includes a night of vocal protest from the public benches in 2023 among her catalogue of past caustic council chamber comments, said: "We do need a culture change.

"As 49 councillors, when we get elected you sign that register to say that you take on a duty to the community. You are no longer a resident that can write what they want and say what they want.

"Far too often, officers who have no rights of reply are targeted and emailed and it's not acceptable.

"As leading councillors we need to step up and say that's not acceptable in this chamber. We are not coming out of intervention all the time we cannot behave ourselves."

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Cllr Worrall added: "We've done some phenomenal work. But it's an embarrassment. I don't want to sit here and listen to that. The officers can't respond."

In her outbursts in a vitriolic meeting in 2023, Cllr Worral came under for from then council leader, Tory Andrew jefferies, who said: "This sort of behaviour is totally unacceptable and it's not what the residents of Thurrock expect from their democratically elected councillors and it needs to stop."

The latest clash of opinions came as it emerged the Labour administration is mulling reducing the number of full council meetings in the next municipal year with members invited to attend more cabinet meetings where they could ask questions but take no part in the decision-making.

Cllr Ben Maney, chairman of the committee, said: "There is a feeling that we keep talking about transparency but some members are beginning to feel that there is a creeping lack of transparency.

"We now know that there is a proposal to hold less full councils in the new municipal year.

"We know conversations are ongoing and no decisions have been made but there is no meeting of this council that is more important than full council."

Cllr Maney added: "It's not okay to hold less and less meetings where members can turn up and vote by saying we're having more talking shops where people can ask more questions."

Cllr James Halden, Conservative councillor for The Homesteads, blamed the introduction of video recording of meetings for encouraging "grandstanding" from some councillors.

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He is no stranger to elequent and cutting comments from the chamber floor and said: "Quite clearly there's been a conversation in the administration between cabinet and officers regarding what you do about the minority of council outbursts from certain members that paints us all in a bad light.

"Unfortunately we work with our colleagues who are sent here by the electorate.

"They are not our employees. We cannot control them. I think a lot more grandstanding has happened since we had video recording."