Cllr Giles took advantage of the presence of Chief Superintendent Keith Perkin to as what view the officer would take of someone divulging the name of a person interviewed by the police in connection with a criminal inquiry. “A dim one”, was the reply.

Cllr Giles then asked “What view would you take of the Chief Executive of EDDC yesterday issuing a message in which he named a person interviewed by the police, that person being an East Devon District Councillor”.

Cue applause from the public seats and tut-tutting from some Tory members.

Commissioner Hogg intervened: “You can’t put the police in this position!”, and Chair Tim Wood hurried on to the next question.

Later, after the Police & Crime Commissioner(PCC) and his colleagues had left, Mr Williams called on Cllr Giles to apologise to the PCC for asking an embarrassing question.

Cllr Giles retorted angrily to the CEO that he had never known such inappropriate behaviour from a Chief Executive.

While no Conservative councillors expressed any concern over the revelation, Independent Susie Bond commented that such “outing” of witnesses in police inquiries could well discourage “whistle-blowers” from coming forward in the future with information of possible interest to the police.