A NEWPORT councillor has slammed complaints that led to him being given a written warning as unfair and spurious.

Miqdad Al-Nuaimi, a Newport council Stow Hill Labour councillor, says he now wishes to move on after an investigation by group whips into complaints made by two cabinet members.

Council Labour group chief whip Trevor Watkins said Cllr Al-Nuaimi was treated fairly and that the sanction could have been worse.

The complaint is apparently relating to something he had said at a private meeting.

“I have been under tremendous strain for the last two months over something I consider both spurious and trivial,” said Cllr Al-Nuaimi.

“I have attended two hearings. I had a strong case for rebuttal of those trivial and spurious complaints, I wish to move on now.”

The Argus first reported in January that Cllr Al-Nuaimi was facing an internal Labour group investigation after Cllr Bob Poole, cabinet member for education, complained about him.

At the time it was widely thought that the investigation came off the back of an email, sent to all councillors, where he blasted Cllr Bob Poole as arrogant.

Cllr Al-Nuaimi has now revealed that at the first hearing in January the complaint seemed to actually be about a written question relating to the Gaer schools merger he’d sent to Cllr Poole on December 23, accusing him of giving a “woefully inadequate answer” and asking him further queries.

But a a later hearing on March 5 it appeared that the complaint was about something he was alleged to have said at a Labour group meeting on October 21, 2013. He said he couldn’t reveal what was said at the private meeting.

Cllr Al-Nuaimi said he didn’t accept that he had broken party rules and had written to Welsh Labour to appeal over his written warning, but a Welsh Labour spokesman told the Argus that there was no such right.

Cllr Watkins said that the whips had adjourned the first hearing to clarify the complaints made, which he said had been made by two cabinet members.

He explained he wasn’t prepare to go into the detail of the complaint.

Cllr Watkins confirmed one was Cllr Poole but did not give details of the second.

Cllr Watkins said: “It was a fair hearing and was a fair judgement that come out of it.

The Argus had attempted to contact Cllr Bob Poole but was informed he would not be making a comment.