Senior councillor Martin Smith will have to wait for a few more weeks before he learns whether he can regain his seat on Bradford Council’s decision-making executive.

The Ilkley councillor was investigated by national watchdog Standards for England after allegations that he failed to declare he was a councillor when submitting planning applications on behalf of clients.

He was cleared of bringing the Council into disrepute and using his position to advantage, but was found to have breached the rules by failing to register a personal interest relating to his work as a planning consultant. The board agreed that no further action be taken against him.

Last night, the Council’s standards committee met to discuss any lessons that could be learned from the case.

Afterwards Coun Smith, who stood down from his position on the Council’s executive in August while the inquiry was going on, said: “I obviously regret any failure on my part and value the lessons learned.”

Coun Smith must now wait until the next meeting of the full Council before he can be re-nominated and voted back on to the executive. The next normal meeting of the Council is not until March, but there is a special budget meeting on Thursday, February 25.

Conservative group leader Councillor Kris Hopkins said: “Executive members are appointed by the full Council which does not meet again for some weeks.”

It was alleged that Coun Smith failed to declare he was a councillor when submitting applications for planning permission on behalf of clients and that he did not record this conflict on a register of councillors’ interests.

The Standards for England ethical standards officer found areas of tension such as Coun Smith’s role as a ward councillor with an active interest in planning matters and his role as a planning agent promoting clients’ applications in the same ward.

However, the board found that the breach was not intentional and there was no evidence to suggest that Coun Smith had attempted to conceal his interest deliberately. They also considered it to be “at the lower end of the scale of seriousness”.

The Council’s planning department has already been advised to automatically refer all planning applications where Coun Smith is acting as an agent to committee for a decision.