[Ed Hammond]

I think that Tameside have (until very recently) had a process by which scrutiny reports go to full council, but they have switched now to a Cabinet-focused approach.

It's unusual to send things to full Council - I suppose that there are several reasons. It meets infrequently in many authorities, and in most places there might be a perception that you can only get "genuine" agreement to take formal action by taking something to Cabinet, rendering a reference to FC superfluous. I do think though that the role of full Council needs to be enhanced and pushing recommendations through that forum gives a sense of full, corporate ownership or recommendations.

I will see if I can find any other examples.

[David Collins]

Wouldnt that be going back to the old days a bit? I could imagine a full Council meeting spending a long time picking over a scrutiny review of a topic like....Meals on Wheels.

[Matt Clack]

We send all final scrutiny reports (together with the Exec response) to Full Council, because this gives Chairs an opportunity to promote their work and keep other members aware of the work programmes. These agendas are so packed, however, that scuritny is regularly the last item and only given a few minutes for the Chair to speak and any questions. Scrutiny Members have raised concerns about this in the past, but there doesn't appear to be any appetite to move them up the agenda.

[tim gilling]

It may be worth looking at the outcomes of the Wright Committee which proposed reforming the way Parliament works to give Select Committee Chairs more influence over what gets debated in the Chamber. Perhaps the executive should give OSC chairs more say over what gets debated at full council and how agendas etc are structured.

A strengthened role for full council was what Prof George Jones was arguing for at our annual conference.

Certaily it would need to work differently to when councils operated under the committee system where, apart from the 'excitment' of the occasional recorded vote or decision to call the police, council business tended to be 'stage managed'.

[Tom Hook]

We send scrutiny reports with exec response to full council to note. Has generated some interesting debates on both the reports and whether the recommendations have been agreed, and also raises our profile.

[Nick Beale]

Scrutiny reporting to full council as well as the executive was always envisaged in the guidance and the legislation. I can't remember when we last did but I could see that you might do so in relation to a framework policy or other matter which is a council function rather than an executive one.

Also, if you were "holding the executive to account" there would be some logic in reporting your conclusions to the council rather than the executive.

[Heather Smith]

Full Council gets our annual report - this is a requirement of our constitution. It does get discussed Generally speaking, though, reports going to Cabinet.

[Rosie Gunstone]

in Medway all our O&S Committees present as part of the Council agenda a summarised report of business at the last round of meetings which enables Members to debate issues there.

[Amanda Simcox]

In Birmingham Scrutiny Reports together with the Executive response's are debated at Full Council. It is there that we ask for the recommendations to be agreed so they can be implemented. Our latest report dealt with a controversial issue and therefore generated quite a lot of debate. If you would like further information please contact me amanda.j.simcox@birmingham.gov.uk.