[natalie mcclellan]

I'd appreciate a look at the Audit Commission report you refer too.

I started working for my local authority well after our Exeuctive/Scrutiny system was implemented, and I've only been working with members in the scrutiny role over the last 12 months or so. I've never worked under the committee system, so a bit of background information would certainly be appreciated.

Thanks Nat

[Nick Beale]

"I know that many of you are quite despondent about the prospect of returning to the committee system ... but there are also some real issues around accountability and transparency that need to be explored."

Those of us still working who can actually remember the committee system could be quids in on consultancies. But seriously ...

I don't remember that Audit Commission paper (impressive archaeology there, Ed) but I always felt 1998's Modern Local Government, In Touch With the People pulled the standard marketing trick of inventing a problem in order to flog a solution. Its picture of the committee system was recognisable, but then caricatures usually are.

I do seem to recall the odd fleeting moment (or was it hour after hour?) of boredom in committee meetings but they did generally ensure that new policies and developments were questioned and debated as they were put forward - the proposers had to give an account of themselves in a public forum at an early stage, something they can avoid to a greater extent in a system which promised "speedier decision making" (aka less debate). Scrutiny is much better at detailed examination after the event than committees ever were, though and better for policy development.

The other job committees did well was to give members a good grounding in the areas covered. I don't think we've ever found an adequate alternative to that method of steadily imparting background knowledge. Briefings and "awareness" sessions just don't seem to do it, perhaps because they're in the abstract while committees worked as learning-by-doing.

Finally, do people stand for election because they want to make helpful comments and suggestions or because they want to get things done, make changes? There's been plenty of research suggesting that non-executive members feel marginalised under the present system - one study acknowledged that such marginalisation could arguably be seen as an object of the 2000 Act, so that the handful of decision makers could get on with the job relatively unhindered.

Finally, as an elector do you feel that your councillor has enough power adequately to represent you and act on your behalf under the current system?

[Earl Piggott-Smith]

I suspect that there will be a few more twists and turns along the road to a committee system. I don't get a sense that there is much appetite among the public and or members to take up this offer - ( the issue of elected mayors and councillor call for action, are both interesting example of a high profile initiatives, which only a few authorities have taken up with any enthusiam). The possibility of a change from committee structure to a scrutiny structure created winners and losers, and the reverse will also do the same.

At the end of the day local authorities will have to develop a system of checks and balances that will enable it to properley manage services at a time of severe financial constraints, where the role and value of the public sector is under challenge to deliver real changes. The role of local authority will be severley tested in the next few years and there will be a greater need for scrutiny to make sure money is being spent in most effective way.

I suspect that scruitiny or some variation will continue for the majority, as local authorities role will possibily move more to contract managment rather than that of direct delivers, which will have implications for the skills needed by members to hold those responsible to account - I think option of changing structure may strengthen the case for continuing with scrutiny rather than replacing it when the pros and cons are looked at in detail - then again i could be proved totally wrong - the unknown knowns....

[Josh Mynott]

Some thoughts, in no particular order.

Never admit to remembering any reports befroe 2000. It shows your age. Wouldn't mind seeing it, though.

Is the plan to allow a return to ye olde worlde committee, or fourth option?

Either way, it'll be different in character, as we have a generation of councillors, including leaders, who have grown up with Exec & scrutiny and the different ways of working that brings. I suspect that attitudes, as much as structures, will be important

A vital element will be cost. Money & time switching over (rewriting constitutions and so on) is one thing, but it would also be interesting to think about a comparison between the support required for committees, and the support required for the current system. My view is that we seem to be running the new system on fewer staff than the old (not that I'm old enough to remember, obviously). Not sure if that's inherent in committees, or just because it was 10 years ago, before they invented computers and that, and every agenda had to be handwritten by monks.

[Josh Mynott]

Some thoughts, in no particular order.

Never admit to remembering any reports befroe 2000. It shows your age. Wouldn't mind seeing it, though.

Is the plan to allow a return to ye olde worlde committee, or fourth option?

Either way, it'll be different in character, as we have a generation of councillors, including leaders, who have grown up with Exec & scrutiny and the different ways of working that brings. I suspect that attitudes, as much as structures, will be important

A vital element will be cost. Money & time switching over (rewriting constitutions and so on) is one thing, but it would also be interesting to think about a comparison between the support required for committees, and the support required for the current system. My view is that we seem to be running the new system on fewer staff than the old (not that I'm old enough to remember, obviously). Not sure if that's inherent in committees, or just because it was 10 years ago, before they invented computers and that, and every agenda had to be handwritten by monks.

[Ed Hammond]

I entirely agree on the 1998 WP - I have not been referring to it when doing my research as the Audit Commission study is far more circumspect and useful. I'll upload it in due course.

I agree with you Nick in what you have to say about the need of recognising the value and virtues of the old system. It's very easy to opine about it and how awful it was (and indeed, I was a mere babe in arms when it was still about) but the reason why it survived for more than 100 years was because it did the job.

The point that the Audit Commission paper highlights is that it encouraged councillors to focus more and more on operational management than on monitoring and review. Of course, you could say, "well, councillors *should* be in involved in the day to day running of the authority" but I think that a balance must be struck, and the AC's research suggest that, in many authorities in the 90s, the balance had shifted the wrong way. For example the report cites the example of one authority that had 302 meetings in one year just to do with education services.

Equally, I would query the extent to which the "traditional" committee system would be able to cope with the very different pattern of partnership working and joint decision making that happens these days. And I have difficulty with the huge time and resource commitment involved, and the time taken to make decisions. Then again, that's democracy.

So the debate is perhaps more nuanced than we might like to think - and it's important that we recognise this. That said I still say that councils should retain the cabinet/scrutiny model because, although it isn't perfect either, it provides a more flexible framework for decision-making and accountability than the old one. Some members and even officers will disagree and for those people, we'll have to work with them to ensure that a return to the committee system accentuates the positives and eliminates the negatives of that system, in part by maintaining a strong emphasis on strategy, policy development and review - the elements that, pre-2000, most often fell by the wayside in committee-based decision making.

[Ed Hammond]

Incidentally, to answer Josh's question - it'll be "whatever executive arrangements you want" - and I would guess that most councils going back would choose to adopt something that doesn't look a million miles away from the fourth option approach. My gut feeling is that for authorities going back, there will be six or seven subject committees which will set up task and finish style cross-party "policy review groups" which would carry out policy review and development along the lines of existing scrutiny T&F groups but I am running away with myself here.

CfPS will, I should say, robustly defend the honour of O&S and the role it's performed for the last ten years, and try to demonstrate why it is more relevant than ever. I think a lot of the issues about failings in the system are cultural more than anything else, and you can't solve a cultural problem by fiddling with your structures (although I do appreciate that the original 2000 Act changes are an example of this precise kind of thing...)

Also, when the Audit Commission report came out, I was nine years old. Mind you I was very interested in local government even then and made sure that they sent me a few copies. I managed to swap them in the playground for a packet of Nik Naks.

[Ed Hammond]

As an aside, I have been doing research this evening and it seems that scrutiny is Michael Howard's idea. When he was at the Department of the Environment in 1993 (DoE of course used to be responsible for local government, from 1970 to 1997 - just showing off now) he commissioned a working party which was the first one to suggest council cabinets and a separate scrutiny function. The Conservatives were planning to launch a series of pilots and pass primary legislation on the subject but lost the 1997 election and of course the rest is history.

The more research on this subject I do, the weirder it gets.

[Nick Beale]

Ehammond Wrote:As an aside, I have been doing research this evening and it seems that scrutiny is Michael Howard's idea. When he was at the Department of the Environment in 1993 ...

The more research on this subject I do, the weirder it gets.

I can remember a very long time ago people talking about "inner cabinet and monitoring" as a newly revealed truth, couldn't put a date to it though.

As for Michael Howard ... the Home Secretary in 1995 who came up with ID cards, as now scrapped by the party he once led - like you said, things get weirder the more you look into them.

Admitting one's age ... you Young Persons can look forward to "an exciting period of change in local government offering challenges as well as opportunities" whereas as some of us can start familiarising ourselves with the emergency exits. I think I can keep my envy well under control!

Finally, apologies for having two "finallys" in my last post.

[Josh Mynott]

And apologies from me for the double post. Stupid mouse letting me click twice instead of wating patiently.

My research indicates that it was actually the Earl of Croydon, Under-secretary for Pointless Colonial Wars Against Pitifully Underarmed Natives in the first Gladstone administration ,who first suggested an Executive / Scrutiny split, during the great "Kaiser's mustachios" controversy of 1873.

Who amongst us who were present during that fiery debate will ever forget the moment when Lord Huckleberry of Carnforth was heard to distinctly mutter under his breath "this call in process sounds pointless to me", causing several bystanders to faint and nearly bringing down the puppet administration in what was then Zanzibar?

As you say, it gets wierder.