Introduction to scrutiny

Public scrutiny is an essential part of ensuring that government remains effective and accountable.  Public scrutiny can be defined as the activity by one elected or appointed organisation or office examining and monitoring all or part of the activity of a public sector body with the aim of improving the quality of public services.  A public sector body is one that carries out public functions or spends public money.  Scrutiny ensures that executives are held accountable for their decisions, that their decision-making process is clear and accessible to the public and that there are opportunities for the public and their representatives to influence and improve public policy.

Public scrutiny is now moving into another era with community-led scrutiny of local decisions.  This is where the public’s involvement in challenging local authorities and public service providers on public service improvement and delivery is actively sought by elected representatives (such as MPs or councillors) or appointed non-executives on governing bodies (such as school governors or non-executive directors of hospital trusts).  Constructive and ongoing engagement with stakeholders, from experts to the general public, helps to achieve genuine accountability for the use of public resources.

Public scrutiny therefore provides a unique perspective on how well public services are being delivered and how they could be improved, from the point of view of those receiving and using those services.
This section contains information on the range of bodies engaged in public scrutiny and includes bodies that scrutinise executive government at the central, devolved, regional, London and local government levels as well as those that inspect and scrutinise distinct public policy areas: criminal justice, education, health and social care, housing and regeneration, public utilities, and transport..

Organisations that span these different sectors or don't fit clearly under any one are listed below:

British and Irish Ombudsmen Association