Public Affairs Part I: Local Government Decision-making And The Committee And Sub-committee System

Public Affairs Part I Local Government DecisionMaking and the Committee and Sub-Committee System

Officers versus Councillors As in central government, local councils make a clear distinction between the roles of elected politicians (councillors) and appointed officials (officers). It is the job of councillors, like MPs and government Ministers, to debate and take policy decisions. Officers (like civil servants at Whitehall) are then required to put those policies into practice on the ground – and are both politically neutral and (according to rank) politically restricted. The principal council officers are as follows: • • •

The chief executive (also known as the Head of the Paid Service) – the most senior officer in the local authority The monitoring officer (usually also the chief legal officer) – in charge of ensuring the authority acts at all times within the law (i.e. doesn’t exceed its powers), and there is no evidence of corruption Senior policy officers in individual departments (e.g. chief planning officer). These meet with the Chief Executive and the monitoring officer once a week or fortnight to discuss policy implementation across the council. Together, they are known as the Chief Officer’s Management Team

Sequence of Decision-Making Prior to the Local Government Act 2000 The traditional sequence for local authority decision-making (i.e. the sequence through which political decisions by councillors had to go before resulting in the actual introduction of new policies on the ground) was a “bottom-up” approach. It worked as follows: •

Major policies proposed by groups of councillors (usually largest party on council), but smaller-scale ones initiated at committee level

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All proposals initially debated and voted on by sub-committee covering relevant area (e.g. planning)

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Once approved, policy decision passed to overarching committee covering that area (e.g. full planning comm)

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Major decisions (i.e. not ones on minor issues, such as whether to give a private homeowner planning permission for an extension) passed to the full council for final approval

Sequence of Decision-Making Since Local Government Act 2000 New Labour’s LGA 2000 (as it has come to be known) was designed to “speed up” the work of local authorities, by reducing the number of ‘stages’ more minor policy and other decisions had to go through before being approved. Major decisions are still subject to full council approval – at least technically – but there is controversy about the amount of power in hands of relatively few councillors under this system. The new sequence is as follows: •

Policies proposed by small group of senior councillors, known as the Cabinet in same way to main policy-devising body at Westminster. These councillors normally drawn from biggest party/coalition

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Many ‘final’ decisions taken by the Cabinet collectively – or individual Cabinet members with delegated powers (sometimes even officers). Decisions on major issues – known as key decisions - still have to be approved by full council on paper, but this is usually a formality

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More minor decisions passed from Cabinet level to committees and sub-committees for scrutiny and input. They are then passed back to the full council for final vote

New Council Chain of Command Under the pre-LGA 2000 model – which still remains in many parts of the country - councils chose a Leader, usually from the biggest party, whose role was to chair debates of the full council, but otherwise act in a de facto Prime Minister-style role. Apart from him or her, though, all councillors were treated as equal – having an equal vote/say on important matters at full council meetings. Since the LGA 2000 was passed, this has changed in areas (mainly major towns and cities) which have adopted the new internal ‘chain of command’. In these areas, members of the Cabinet have “Executive powers” over and above those of ordinary councillors. Effectively, this means that there is now such a thing as a backbench and a frontbench councillor.

New Council Chain of Command There are three different types of ‘command structure’ under the newstyle arrangements: • A Leader (appointed by the authority from among the elected councillors) and Cabinet (appointed by the authority and the Leader, predominantly from among the largest elected party grouping) • A directly elected Mayor and Cabinet (appointed by the Mayor from among the elected councillors – normally, as in the past, chosen from his or her own party/the largest party) • A directly elected Mayor and Council Manager (a senior officer with relevant expertise, appointed in a purely advisory, rather than political, capacity – this usually only happens in smaller authorities)

Introducing Elected Mayors To introduce an elected Mayor (as in London, but rejected by Brighton and Hove) is as follows: • A referendum for an elected Mayor can be demanded by five per cent of local voters – and the council has to abide by the decision reached in any such referendum • However, if an unsuccessful referendum is held, there has to be a gap of five years before the next one is called • The Question to appear on such referenda should carry the following wording: “Are you in favour of the proposal for (name of city or borough) to be run in a new way, which includes a mayor, who will be elected by the voters of that (borough, city, county or district), to be in charge of the council’s services and to lead (name of authority) and the community it serves?”

The Old-style Committee System In local authorities which have not adopted the post-LGA 2000 decisionmaking framework, the old-style committee system still remains. This is as follows: •

Standing/Statutory – i.e. permanent committees set up to discharge a specific function (e.g. planning committees, education committees, environmental services committees). The most powerful was the policy and resources committee – which held the purse strings and tended to be chaired by the council leader

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Ad Hoc – these can be given briefs that are directly related to the above, but are set up to consider specific issues in greater detail than is possible on standing committees

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Area-based – formed to look at policy governing specific geographical areas under a local authority’s control. They sometimes contain members of the local community alongside councillors, and can even have budgets delegated to them

Some Quirks of Old-style System – Old-style committees are allowed to co-opt non-councillors to serve on them, either temporarily or on a more ongoing basis (e.g parents/teachers on education committees). New-style Cabinets are prohibited from doing this (as, in some cases, are the smaller non-executive/scrutiny committees of councillors set up by non-Executive members to scrutinise the Executive/Cabinet and Mayor/Leader) – Co-opted members cannot vote - unless they are church representatives sitting on a committee exercising an education-related function (in the case of old-style committees) or serving on a post-LGA 2000 advisory – as opposed to scrutiny - committee with no powers

Some Quirks of Old-style System – Old-style committees are allowed to co-opt noncouncillors to serve on them, either temporarily or on a more ongoing basis (e.g parents/teachers on education committees). New-style Cabinets are prohibited from doing this (as, in some cases, are the smaller non-executive/scrutiny committees of councillors set up by non-Executive members to scrutinise the Executive/Cabinet and Mayor/Leader) – Co-opted members cannot vote - unless they are church representatives sitting on a committee exercising an education-related function (in the case of old-style committees) or serving on a post-LGA 2000 advisory – as opposed to scrutiny - committee with no powers

The New-style Committee System Local authorities which have adopted the post-LGA 2000 decision-making framework now have two broad types of committee: non-executive and scrutiny: • Non-executive – despite their title, these have the power to take final decisions on certain matters, but only very minor ones (for example, relating to small-scale planning permission issues, building regulations, etc) • Scrutiny – like their predecessors in old-style councils, these are charged with ‘line-by-line’ examinations of executive proposals, and can suggest policy amendments and criticise the day-to-day workings of council departments. They have little power, though

Other Changes Under New Model • Each council required to pass and consult on its own constitution, setting out the powers and duties of its leader/elected Mayor/executive/Cabinet/council manager, and those of various committees • Individual members of Cabinets now given specialist portfolios to cover (like government Ministers) – e.g. education, housing, etc. This makes them the lead member for that area • Monthly forward plans must be published, setting out policy/strategic goals for future

Order of Business in Meetings The Customary Order of Business in Full Council Meetings is as follows: • • • • • • • •

Agenda for business prepared by the council’s Chief Executive, Secretary or Director of Administration Meeting opens with approval of minutes of previous meeting Questions (usually written down in advance by specific councillors) put to relevant committee chairmen. In councils that adopt an LGA 2000 constitution, questions are put to the elected Mayor, the Leader or relevant Cabinet member Public observers given chance to question committee chairmen (optional) Petitions from electors presented to full council by the local councillors representing the electors in question – actual debates on these issues will be held at relevant later committee meetings Committee reports considered by the full council. Debates often arise at this stage if a matter raised is politically controversial At the above stage, individual councillors with strong objections to a given committee proposal will ask for the matter to be amended or even “referred back” to the committee Notices of Motion from individual councillors (normally tabled in advance) may be put to the meeting. These usually cover issues that are not otherwise formally touched on by the agenda. In the case of post-LGA 2000-style councils, any such notices that impinge on “executive” issues must be referred to the Executive/Cabinet

Press and Public Access The Rules governing access specify the following: • Public registers must be kept listing names and addresses of all elected councillors and details of the committees on which they serve, plus delegated powers • Press and public have right to attend all meetings – unless the information being discussed is confidential or exempt. The former refers to information supplied by govt departments or matters whose disclosure is prohibited by statute or the courts, while the latter can cover the following: (a) personal and/or commercially sensitive details; (b) matters in the process of being negotiated; and/or (c) issues protected by legal privilege • A decision to exclude the public and media for the duration of a specific “exempt” or “confidential” item must be formally proposed, seconded and voted upon

Press and Public Access • Copies of agenda papers and all officer/subcommittee reports submitted during the course of the “open” part of the meeting must be made available at meetings – and no matters must be heard unless they listed at least three days beforehand • All reports presented for public inspection should list any background papers used to help draft them (these can be examined by the public, but they may be charged) • While embargoes can sometimes be used by authorities to prevent the media publishing details of something before a certain date, this should be rare • “Reasonable accommodation” (including video links/overflow rooms) provided

Process for Implementing post-LGA 2000 System Councils seeking to introduce a post-LGA 2000 decision-making system have to go through the following process: • Issuing an explanation of the three different models of executive structure – without steering consultees to vote in a specific way • Hold a more detailed consultation on a proposed new formal consultation based on whichever model is favoured

How Council Services Are Run Until the 1980s, most council services - including schools, day centres and care homes, for example – were run in-house by local authorities’ own employees. In the 1980s, the then Tory government introduced the concept of competition – and the notion that the most “efficient” way to run local services might not necessarily always be to do so directly. Private companies and voluntary organisations were invited to tender for the right to run, say, local bus services via a process known as compulsory competitive tendering (CTT). Local authorities were permitted to continue running services inhouse – but only if they “proved” at the tendering stage that they were offering the best value for money. Where councils continued running their own services in this way, they had to set up semi-independent companies to do so on their behalf, called direct service organisations (DSOs) – for things like administration or rubbish collecting – or direct labour organisations (DLOs) for things like building maintenance. Under Labour, the term CTT has been superseded by that of “Best Value”. With this system, councils are no longer forced to run a tendering process when contracts come to the end of their lives - but they are subject to periodic inspections, at which they must be able to “prove” the provider of a given service they are currently using is offering the “best value” available.

Pressure to Outsource/SubContract Under Old System • Unlike private contractors, the ability of DLOs/DSOs to contract for work outside their authority’s area was severely restricted – thereby curbing their ability to make profits and efficiency savings • DLOs and DSOs obliged to: (a) publish separate accounts to those of their parent local authority; (b) produce an annual report; and (c) make a six per cent return on their capital • If a DLO/DSO failed to make the six per cent return, the Secretary of State could intervene and require the CCT process to be run again, thereby effectively depriving the DSO/DLO of its contract at a premature stage. (Officially, this was an attempt to crack down on “anti-competitive behaviour” – i.e. the imposition of conditions by councils designed to put off prospective private contractors)