Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Bill [HL]

This is a probing amendment in regard to scrutiny. It is the first of a series of amendments on the subject. One of the first Bills of the current Labour Government established the executive and scrutiny functions of local authorities. Initially it did not work too well because most of their members had been members of committees and did not like to think that they were not going to be part of the decision-making process and were not keen on scrutiny. That has moved on over a period of years as many new members have arrived and it is accepted that scrutiny plays a major role in what happens in local government. We are now appointing a scrutiny officer and I would like to understand the Government’s thinking on that. There are two important officers in local government: the monitoring officer and the Section 151 officer. The monitoring officer deals with matters of probity, legal matters and members’ complaints; it is an important role in local government. Our Section 151 officer has an important role because she tells us what she thinks, sets out how viable we are and tells us if we spend too much money. She is giving me a report today about the finances of the county council in preparation for our budget. Here we are appointing a scrutiny officer. I cannot imagine that the Government see the role of a scrutiny officer as being on the same level as these two officers but the Bill seems to rate him almost at that level. We have had a middle-ranking scrutiny officer ever since the legislation was introduced, but I have found that the strength of scrutiny lies in the members who do the scrutiny rather than the officer. One of our first scrutiny officers was always sending difficult e-mails to the chief executive asking, ““Why haven’t you done this? Why haven’t you done that?””. The chief executive deals with administration and members; the scrutiny side is different. Obviously, the monitoring officer and the Section 151 officer work for the chief executive. Scrutiny is given to how policies are delivered and sometimes it can be critical of the executive and the officers. I therefore see a difficulty with how a scrutiny officer at the same level as the Section 151 officer and the monitoring officer will work with the chief executive. All principal authorities should have a scrutiny officer and most do—again, we are putting into legislation something that mostly happens already—but I cannot understand what the Government mean by putting the scrutiny role almost at the level of the Section 151 and monitoring roles. I do not think it will work. It is a different role; it is not a role supporting members and the legitimacy and probity of the council. Perhaps the Minister can explain the Government’s thinking on this.