Agenda item

5.1

The Committee received 6 questions from a member of the public, which were submitted prior to the meeting.

Ruth Hubbard, It’s Our City

1.    The work developing design principles for a new committee system took place over four months including some intensive work with stakeholders and members of the public - who gave their time willingly to contribute.  It is not clear how the committee system structure report relates to, aligns with, or puts the principles (and their implicit outcomes) into practice.  In some cases what is being proposed seems to be in active tension with, or in opposition to, the principles. What was the point of all that work and citizen/stakeholder input?  I recognise that the report covers a limited number of core issues at this stage but  isn't this part of the governance problem - stated council commitments with little real meaning, and no actual demonstrable impact or influence via engagement and consultation

In response to question 1, The Chair, Councillor Julie Grocutt stated the Governance Committee agreed in public to use the design principles both when considering the various options and when reviewing later on how well the new system is working. The way that those principles changed significantly during development clearly showed the impact of citizen and stakeholder input. It was the Chair’s expectation that evidence from all three sessions of the Inquiry and the principles should be in the forefront of members’ minds when giving consideration to the options presented at the meeting.

2.    Eight main committees are proposed (plus a significant finance sub-committee).  What makes Sheffield an exception and ‘extreme outlier’ on this, especially in the face of evidence received and statutory guidance.  And, from the Wirral, where a very recent External Assurance Review by the government’s DLUHC is requiring a reduction in their number of main committees (a reduction not from 8, but 7 committees).  Being an extreme outlier with 8 main committees would also be an explicit and conscious decision to very likely increase both bureaucracy and resource load (and that would also go against the design principles).  How is this justifiable in the current circumstances, and what do you think voters will think if this is the decision

In response to question 2, The Chair explained that section four of the report dealt with this issue. Members heard through the inquiry process that there are risks to having too many committees, however we also heard that it is crucial to align committees to the way the business works. This is to avoid things like senior officers losing capacity due to needing to each attend and prepare for multiple committees every month, and to make sure financial accountability is crystal clear. The report proposes that the scale and complexity of this Council’s business, as the first ever Core City to move to a committee system, means that there are actually benefits overall in terms of timeliness and reducing bureaucracy to aligning the committees to functional areas of the council and their clearly distinct budgets. We heard from the Chief Executive that in her view there were seven of these functional areas. Then there is a cross-cutting committee making eight. Members today, and at Council in March, can take a view as to whether these risks and benefits have been appropriately weighed up.

3.    The proposal appears to me to exclude some or a few elected councillors from playing a full role on at least one of the main committees.  This would, of course, be more than bad faith following the community campaign and referendum.  I am sure citizens and communities would be very active in ensuring relevant ward voters were aware if any of their councillors were not representing them in a main committee decision-making role - or if particular parties were against all their councillors sitting on a main committee. At one point the proposal seems to be driven by the maths rather than the imperative for change, core purpose, principle, or intended outcome.  This approach seems highly inadvisable when it’s clear some other councils have 13, 15 and even 17 on committees and are operating effectively.  Will the committee carefully rethink and reject this proposal?

In response to question 3, The Chair explained that this was a matter for the committee to consider in the meeting. It is dealt with at section 9 of the report and Ms Hubbard was thanked for her comments. It appears to the Chair that under these proposals every councillor would have on average about three or four seats on real decision-making committees. The committee was very mindful of the need to ensure that the role of City Councillor is not so onerous as to prevent ordinary people with families and jobs from being able to be councillors. The more seats created on committees at the Town Hall, the less time members can spend in their local wards.

4.    The paper also appears to be inching more and more in the direction of giving a range of additional powers to the ‘overarching’ Strategy and Resources Committee. For example, suggested additional powers to make urgent decisions, suggested additional powers to do external 'scrutiny' tasks when these could and should be integrated into main committee work.  The necessary shift in thinking away from strong leader governance does not appear quite to have been made, despite the pretty unanimous warnings on this point given in evidence in the inquiry sessions, and in consultations. Does the Governance Committee agree with the expert John Cade from INLOGOV (who you heard from) that it would be a “betrayal” to somehow try to recreate a Cabinet function?  (Conversely, can the committee not see the value of a Strategy and Resources committee that is more strategic, connecting things up, overseeing the budget as a whole and so on, as has been presented in evidence to you?)

In response to question 4, The Chair mentioned that again, members would need to give consideration to this in the meeting. The Chair stated that the committee were absolutely mindful of what it meant to move away from the Cabinet System to a committee system and had heard nobody attempt to artificially prolong the old way of doing things. The Chair hoped to reassure Ruth Hubbard somewhat anyway because the clues to the primary functions of the proposed Strategy and Resources committee are in the name: to operate strategically, joining up cross-cutting issues across the other committees, and to oversee the finances.

5.    Section 13 on Post-Decision Scrutiny (especially paras 13.1, 13.2 and 13.3) is problematic.  It also contains inaccuracies and significant omissions that amount to inaccuracies.  For example: Sentence 1 could just as easily say the emphasis is on collaboration and the potential for consensual decision-making. Sentence 2 is inaccurate - it was always possible to have different parties in Cabinet, it is just that Sheffield ruling groups have chosen not to do this (as some other councils do).  (Indeed this choice is what has contributed to such a big democratic deficit in Sheffield, which was the main reason for the petition and referendum). Paragraphs 13.2 and 13.3 are also highly problematic and they omit a fundamental purpose of scrutiny - to amplify the voices of the public and stakeholders.  

Please can this section of the report be at least corrected, and amended?  However I would prefer it be fully reviewed and rewritten as it fails to understand the significance of the shift to “good decision-making” in a modern committee system and how this incorporates many of the functions and good work of scrutiny.

In response to question 5, The Chair agreed that one role of scrutiny was to find ways to bring the voice of residents into the decision-making process. This was always a challenge since scrutiny committees weren’t able to make formal decisions on the back of what they heard. The Committee was putting a lot of thought into how to bring the voice of residents into the whole decision-making process and this was the subject of their second substantive agenda item today.

6.    The report omits any mention of stakeholder input (as above, vital if one wants to ensure that the strengths of scrutiny are built in, and also vital for good decision-making (but also essential for inclusive and improving democratic practices).  There are simple, extremely resource-lite, and efficient, participatory mechanisms that would be very easy to embed at the outset of new governance arrangements to ensure that a range of different stakeholders are heard directly in relevant Policy Committees, and as a very solid starting point/baseline position. Will the committee ensure that the new arrangements and constitution embed such a baseline for direct stakeholder involvement into main committees? 

In response to question 6, The Chair explained that it was not omitted. The report stated clearly at 3.3 that stakeholder input is yet to be designed and that this will be crucial. The other main item on the agenda dealt with the progress on this matter. The Governance Committee had said clearly since September that because of tight timescales and the need to work iteratively, the Committee would first agree the ‘what’ (ie an outline of the structure of the system) and then we would later add the ‘how’ (ie ways of working within this system including how to bring the voice of citizens into the process).