Examination of Witnesses (Questions 180
- 189)
TUESDAY 1 FEBRUARY 2000
MR STEPHEN
FREER AND
MR VERNON
SORE
180. Would you say that that balance is not
right at the moment?
(Mr Freer) I think this is just such new territory
that it is not possible to say as yet; really, there is not an
established order or balance there, and I think that is to be
created, over the next two years, under the new arrangements we
have been discussing.
Mr Olner
181. Given that things are fairly established,
Mr Freer, and having accompanied you on many pilgrimages to see
the Local Government Minister when you were Chief Finance Officer
at Warwickshire, it was well established that the Area Cost Adjustment
and the Standing Spending Assessment were very disproportionate
in parts of Warwickshire and in shire counties as opposed to other
authorities. Do you think the Audit Commission ought to be making
views known to central government about the inequality that local
government faces in the delivery of its services?
(Mr Freer) I need to be careful here, Chairman, because
I am conscious there are London treasurers in the public gallery,
so anything I say about too much resource for the South East of
the country could be difficult.
Chairman: Yes, we have got the message.
Mr Olner
182. So there again then, if the Local Government
Association cannot sort this out, does the Audit Commission need
to sort it out?
(Mr Freer) I think it is important. The Commission's
principal focus has always been on local authorities, but it does
have powers to carry out reviews, as you know, which look at central
government's role and contribution in some of the major policy
areas, and I think it is important that the Commission takes advantage
of those opportunities. Whether issues like the overall funding
system and all of the detailed arguments that are enshrined in
that, where we all think, frankly, that our particular authority
ought to have a larger slice of the cake—
183. But, surely, that can be measured; they
measure the outputs on a similar basis, why cannot they measure
the inputs on a similar basis, and if they are wrong tell central
government to put it right?
(Mr Freer) The point I was going to make is, it does
seem to me that there is a danger that there are so many arguments
going on within that territory, with, as I said, every authority
in the country believing that it should have rather more; there
are also so many different ways, so many different methodologies,
for carving the cake that I doubt whether even the Commission
has the wisdom to produce a report which is the definitive statement
on the funding system, but I do think it is important they operate
in that area, from time to time, too.
Mr Brake
184. Can I ask a very specific question about
something that we have not touched on yet. Do you think the right
balance has been struck between the legitimate right of a resident
to challenge a local authority's accounts, for instance, and the
obstructive actions of a litigious resident who is intent on causing
mayhem for a local authority?
(Mr Freer) I think that, probably, the right balance
has been struck there. It does seem to me to be very important
to protect the rights of the individual member of the public to
play a part in the process and to have powers to complain and
make things happen, if he, or she, is dissatisfied. The fact that
some of the people who take advantage of those powers and opportunities
will fall into the second category that you described, frankly,
I think, is probably a price we have to pay for having a system
in which the individual has power.
Chairman
185. The Chartered Institute for Public Finance
and Accountancy sounds sort of quite impressive, does it not,
a professional, high standards body? I was somewhat shocked, in
the summer, when the Committee was looking at parks, that your
statistical returns had quite a few local authorities that had
not bothered to make returns. Does not that really destroy any
credibility for you, as an organisation, if some treasurers do
not think you are even worth sending the information in to?
(Mr Freer) Certainly, our statistics are improved
if there is full coverage. Happily, my expectation would be that
the arrival of Best Value will encourage more authorities to participate
in that process; we already get pretty high coverage. But I take
the point you are making, but I think that will improve in the
future.
186. But if we went back 30 years, you would
have had 100 per cent returns, would you not, for your information;
you were then an impressive body, almost the only one that would
make comparisons between one local authority and the other? But
you have been undermined substantially by other people doing that
auditing role; it appears that your statistics have got less and
less reliable from one year to the next?
(Mr Freer) Actually, I would not agree with that.
I think I am inclined to agree with your opening gambit, which
is that 30 years ago we would have had higher coverage, but what
I am inclined to disagree with is the view that this is about
other people sort of stealing our thunder. It is difficult to
generalise, but I think what has happened is that, over the past,
say, 20 years, more and more authorities have had the experience
of being heavily criticised, in response to statistics that have
gone into the public domain that have shown them to be at the
bottom of the league table, and have decided that one of the ways
in which they can respond to that, one of the ways in which they
can fight that, or avoid that difficulty, is simply not to submit
some of the statistics; obviously, there are some occasions where
you do not have a choice, but in relation to CIPFA statistics
you do. However, I think Best Value will sort out some of this
in the future, because one of the famous four Cs in Best Value,
of course, stands for compare, and there is now a duty on authorities
to be able to demonstrate, proactively, themselves, that their
costs and other statistics about their services compare favourably
with other authorities in the same business, as it were.
187. You make no effort to check your statistics,
do you, you simply rely on what local authorities send in to you?
(Mr Freer) To a very large extent, we are obviously
dependent upon the accuracy of the information that is given to
us.
188. Now, certainly, as far as parks are concerned,
it was amazing that local authorities seemed not really to know
the area of park that they had, and yet they were quite happy
to send in a figure, to sort of fill up most of the columns in
your Annual Report?
(Mr Freer) You have me at a disadvantage on that particular
publication.
189. As far as these statistics are concerned,
are you really confident that, with Best Value, you, yourselves,
really know things like the basic information on which the judgements
are made?
(Mr Freer) We try to be as clear as we possibly can
be about the analysis of the information that is required, and
the definitions that lie behind different boxes, as it were, on
the form. And I think that, in overall terms, the statistics that
we produce make a useful contribution to the discussion and debate
about public services, but that is not to say that some of the
difficulties that you have described do not exist, and certainly
it is not to say that the service cannot be improved. And, as
I have indicated, we would hope that Best Value would help us
to improve in those areas.
Chairman: On that note, can I thank you very
much.
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