Local Authorities (Overview and Scrutiny) Bill

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The Committee consisted of the following Members:

Chairman: Mrs. Joan Humble

† Binley, Mr. Brian (Northampton, South) (Con)

† Cohen, Harry (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)

† Corbyn, Jeremy (Islington, North) (Lab)

† Curry, Mr. David (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)

† Drew, Mr. David (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op)

† Follett, Barbara (Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government)

† Goldsworthy, Julia (Falmouth and Camborne) (LD)

Goodman, Mr. Paul (Wycombe) (Con)

† Iddon, Dr. Brian (Bolton, South-East) (Lab)

† Lait, Mrs. Jacqui (Beckenham) (Con)

† Raynsford, Mr. Nick (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)

† Seabeck, Alison (Plymouth, Devonport) (Lab)

† Syms, Mr. Robert (Poole) (Con)

† Turner, Mr. Neil (Wigan) (Lab)

Wicks, Malcolm (Croydon, North) (Lab)

Younger-Ross, Richard (Teignbridge) (LD)

Sarah Davies, Committee Clerk

† attended the Committee

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Public Bill Committee

Wednesday 3 March 2010

[Mrs. Joan Humble in the Chair]

Local Authorities (Overview and Scrutiny) Bill

9.30 am

The Chairman: May I welcome everyone to the Committee? Before we begin the consideration of the Bill I have a few preliminary announcements. Although it is not very warm, Members may, if they wish, remove their jackets in Committee. There is a money resolution in connection with the Bill and copies are available. Please would all Members ensure that mobile phones, pagers and so on are turned off or switched to silent mode during Committee? I have not selected the two amendments on the amendment paper, so we shall move straight to clause stand part debates on each clause, if the Committee wishes to debate them all.

Clause 1

Matters to which this Part applies

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

Mr. Nick Raynsford (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab): It is a real pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs. Humble. It is the first time I have done so as the promoter of a Bill, although I have done so in my more normal Back-Bench position. The Bill was introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Bury, North (Mr. Chaytor) on 16 December. I have, however, been asked to see it through its remaining stages in this House.

I am grateful to all Members who have agreed to serve on this Committee at rather short notice, and I ask them all to accept my apologies both for that short notice and for some of the rough edges that may affect the procedures in Committee. It was clear to me when I was asked last week to take on the Bill that we had to move speedily if it was to have any prospect of making progress before the coming general election.

I am also grateful for the support that was voiced for the Bill in all parts of the House on Second Reading. It is a measure to enhance and expand the capacity of local authorities to scrutinise activities undertaken by other bodies discharging public service responsibilities in their areas, and as such, it contributes to the localist agenda that I know has support on both sides of the House.

I know that there will be questions posed about points of detail in the Bill, and where it is not possible for those to be fully considered in Committee, I hope they will be considered on Report. However, I believe that the overall purpose and objectives are widely supported, so I hope that the Bill can make good progress. As on Second Reading, I should make clear my non-pecuniary interest as chairman of the Centre for Public Scrutiny, a not-for-profit organisation that exists to promote better and more effective scrutiny.

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I hope that it will help the Committee if I give a short outline of the purpose of clause 1. The clause sets out the framework for the enhanced scrutiny powers provided by part 1 of the Bill. Subsections (1) to (4) provide that the enhanced scrutiny powers will apply when overview and scrutiny committees are scrutinising matters of local concern in connection with the provision of public services by authorities or persons designated in regulations by the Secretary of State.

Subsection (5) provides that an authority or person may be designated generally or in respect of particular services. Subsection (2) defines the circumstances in which a matter is of local concern to a local authority as circumstances in which the matter affects the local area, or its inhabitants, to a greater degree than other areas or their inhabitants.

Subsection (3) defines the term “public service”. For the purposes of the Bill, a “public service” includes not just services provided to the public in the exercise of functions of a public nature, but also those carried out under statutory authority, such as by utility companies, or those that are wholly or partly funded by central or local government through grants, subsidies or other financial assistance. It is immaterial whether such a service is delivered by a public authority or by another body, be it public, private or voluntary, and whether charges are made for the service.

I have set out the key terms that set the parameters for the scrutiny powers in the Bill. They establish the scope and range of the powers and the circumstances in which they can be used by overview and scrutiny committees. They are important parameters. While providing a broad framework for enhanced scrutiny powers for councils, they also ensure that scrutiny remains focused on local issues and stays true to its purpose, which is to be constructive in examining, and suggesting improvements on, issues of real local concern.

Subsections (4) and (5) provide that the new powers will apply only to bodies that have been designated—either generally or in respect of particular services—by regulations. There is scope within the framework for the Secretary of State to designate a wide range of persons or authorities as being subject to the enhanced scrutiny regime.

On Second Reading, hon. Members raised concerns about the broad scope of the regulation-making power and sought further details about the types of body that will be subject to the enhanced regime. Decisions on which bodies will be specified as being subject to the regime are ultimately for the Government to take, and I hope that the Minister will be able to give us an indication of the Government’s thinking on that issue today. In any case, subsection (6) provides that regulations designating bodies as subject to part 1 of the Bill will be subject to the affirmative procedure, so Parliament will have the opportunity to consider and debate designation of particular bodies.

Mrs. Jacqui Lait (Beckenham) (Con): I, too, welcome you to the Chair, Mrs. Humble. This is the first time I have sat under your chairmanship, but in the brief, few minutes in which you have been in the Chair you have established your personality, and I hope that we continue to proceed in such an amiable fashion.

I did not take part in the debate on Second Reading, but when I was first approached and asked to take part in the Bill’s proceedings, I read the Bill, and it reminded

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me of the title of a play by Pirandello, “Six Characters in Search of an Author”. It struck me as a case of “Six Committees in Search of a Role”. Then I started to read the Second Reading debate and discovered that my concern had already been voiced by others.

I have consulted my Front-Bench team, who are very disturbed that, notwithstanding the timetable problems, there has not been sufficient time to table the amendments that we would wish to have discussed in Committee, so that we could try to clarify the issues raised on Second Reading. We will almost certainly be tabling amendments on Report. However, I have no wish to hold up the Committee today, or to try to create a second Committee stage on another occasion.

I should declare that I, too, have an interest, because my husband is leader of East Sussex county council. It has an overview and scrutiny role, which he implemented successfully. The issue is, therefore, not a personal one to do with overview and scrutiny not being seen to be effective, because in East Sussex it is effective. It is the approach taken that is so important.

The right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich pointed out in his Second Reading speech that district councils are excluded from the Bill. I hope that the Minister will reassure us that such councils will be included. It is the council’s approach to scrutiny and overview that makes it a success or otherwise. If a burden of demand, regulation, officialdom, bureaucracy, cost and requirement is imposed, I am sure that it will not be long before marks are awarded for how effective the overview and scrutiny committees are—well, unless there is a change of Government.

A decent overview and scrutiny committee and a good council, with good relations with its various partners, should not need to require those partners to turn up for scrutiny. They should already be working together on any agreement, and should be happy to be open and honest about what is happening. If we need to impose burdens and regulations on partners, which should be willing to participate in the good management of their agreements with local councils, that is the mark of a poor council.

On Second Reading, my hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Justine Greening) made the point that there are still major ambiguities about which bodies the Bill will cover. I have seen a list, and most of them are public bodies, but one area is not clear. These days, so many local area partnerships involve charities and small and medium-sized businesses. If those bodies are affected, imposing a burden of scrutiny and overview will put extra costs on charities, which are raising money from the public in difficult times, and which should be looking after every penny, to the benefit of the work that they are doing under contract with the local authorities.

Small and medium-sized businesses are also struggling in these difficult economic times. They would have to face not just the cost involved, but the fact that the management’s time would be taken up. In a small enterprise, that management can often be the boss, and the boss is already struggling with the extra burden of red tape imposed on businesses in the past few years. Yet another burden will mean that the expertise that small and medium-sized businesses can bring to the delivery of partnership agreements in various forms will be withdrawn—but not in some great confrontation; instead, next time, those businesses will not bid for the

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contracts. That expertise will therefore be lost, to the disbenefit of the public for whom everyone is working. We need to look more closely at, and have a much better and clearer definition of, the bodies that the Bill will cover.

I do not wish to go on for too long, but what matters does the Bill cover? Will it cover just what is in a contract, or anything that anyone has a bee in their bonnet about? How will a matter of interest to local people be defined? We all know, working in communities as we do, that for every person who has one view about a body, there is an equal and opposite view from someone else, with all gradations of views in between. If a local authority scrutiny and overview committee thinks that it can inquire into anything that it fancies, then I am afraid that it will turn against it the very people on whose behalf it should be working, or indeed the very people whom it needs to take along with it in order to deliver the services.

Clause 1 stand part may not be the best place to talk about the conflict-of-interest issues relating to allowing executive council members to sit on scrutiny committees. I apologise to the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich for not having congratulated him on taking over, at such short notice, what is turning out to be a difficult Bill, but he did rather run through the Bill very quickly. I do not want to hold things up, and I am happy to be guided by you, Mrs. Humble, but I wonder whether I might point out briefly the concerns about the conflict of interest in allowing executive council members to sit on the scrutiny committees.

I have already raised the issue of the district councils. This is probably more a process issue, of interest to the Committee only, and not to the greater public, but the Bill extends the powers of joint committees, even though regulations to set them up are not yet in place. If the Minister can enlighten us on what she expects to happen, that might at least reduce the number of amendments that we are likely to table on Report.

9.45 am

With those broad comments—I am sorry, but they were not as brief as I had intended—I would just like to say that, as a matter of principle, I will ask my colleagues to join me in voting against clause 1 to register that we think that there are difficulties with the Bill that need to be addressed seriously.

Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Devonport) (Lab): It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship and to take your guidance, Mrs. Humble.

I welcome the powers in the Bill. I hoped that the Bill would get a fair wind, so I am disappointed to hear that we face a vote on clause 1. I did, however, have a concern about the clause. That is why I tabled an amendment, which was not selected. It might be slightly pedantic, but the use of the word “greater” in the clause gives me concern. Perhaps that could be described as a local concern, given the wording used in other parts of the clause.

I would welcome the views of my right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich on whether “greater” is restricting. It suggests that only where the impact or concern is deemed to be larger in one area than another will an issue fall within the remit of the

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clause, rather than where the impact of an action, or the decision of a body, is simply different in different areas. For example, let us say that there was a large project in an area that was bounded by three or four authorities, and that they were looking for a large pool of labour to be employed. We would expect the local Jobcentre Plus to be able to find work for a proportionate number of people from each of the local authorities. However, if one local authority was doing particularly badly, and local concern was raised by local residents, who did not feel that the performance was as it should be, it might be a question not simply of the number of people affected, but the service being offered. I would therefore very much welcome my right hon. Friend’s views on the word “greater” and on whether, on Report, an amendment might be appropriate, so that we could revisit the issue and bring forward a different word—perhaps the word “different”.

I understand that there is a need to ensure that the clause is kept as tight as possible to avoid local authorities being tempted to stray beyond their locality—that picks up a little on the point made by the hon. Member for Beckenham—and to hold to account those bodies affected by clearly defining local matters. However, there is a desire to avoid local authorities behaving in an almost vexatious or frivolous way by crossing boundaries, or taking a “not in my back yard” view.

Julia Goldsworthy (Falmouth and Camborne) (LD): I strongly agree with the hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport, on the issue raised, under clause 1(2), about the extent to which the matter has to affect a local authority before it can come under the consideration of an overview and scrutiny committee. An example from my constituency of an issue that is subject to an overview and scrutiny committee decision is the transfer of upper gastrointestinal cancer surgery to Derriford. People in Devon will have a completely different experience and attitude towards that change from people in Cornwall. We could have an argument about who experienced the greater impact, but we can certainly argue that people have different experiences and real concerns that need to be raised. That is an important difference that needs to be taken into account.

I was slightly confused by the comments made by the hon. Member for Beckenham. On the one hand, she says that councils already undertake such scrutiny, so what is the need to add regulation? On the other hand, she says that the requirement will be an additional burden. I am not sure how both things can apply at the same time.

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Prepared 4 March 2010