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The noble Baroness invited me to explain why we are doing what we are doing. I hope that I can persuade her of the veracity and purpose behind it. Simply, all that the White Paper and the Bill have sought to do is to build on the work which was started in 2000 and which has been very successful in councils. The 2000 Act required all but one council to have executive models of government. In the Bill, we have strengthened the leader and Cabinet model in three ways: first, by making provision to allow the leader to appoint his or her executive team; secondly, by creating a presumption of a four-year term of office for leaders who are directly or indirectly elected; and, thirdly, by vesting executive powers in the leadership, so that it has the freedom to delegate powers and to make arrangements that will strengthen leadership and direction.
At the same time, the Bill removes the one anomaly that existed in the Local Government Act 2000, which allowed a large council such as Brighton and Hove to continue to operate without an executive. Following the enactment of the Bill, Brighton and Hove will be required to move to a new-style leader and Cabinet executive.
We are also offering councils a third choice of executive model through the introduction of the elected executive model—which we shall debate in a little while—and the removal of the requirement for a council to hold a referendum before moving to a mayor and Cabinet executive model. We will debate that later, too.
In contrast, the amendments tabled by the noble Baroness would overturn what we—and, I believe, the generality of local government—see as the settled and successful position that the 2000 Act established. We have had 18 months of dialogue with local government
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The noble Baroness would take us back. Hers is a retrograde if not a reactionary step. It would also fly in the face of the evidence that we now have which confirms the benefits of executive arrangements. I will quote this evidence now; I hope not to quote it again in successive debates, but it is important to put it on the record. The Evaluating Local Governance five-year evaluation of new council constitutions, which we commissioned shortly after enactment of the Local Government Act 2000, showed, in its interim report Does Leadership Matter?, published in June, that the two main current models of executive arrangements involving directly elected mayors or leaders and Cabinets clearly demonstrate the facilitative leadership, in terms of visibility, accountability and a streamlined focus for decision-making, that are needed in modern local government. That research also says that the executive arrangements proposed in the local government White Paper, and subsequently in the Bill, are likely to deliver the leadership that favours this facilitative style.
The final report, which we published on 5 October, says:
“There is general agreement that the aim of enhancing effective leadership has been met and that the new executive arrangements have bedded down well, thus providing more visible and effective leadership and quicker decision-making which is in turn associated with better service delivery”.
Crucially, the independent ELG report found that councils operating executive arrangements that vested increased power in the leader—allowing leaders to take decisions themselves and to appoint and allocate portfolios—gained higher CPA scores between 2003 and 2006 and performed better with the 2005 and 2006 direction of travel analysis. Those are the changes that we want to see in all local government because, as the report said in its conclusion:
“Taken together our findings show a consistent relationship between on the one hand, authorities with stable political leadership and authorities that have over a period of time given the full range of powers to their leaders and, on the other hand, better service performance and greater citizen satisfaction”.
I am sure that noble Lords do not oppose that conclusion, not least because, although I do not doubt or dispute that particular councils may wish to return to the committee system of leadership, more than one-third of the small councils eligible to operate alternative arrangements have opted to move back to executive arrangements. The noble Baroness raised the example of Babergh. I understand that officers of Babergh District Council have been in touch with DCLG officials to discuss moving from alternative arrangements to executive arrangements. That is an example of how the benefits of executive arrangements are being perceived locally; it is an instant and interesting example of how things are moving.
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The bottom line is that the committee system served well for a long time, but the analysis that preceded the 2000 Act made it clear that, crucially, people did not know who was in charge or who was accountable. They did not know whom to praise or blame. They did not know how decisions were taken or on what basis. Ultimately, they did not know whom to go to if they had a problem. The Cabinet system identified, motivated and energised people. I do not see it as a default mechanism for councillors who are unable or unwilling to take part in the full business of being a councillor—a ward councillor or representative councillor serving on area committees, overview and scrutiny committees and policy committees.
There is a range of ways in which councillors should be and are active. It is a counsel of despair if we suggest that the leader and Cabinet system debilitates the role of councillors. That is part of the problem that Jane Roberts will look at in her commission. It is part of the problem that we across this House should engage collectively in addressing, whether it is looking to stimulate people coming forward to local councils, educating young people in the role and importance of local government or doing a range of things besides. It is compatible with better leadership. I take the point made in Committee that we are talking not about stronger leadership alone, but about better leadership. I believe that this Bill is about better leadership. It is not the Government being perverse. It is based on the solid evidence and experience of seven years of progress and outstanding councils.
Some amendments in this group seek to retain the mayor and council manager model, which I should like to address briefly. Noble Lords are aware that the mayor and council manager model was introduced by the Local Government Act 2000. Since that time, only Stoke-on-Trent City Council has operated that model. It adopted the new model following a referendum triggered by a public petition under provisions in that Act. Noble Lords will know that the provisions in the Bill now require Stoke to move away from this model. A governance commission was launched last Friday to assist it in deciding to which model to move.
We put forward governance models with the aim of delivering better leadership. In 2000, this innovative model was based on the analogous model of the private sector, where the mayor would resemble a non-executive chairman of a company and the council manager its powerful chief executive. Local authorities need improved, accountable leadership in order to deal with the constant change. The evidence on the operation of this model was that it was not capable of delivering that. It has been stated that, as the executive consists of just two people—an elected mayor and an appointed council manager—who take all the day-to-day decisions, this has resulted in too much power being placed in the hands of an unelected council manager.
There is dissatisfaction across Stoke about the failure of the model. The council is clear that it does not want to continue with it. There have been public campaigns requesting change and there are no voices in support, which is why we have moved to set up a
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Learning from that experience, we have proposed a package of governance arrangements. It will strengthen overview and scrutiny, which will ensure that executive and non-executive councillors are able to deliver improved services for their areas. It will deliver increased accountability through the increased availability of directly elected models and councillor calls for action, which we will debate in Part 5. On the evidence, we do not believe that the mayor and council manager model will deliver the better leadership that we are seeking, which is why we want to get rid of it.
With that explanation on the latter part of the group, plus my response to the earlier parts of the case put forward by the noble Baroness, which were powerfully argued, I hope that she will withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Hamwee: My Lords, does the Minister accept that she has made my noble friend’s case extremely well? She advocates the leadership models. Will she accept that these amendments would still leave a “menu”—as modern jargon would probably have it—from which local authorities can choose? In part, she seems to have characterised a move back to previous models to the exclusion of the Government’s proposals.
4 pm
Baroness Andrews: My Lords, that is not how I read the amendments. To reiterate the case, the leadership models offered in the 2000 Act are enhanced in the Bill. This is the right way forward for the reasons that I have given.
Lord Smith of Leigh: My Lords, before the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, responds, how does my noble friend square the idea that she wants to promote leadership in councils with a return to the committee system? Those of us who have experience of that system—
Baroness Morgan of Drefelin: My Lords, I remind the House that this is the Report stage and noble Lords do not normally speak after the Minister has sat down.
Baroness Scott of Needham Market: My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Baroness. For about half my adult life I have been involved in local government. People who do that do so for a number of reasons, but it usually comes down to a sense of wanting to deliver for the area in which they live. Differences of opinion arise over how improved services and outcomes are delivered to the people whom they represent. While I was leader of a council group in Suffolk, we moved to the executive model,
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I want to raise one or two other issues. We have left in the councillor manager model not because we think that it is a good model, but simply because if a local authority wants to use it and thinks that it can work, it ought to be able to use it. I am intrigued that the noble Baroness says that it cannot work because all the power devolves to two people. Under the directly elected executive model, the minimum size specified is two people. Although it can be larger, nevertheless the minimum is two, so I do not see the consistency in that argument.
In later amendments, we shall turn to the problem of what happens in authorities where there is no overall control. That is where my real worry lies. The models offered here may work and be consistent with strong leadership in areas where one political party is in control but, as we shall examine in later amendments, it is difficult to see how they would work in the one-third of councils with no overall control. A significant number of people would be affected.
Lastly, I make the point that having this drive towards so-called strong leadership—with the sense that old governance models in which councillors are elected and serve on committees that are involved in decisions are somehow inimical to good decision-making—is akin to saying that the democratic process is a nuisance and gets in the way of speedy decision-making. That is profoundly dangerous, as is the principle that power should be concentrated in the hands of a few people. The principle of democracy is worth upholding and I see the practicalities of this becoming much more difficult in the future.
We have had two good debates about this and, although I do not agree with the noble Baroness, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Greaves moved Amendment No. 78:
Clause 62, page 34, line 36, leave out “by the executive leader” and insert “according to rules set out in the constitution of the council”
The noble Lord said: My Lords, in moving Amendment No. 78 I shall speak also to the other amendments tabled in my name in the group. First, I apologise for being unable to be here on Monday, and I am not sure that I ought to be here today. But never mind, I shall struggle on for a bit.
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These amendments follow on from the group just spoken to by my noble friend Lady Scott. They are about the nature of good leadership and local democracy, and how the two can be brought together. My noble friend alluded to the worry shared by many of us that the Government bang on about leadership—which may be good or bad, but if it is strong it is okay, it seems—but they do not talk very much at all about democracy.
Good local government involves both good leadership and strong democracy, and that leads us, as my noble friend said, to have a series of important fundamental differences with the Government. Some are philosophical differences, if you like, but many are practical as well. We do not think that even in the short run—and certainly not in the longer run—the kinds of models the Government are putting forward will result in good local government as I have just defined it.
Amendment No. 78 relates to who appoints the executive on a council. At the moment—this is set out in legislation—councils have a choice: they can elect a leader at their annual meeting and the leader can appoint the executive; or the annual meeting of the council can appoint the executive as well as appointing the leader. Many councils will be shocked and horrified to learn that they are not to have the ability to appoint what is now, in councils with executive arrangements, the overriding body, the committee, which runs the authority and takes the executive decisions. The idea that that body as a whole, and each of its individual members, will not be able to be appointed by the council is not understood at all.
Since we left these discussions at the end of the Committee stage just before the Summer Recess, I have been asking people whether they know what is in the Bill and what they think of it. I found that a huge number of councillors have not the slightest idea that such matters as this are being put forward. I am not proposing that councils should have to do what I think is right, but I am suggesting they should continue to have the choice they have at the moment: that the arrangements for appointing the executive should be made by the authority. If the council wants to have the executive appointed by the leader, so be it; if it wants to have the executive appointed by the council, let it have it appointed by the council. But to force councils into a position in which one person then decides who is on the executive is wrong. As my noble friend said, in councils which have no overall control or where control is changing, this is a recipe for many messy rows.
Amendment No. 83 seeks to leave out Clause 63 which relates to the discharge of functions. The Minister was very honest: she said that she wants the leader to have all powers to make decisions and that this is the way to run an authority. I beg to differ. Good local government is a matter of discussion, debate and of coming, it is hoped, to a consensus. Very often a consensus is reached, but where there is none, a vote is taken. To put all decision-making in the hands of one person is fundamentally wrong.
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Many councils will come to arrangements where this does not happen because if you want to be leader of a council you will not be elected leader unless you have agreed in advance to devolve the decision-making to the kind of arrangements which exist at the moment—to the executive, to area committees, to individual councillors or whatever. But the ability of a leader to take back those decisions is entirely wrong and ought not to be in this legislation. I therefore seek to delete Clause 63, which would leave the existing mayoral arrangements as they are but would remove the ability of councils to give all power to the leader on all executive decisions. That is not right.
I have not had a chance to read the second ELG report of 5 October, although the first report was somewhat equivocal and its conclusions were based on the way it did its research. I will read it with interest but will look with great scepticism on the view that only by giving power to one individual are you going to get good local government. The opposite is, in many ways, true.
Leadership is not about one person. Good democratic leadership is about a whole series of people. I should declare an interest, since we are at the start of Report, as a member of Pendle Borough Council and of the executive of that council. I was thinking about how many people on that council are in leadership positions. If you include the leadership of opposition groups, it is getting on for half the council—more than 20 out of 49—who are in genuine leadership positions in different ways. That is how good local leadership should be spread around.
There are other amendments in my name in this group. Amendment No. 128 is specifically about the case of councils in no overall control and the period in office of the leader. We had a lot of discussion about that issue in Committee and I will not go into it again, but many of us believe that having a leader elected compulsorily for four years is not a good idea, particularly where there is no overall control or control of the council changes from time to time, perhaps quite regularly. The amendment puts forward a fairly modest proposal that councils can have in their constitution a provision that the four-year appointment does not apply if the council is in, or goes into, no overall control. That seems sensible in order to make that kind of situation work. If we do not do that, the possibilities are obvious: a lot of trouble, silly arguments and politicking when people ought to be getting on with running the council. That is exactly the kind of thing the Government say they do not want, but it is what will happen if leaders are appointed for four years in situations of no overall control.
The Government will say that those leaders can be removed, but putting down a motion of no confidence in a leader to get rid of him is an extreme move. No doubt the processes of politics in many councils will work behind the scenes, but they ought not to. As my noble friend said, in many places in the past seven years local government has certainly become a lot less transparent and open.
Amendment No. 129 ensures that council constitutions contain a proper procedure for removing a leader who has lost the confidence of the council. If that does not
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Amendment No. 131 is a tidying-up amendment dealing with what happens if a leader has been removed. It contains some provisions relating to the new leader. I will listen to what the Minister says about it with interest before I say anything else about it. Perhaps I will not need to; perhaps she will satisfy me that everything is OK as far as that is concerned.
The Minister said that if there is one leader, it is clear who to praise and who to blame. That set alarm bells ringing. To some extent local government is about praise and blame because people have to be re-elected, but it is not a praise-and-blame game. It is not a television “reality” show, where people are voted in or out at the whim of the moment. It is far more important than that; it is about people working together co-operatively, collectively, collegiately—all the things, as I have said, that the Labour Party used to stand for. Now, apparently, it stands for “leadership”, which a few years ago would have been called Stalinist if people were being polite, and would have been called other things if they were not.
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