“Councillors on the Frontline”

Clive Betts Excerpts

Thursday 5th September 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)]

It gives me great pleasure to introduce the report by the Select Committee on Communities and Local Government, “Councillors on the Frontline”. The title was changed between the initiation of our inquiry and the eventual production of the report; I will explain in a moment how the term “Councillors on the Frontline” came about. It was changed from “Councillors in the Community”, the first name that we chose.

Councillors do a vital job. I might even get agreement from the Minister on that. Perhaps he will not agree with everything that I say from now on, but that is certainly not a bad place to start. Councillors are on the front line of service delivery and democracy, and they are the lifeblood of our democratic system. I feel strongly about the importance of the role that they play.

Our inquiry first considered who we wanted to take evidence from and how we should take it. Obviously, we called Dame Joan Roberts, because of the Roberts commission. It was a useful starting point for looking at what had been done, but apart from that, we considered the matter afresh. We took evidence from people; we did not go back to see what had or had not been agreed in the past. We considered the role that councillors perform and the current barriers and obstacles to their performance.

We took formal evidence from a variety of organisations, and, in the end, from the Minister, but we also tried to go out and search for evidence in a slightly different way. We began with a seminar of councillors from a variety of authorities and of different statuses within authorities. Some were cabinet members, some were leaders and some were councillors whom we at first termed back-bench councillors. We took evidence from them at those seminars, organised by the Local Government Association.

We had an interesting visit to Sunderland to see what councillors were doing on the ground. I see the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) nodding his head; I think that we all found it interesting. They were genuinely trying to devolve power to local councillors and local communities. That is where the title “Councillors on the Frontline” came from. I asked a colleague who remembered me from the Association of Metropolitan Authorities many years ago, “What about your role now as a back-bench councillor?” He said, “Clive, I’m not a back-bench councillor; I’m a front-line councillor.” I thought that that change in mindset was important, and we took our report heading from it.

We took evidence formally. We had a speed-dating session. I was not quite sure what that was, but essentially, we got in a number of people, and Committee members went around individually and chatted to them for 10 or 15 minutes each, taking information, ideas and views from them. That was interesting, because we did not really invite councillors; we invited people who had been councillors and given it up for whatever reason, and people who were community activists but had decided not to be councillors. They were playing a vital role, but they had decided that being a councillor was not for them, or they would have liked to be councillors, but had found certain obstacles in the way. That helped better inform our understanding of the situation. It was an important start.

We also considered the surveys that had been done on the composition of councils. It is worrying—I know that the LGA is worried—that the average age of a councillor in this country is 60. I want to make it clear that there are many excellent white male councillors of retirement age doing a very good job, but equally clearly, there are many women, young people and people from black and minority ethnic communities who could be doing a good job as councillors but are not. We considered that challenge right at the beginning. It certainly influenced our discussions thereafter. The fact is that 69% of councillors are men, 96% are white and 45% are over retirement age. They are not reflective of their communities in that sense. That issue was clearly flagged up at the beginning in the information that the Committee received.

We know that the role of councillors is changing significantly, and we reflected that. The development of the cabinet system over the years has changed councillors’ role, as has the fact that they are involved in scrutiny. Scrutiny committees did not exist when I was a councillor back in the 1980s. Even where the cabinet system has been introduced, councils have responded to it and dealt with it in different ways, but there is clearly now a role for front-line councillors who represent their community—they have been called facilitators, civic entrepreneurs and a variety of other names—to go out and engage with their communities in a practical and meaningful way.

Different councils do that differently. We saw evidence in Sunderland of a proactive approach to training and encouraging councillors, setting up area committees with area budgets and an area manager and encouraging councillors to meet and work with other public bodies, schools and voluntary groups. Those councillors had some power and influence to get things done in those communities. When we visited one of the local area committees, we said to the leader of the opposition, who happened to be a councillor in that ward, “What do you make of all this?” He said, “As a ward councillor, I think it’s great. It actually works. I have influence, and I can get things done in my local community. My local community can come to me knowing that. That has been a change. But as leader of the opposition, I think it’s a long step backwards, because now I have many fewer things that I can complain about to the local newspapers. Things are done better and more responsively to the needs of local constituents.” I thought that that was a powerful and honest message.

When we did our report on localism earlier in this Parliament, we encouraged councils to look at the second level of localism and devolution. It was right that Government should push powers down to councils—we can have views about how well or badly that has been done—but councils should be encouraged to do so as well, in a variety of ways. It would be down to local councils to do that in their own way in their own area. Circumstances will be different in different parts of the country, but we certainly encouraged that in our report.

When we did a report on the co-operative council, we went to Lambeth, where my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon North (Mr Reed), who was then the leader of Lambeth council, showed us examples of what happens on the ground. My neighbouring authority, Barnsley, has just produced a report about developing area and ward budgets on a stronger basis. Again, lots of councils of all political persuasions are doing that, and it should be welcomed. It gives a much more meaningful role for all the councillors in a local authority. We recognised and recommended such action, and we thought that the LGA could play a role by identifying examples of good practice, not so that everyone would do things in the same way, but so that individual councils could be aware of what happens in other areas as well. We were pleased with what we saw in Sunderland.

We know that councils are going through a time of great change. The localism agenda has certainly produced changes, as have the housing revenue account reforms, which the Committee welcomed, and the city deals, which is one of the best things that this Government have done. In my authority, thanks to the city deal, the council is taking on powers over apprenticeships and economic development. That is positive. The working relationship with local enterprise partnerships is another change, as are public health changes, on which we also did a report recently, the commissioning of adult care and the development of combined authorities.

Those are big challenges for councils. At one time, one could be a councillor for 10 years and nothing much would change in terms of how councils ran. An awful lot has changed. It changed in previous Parliaments, and it has changed a lot in this Parliament. It is a bit challenging for councils to keep abreast while carrying on doing their important and difficult job.

The Committee said—perhaps this is one area where the Minister will not necessarily agree with me—that we were not always sure that ministerial comments were helpful to councils in doing their job. Over the summer, we have heard how councils can better manage their parking arrangements, how parking can be organised on double-yellow lines, and how they can put their bins in better places. They have been accused of being democracy duckers for not holding referendums, because they did not put the council tax up by more than 2%. Most of those matters are for local councils to decide. If the Secretary of State is always second-guessing things right down to the minute detail, it gives the impression that somehow councillors cannot be trusted to get on and do the job they are elected for. One of our recommendations said:

“We remain concerned about the Government’s mixed messages on localism. The Secretary of State’s use of terms such as “guided localism” and now “muscular localism”—

which he used about the planning changes—

“suggests an inability to let go of the reins and embrace the concept fully. This can be frustrating and confusing for councillors and councils wishing to make the most of localism.”

That is not just a concern of the Select Committee; it very much reflects what councils and councillors, of all political persuasions, have been saying to the Committee. We made that point in our recommendations because if we really are going to say that powers are being passed over to councils, and that they will exercise them according to local conditions, we cannot always second-guess them and criticise them when one council does something in a slightly different way from another.

The hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) is here, and in his previous life as a Minister, he spoke about what I thought was an important concept: he said that it was not a matter of postcode lottery, but of postcode choice. We should not be against postcode choice; if councils make that choice rationally and properly, we should encourage them to do so as an important part of localism. I certainly think that, and I believe that the Committee would concur.

On the composition of councils, we were concerned about the age of councillors, the balance of men and women, and the balance of those from white and BME communities. They are not representative, they do not properly reflect their communities, and that is not healthy for democracy. To some extent, we recognise that it is the political parties’ job to sort that out. Representatives from the parties gave evidence to us, and we were encouraged and pleased that they all seemed to recognise the problem. They have different ways of addressing it—women-only shortlists is something we do in the Labour party, but I know that the Conservative party is not convinced by that—but at least everyone who gave evidence appreciated the problem and wanted to do something about it.

However, we were not always convinced, in the case of any party, that the promises made at national level were necessarily being communicated, dealt with and implemented at a local level. All the parties still have to look at and deal with that challenge, but if we get this right, we can encourage a lot more people to come into local government. That will help stimulate local government and create a greater vibrancy. New people coming in with fresh ideas—particularly those from different backgrounds, including younger people, people from the BME community, and more women—will always change the way of thinking and come up with new ideas and solutions. That should be welcomed, and we should encourage it.

We welcome the Local Government Association’s Be a Councillor programme. We thought that was excellent. We wanted to encourage it, widen it and get local councils involved in the promotion of democracy in their areas. We thought councils could do that. They do not have to do it on a party-political basis—of course not. They can simply encourage young people to get involved in the democratic process, and that would be good.

We looked at performance and training. There is always a worry, particularly in these times of great financial hardship for local authorities that—this is an added problem for councils to tackle—the support that councillors receive gets cut back. If anything, councillors, need more support and training, given the very difficult decisions they are now making. That is a decision for local authorities to make, but again, in this area, Ministers’ voices could be raised. They could say, “Well, all right, it is down to councils, but when large sums of public money are being spent, it is important that the people making those decisions have as much expertise and skill as possible and that they get the required training.” Making sure that happens is a challenge for councils up and down the country.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Is my hon. Friend suggesting—it would be highly controversial—that Members of Parliament should be trained for the job as well? The urgent statement we had today shows the real problems that arise when we have undertrained Members of Parliament, who have not been trained as Ministers, supervising civil servants who get out of control.

[Mr Betts]

I thank my hon. Friend for that—I think—but I will not be led down the road of discussing a debate that happened in Parliament this morning. However, I think there is a case for such training. I pointed out the major financial changes in local government that councils are having to deal with, but of course, we have to deal with those as Members of Parliament, too.

On our Committee, for example, we have tried to get more briefings from the Scrutiny Unit in Parliament, which is an excellent resource, and from the National Audit Office, which is trying to work more closely with us, so that we can understand some of the complicated technical issues—which I am sure that the Minister can explain to us, if he wishes, at any point in time. We are all trying to grapple with these issues, and I agree that training is important for us as well. It is also important that we try and reach out to potential councillors and potential candidates, and that parties and local councils work on that as well.

We looked at the barriers, why we have an unrepresentative group, and why certain people feel it is just not for them. Perhaps they would like to be a councillor, but they do not become one. Time is a factor. Flippant comments are often made, such as “Well, it’s only a part-time job, a few hours a week.” I do not think it is; the ward work alone can be demanding. Cabinet members clearly have larger time commitments, but if someone is on a scrutiny committee and they are going to do what we saw in Sunderland, where ward councillors are taking decisions through area committees and are spending money, that is also a time commitment. It is easier for retired people than it is for people who work, which is why more retired people tend to go on councils. That is a fact, but it is also a challenge and a barrier.

I remember a time in Sheffield when all the major steelworks would almost vie with each other. One would say, “We’ve got two councillors on the council”, while another would say, “We’ve got three.” They all saw giving time off as a badge of honour. I accept that it is easier for large organisations employing thousands of people to do that than it is for small businesses, but it is a challenge to try and ensure that being a councillor is an opportunity open for many people in all walks of life.

As part of our process, we talked to young people, some of whom had been councillors and had given up. One reason was that young people start off, perhaps prepared to make a sacrifice about having a job, but eventually, they have to get a job, and the employer starts saying, “I’m sorry, time off really isn’t on—well, maybe we can find you half a day every fortnight.” They cannot really do the job in that regard. We heard from a councillor—I think she was a Conservative councillor—who said she was trying to get a job, and the jobcentre told her to take the fact that she was a councillor off her CV, because if anyone saw it, they would not employ her. That is really worrying. We ought to give proper attention to that, and the Government have to address it as well.

Councils can help councillors by providing better admin and clerical assistance. Again, there is a worry that such things get squeezed and scrapped when councillors are, understandably, trying to protect front-line services from cuts. We looked at what is happening in the Ministry of Defence. We made the following recommendation:

“The Ministry of Defence is giving serious consideration to the ways in which employers can be encouraged to support military reservists. The Department for Communities and Local Government should conduct a similar review. We recommend that the Government consult on how employers can be encouraged to provide support to their staff who serve as councillors.”

We are not saying that it has to be exactly the same as the MOD, but at least if the Government were out there saying to employers, “We think this is important. We think serving as a councillor in your community is something we should encourage people to do”, having that ministerial steer would be helpful. Do a review. Work with the LGA. At least recognise it as a problem, Minister, because it is a problem, as was clearly shown in our own evidence.

I am getting towards the end of my comments. We also raised the issue of allowances. Given the press comments and ministerial responses made initially about our report, one would have thought the only thing we said was that all councillors should be paid more. Actually, we did not say that anywhere in the report. We raised the issue of allowances because it was raised with us in evidence as a problem—it was an evidence-based report; that is what Select Committee reports are. We did not recommend, as I say, that allowances should be increased. We got the evidence clearly that councillors, in some cases, were not well paid.

We did not agree with the idea of having a national rate for councillors, because we recognise the big differences in the job that councillors do in different authorities, and in the jobs that various councillors do. However, we were generally persuaded that councillors had the right to expect an appropriate level of compensation for the time and loss of earnings. Both are important; it is about the time that councillors put in, often at weekends and evenings, but it is also about the time that those in work give up, and the loss of earnings as a result, which is often a risk.

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

To reflect on the speed-dating exercise that we did, the allowances came across as being a substantial sum of money. For someone who is very young, and perhaps not yet in their first job, it is a substantial payment, but for people in full-time work, the allowances were relatively modest. That is one reason why the analogy with reservists is particularly interesting.

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[Mr Betts]

The hon. Gentleman virtually anticipates my next point, which is that we met young people who were happy in that situation. Perhaps they had just been to university and were used to living on student loans and earnings. They had moved on to being a councillor and, as a first step in life—perhaps they had got some part-time work as well—that was okay. However, once they started to get permanent employment and to move up the income scale, being on the council suddenly caused them significant loss and, if they had got into relationships and had children, the loss was very off-putting and became a barrier. We talked to people who had joined a council at a relatively young age and, when they got to 30, they did not stand again or perhaps they did two terms and then did not stand again. That was a very serious issue.

We heard from councillors that they did not put up allowances because they were concerned about the public and press reaction, which is something that councillors have to live with, but we also heard that very often they did not put up allowances because there were enough people on the council who felt that they were okay. People with a private income or who were retired had no great incentive to put up the allowances. The people who were in work and relying on that money to replace lost earnings were in a minority, so they could not get an increase in allowances.

We therefore made two recommendations to the Government, but Ministers dismissed them and I am very disappointed about that. We said, “Look, Parliament has had this problem.” We had gone through all the traumas about how we fix our pay, so we said that the issue should be dealt with by an independent body. We said, “Set it up and then we have nothing more to do with the issue—hands off.” I think that the public understand that. Sometimes I think that Members of Parliament have a little difficulty understanding or appreciating it. The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority is not always everyone’s flavour of the month, but it is an important step for us to say, “We don’t decide our pay.” Why should councillors not be allowed to take that step if they want to do so? They can set up independent panels now to advise them, but we heard from one witness after another who said, “Yes, we had independent advice and a recommendation, but we felt we couldn’t accept it. It was all too difficult.” Why not at least give councillors the option to be able to delegate absolutely, just as MPs have done?

We suggested one other power, which I do not think councillors have now, not merely to give an allowance, but to give a loss-of-earnings payment. It could be capped; it could be limited; it could be instead of part of the allowance, but I think that the public will get it. If someone loses money and can show that they have lost money by being away from work to do their council work, why should they not be recompensed for that in a specific way that I think the public could understand? Ministers dismissed that and said, “The allowance is there. It gives people compensation.” It does not. We heard evidence from people on that.

The reality for most councillors is that once they start getting better-paid jobs, the allowance does not cover their loss of earnings, let alone anything for all the work that they do at the weekend and in the evening, which comes out of their family time. I do not know why Ministers cannot be a bit more relaxed about saying, “This is reasonable.” It used to happen previously, before the allowance system was brought in. It was possible to award loss of earnings then. I certainly received such payments when I first went on a council and I think that such a system would be useful if councils wanted to adopt it.

I say this to the Minister just in passing. We did not have before us the incredibly mean proposals about councillors’ pensions, which came after the Select Committee report. It is one thing to say to people, “Lose your family income or have less family income”—because it is family income, not just an individual’s income—“now as a councillor.” It is another to say, “Because you are off work and not able to pay into your pension scheme as much as you otherwise would have done, for ever and a day once you retire, your pension will be reduced as a result of the effort that you put in as a councillor—for being a councillor.” I just do not think that is fair. It is unreasonable. I can understand why the LGA and others have got very upset about that proposal. The Government could avoid that; they could row back from the proposal. It is another barrier for people who are in work and thinking about becoming a councillor.

As well as that comment from Ministers, there was the comment from the chairman of the Conservative party, the right hon. Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Grant Shapps), on the “Today” programme when I was doing an interview in the studio. He came on and said, “Really, councillors shouldn’t be paid much, because they are volunteers; they are like scout leaders.” If councillors had been upset with the Government about other things, they were even more upset after that. I am thinking of the number of councillors who have made comments to me. The Minister has probably had similar comments from some of his colleagues in local government—he smiles at that—up and down the country.

That comment really upset people. One Conservative councillor gave this response, which was communicated to the Committee secretariat:

“it’s great to have a bunch of volunteers running everything but when you are responsible for a budget of over £900 million is this appropriate?”

Of course it is not. Of course councillors are not volunteers. They are doing an important public service and should be properly rewarded. Most councillors are not in it for the pay, but the idea that they are volunteers and scout leaders is not correct.

Then there was the other comment—I think that it came from Conservative Central Office—that it was

“a cynical and sleazy move by the Labour Party”

to put councillors’ allowances up so that the Labour party could cream a bit off the top and gain more money. Well, okay, if the Conservatives think that all members of the Select Committee are cynical and sleazy, I suppose that we will have to live with that. [Interruption.] Perhaps we will not. The idea that the hon. Members for Rugby (Mark Pawsey) and for Harrow East were not merely cynical and sleazy but involved in a plot with the Labour party to cream off money is a little too far-fetched for the chairman of the Conservative party to try to justify. I am sure that in the debate today the Minister will want to distance himself from those comments.

I have a challenge, which the LGA raised with me this morning, for the Minister. I refer to the lobbying Bill—the Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill. Although it does not come under our report, it does affect the role of councillors. The LGA has said today that it is concerned. The legal advice that it has received is that the lobbying Bill as written could prevent councillors from engaging in campaigning and lobbying of Government in the year before the election; they could be caught by the rules. Can the Minister give an absolute assurance that that is not the case and, if there are any concerns, that he will talk to his ministerial colleagues to ensure that those concerns do not become a reality?

In our report, we have raised issues that are very important. We hope that we have started a debate about the important role of councillors, the challenges that they face in that role and the help that they can be given to perform the role better. We have looked at how we can deal with the gaps—the fact that councillors are not reflective of their communities. The responsibility in that regard is for parties as well as local government itself. We have considered the councillor’s role, how it is different in different authorities, the challenges for councils and the LGA, and the barriers to becoming a councillor. We have considered the challenges for employers, for councillors and for Government.

As the Select Committee said in the report, we want councillors to be

“at the centre of community life, well known and respected by those they represent, and empowered to effect change within their local areas.”

Democracy at all levels depends on the health of the councillor population. We hope that the Government will play their part in giving front-line councillors the support that they need.

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[Martin Vickers]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention in support of the case. If we are serious, as the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) said, about getting a cross-section of the community involved, it is vital that we do not make it more difficult for the self-employed, among others, to do so.

[Mr Betts]

Is it not just a bit more complicated than that? The Committee heard evidence from people who worked and preferred evening meetings but also from women with child care responsibilities who said they would prefer to have meetings during the day. We also heard from people on county councils who had to drive for two hours to, and from, a meeting who said that they did not want to finish at 10 pm and then have to drive home. There are different problems for different people, and that is a challenge.

[Martin Vickers]

I thank the Chairman of the Select Committee for highlighting that point. I do not pretend that there is an easy solution by any means. Traditionally, county councils have tended to have more daytime meetings, but I think that, on balance, that is a deterrent. I would obviously leave it to individual councils themselves to decide, but there seems to have been a move to more daytime meetings, which probably makes it more difficult for more people.

We have briefly mentioned training. Councillors should be trained—briefed—on changes to legislation and such things. That is vital, but I would rule out the talk about performance contracts. We, as elected politicians, are judged by the electorate. They ultimately determine whether we are a success or a failure, and that is how it should be left.

Councillors are—as the report says—and should be at the centre of community life, but we must give them the tools and the opportunities they need to do the job. They can be at the centre of community life only if they are the ultimate decision makers.

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[Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Brooke, though it is perhaps a source of regret that, for the first time in as long as I can remember, we have a local government debate in which you are not participating. It is a pleasure none the less to see you presiding over us instead.

I congratulate the Chair and the members of the Select Committee on the production of the report. I noticed that there are some useful and interesting statistical appendices, one of which demonstrates that some 46% of Members of this House have, at one time or another, served as local councillors, and I am one of that number. If we include those hon. Members who were present at the beginning of the debate, we will find that in the case of this debate we are up to 90%, but I do not want my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde (Mark Menzies) to feel at all embarrassed about that, for he is, none the less, an excellent Parliamentary Private Secretary and is doing a fine job of supporting my hon. Friend the Minister.

It is instructive and worth recognising that a high percentage of people have moved from local government to Westminster. That is a healthy thing—I would say that, wouldn’t I? However, I think that we would all say that. I agree with the hon. Member for Croydon North (Mr Reed) that there is real opportunity for a cross-fertilisation of knowledge between the two tiers. However, as will become apparent, there are other matters on which I do not agree with him. Nevertheless, he made a perfectly fair point, which we all recognise.

The report is useful. I had the pleasure of giving evidence to the Select Committee on behalf of my party, so I am in the odd position of being a participant both in the report and in the debate. There was an interesting exchange about how we make councillors more representative. I was elected to a London borough when I was just short of my 22nd birthday.

[Mr Betts]

A few years ago then.

[Robert Neill]

It was very recent, as the hon. Gentleman rightly says. Like me, he will remember that it was at a time when the Association of Municipal Corporations was still going. I had just qualified as a barrister, and I was doing criminal work in and around London and Essex, which comes back to the point that I made to my hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers) that a lot of us in those days were in full-time employment of one kind or another. As I was self-employed, I was not earning if I was not in court, so there was a particular pressure there. We dealt with it in our council—granted we were near London, so many of our councillors had to commute—by insisting that, save in very exceptional circumstances, the meetings were held in the evening. I accept that the situation varies from place to place, depending on geography and demography, but we have to adjust to that.

Throughout the time I was a councillor, I managed to hold significant positions of responsibility including the majority party’s chief whip—in a coalition at one point I might add—chairman of social services and environmental services and leader of the fire authority. As there was political will and agreement between all parts of the council, we all managed to carry out such functions without its becoming a full-time job, which is important.

I value the role of the councillors. That does not necessarily mean that I think that their actions should always be immune from criticism, but I value them and the role of local government. The point about the role of the councillor, and the whole added value that it brings, is precisely that it is not a full-time profession.

I had slight worries about the suggestion that we should remunerate councillors on the basis that they are, in effect, pursuing a full-time career, and I had even more worries about the gloss that some hon. Members and other commentators put on it, hence all the conversation around pensions and so on. The reality is that, whatever the level of commitment, that is not what it should be and not, I think, what the public wants it to be. That is not to say that we should not be professional and that people should not be recompensed for the moneys that they often sacrifice when they carry out such public service.

At a time when the public is sceptical of career politicians at any level, including those in this House, it would be wrong to send out a message that once someone goes on to a council, they do that full time, regardless of the size of the authority. Moreover, such a move would not reflect the reality on the ground that the size of local authorities and the commitment that members put in varies greatly. There is a world of difference between serving as a back-bench councillor on a small district council and serving as an executive mayor or the leader or a cabinet member of a unitary authority. We must accept that there is a range of differences, and that a national template cannot be imposed on them. An error that the earlier Councillors Commission made—I am glad to say that the report has not made it—was to try to impose national minimums for remuneration and so on. The Government are right to say that allowing councils to outsource their remuneration policies to an independent body—although it is useful to have such a body to advise—runs the risk that it does not then calibrate effectively to that change in local circumstances. We must always be honest and up front about that.

I accept that being a councillor was not always a selling point. When I was a barrister, my clerks did not generally put on what was the equivalent to the chambers website that I was a councillor, apart from those couple of occasions when I was instructed either to prosecute or defend members or officers of local authorities for breaches of the criminal law. I accept, therefore, that there is a bit of an issue, but people deal with that in a common-sense way.

It struck me throughout my time on Havering council, which was an authority that changed hands from time to time, that there was a certain refreshment or turning over of the membership without its being imposed in any hugely structured way. That is why our discussion about what the political parties can do to get a better representation of the community in councils was helpful, but it is right to come to the fairly nuanced conclusion that we cannot impose such a move from above. I passionately want to see more women and more members of our black and ethnic minority communities involved in public life. Although I know that I, as vice-chairman of my party, have a bit of work to do to help my colleagues achieve that, I do not believe that an imposed model works, not least because the way in which individual political parties operate varies. Some are more decentralised than others, and that is true of both the Conservative and the Liberal Democrat parties.

Imposing such a practice through quotas does not work. Furthermore, it is almost counter-productive, because it is important that someone should be able to say that they came to this House or to the council on their merit. They should be able to say, “People voted for me because they thought that I was the best candidate.” We do not want to undermine that at any level. That is why I am wary of too rigid an approach to remuneration and pensions. I do not want to get to a situation where a professional and often time-consuming piece of voluntary public service is treated as a career, but that would be the message that went out if we followed the route that is hinted at in some parts of this report.

Most members of the public would be surprised to find that councillors are members of the local government pension scheme—arguments relating to such membership can be made either way. Sometimes analogies are drawn with Members of this House, and we must take them on board when we discuss the matter. I am a member of the local government pension scheme, as most members of the London Assembly were, but I am now a retired member as my pension was frozen as soon as I left—I simply say that for the record. That was because the previous Government decided that the devolved bodies, of which the London Assembly was one, should have full-time salaried posts, so there is a distinction there.

[Mr Betts]

Generally, I find that I agree with the hon. Gentleman, apart from on pensions. If a councillor is not full-time but has to spend a day a week away from work—that is not unusual for many councillors—and therefore has to give up their pay from work and their pensionable element of that pay, they are effectively getting only 80% of their pension value for working for that week. Is it unreasonable to have a system that allows them to replace that element of lost pension provision by paying in to another scheme that simply reflects that situation and gives them that element, so that they do not lose out on pension for the time they have served on a local authority? Is that unreasonable?

[Robert Neill]

There are two things that we can think about that; I understand—superficially—where the view comes from, but there are things that we should look at. First, there is the question of entitlement to paid time off to enable people to do their work, which we ought to think about. Secondly, and this is something I had to think about as somebody who was self-employed, if I was not earning a fee, whatever percentage of that fee I might have put towards my pension arrangements, I would have to make up elsewhere.

What we can do, and this would be permissible under the Government’s proposal, is say that there is no reason why a councillor cannot put a portion of their allowances, which are set locally, towards a private pension. Then, of course, they could claim the tax relief, which is part of that process. So people are not prevented from making some provision.

I accept that this is a difficult issue, but I think that there is a general feeling among the public that—if anything—we will have to be rather more cautious in our approach to pensions right across the public sector. That applies to Members of this House—our pension scheme is being revised, including for Ministers; the ministerial pension scheme is being revised—and it is happening to civil service pensions and to local government officers’ pensions. We cannot escape the fact that doing otherwise would send a message that is rather at variance with the general thrust of the approach towards pensions in the public sector. The Government’s actions are consistent with saying that, for a raft of reasons, we must recognise that we can perhaps no longer adopt the same approach towards pensions as we did before.

As I say, I accept that this is a difficult and controversial issue, and I have tried to use pretty moderate and non-partisan terms. I understand the arguments either way, but we have to be realistic about things.

As I have said, the great value of councillors is that they are not officers. I would not want—even by accident and inadvertence, if you like—to get to a stage where we do something else that reinforces the idea that councillors are part of the payroll. We would not make councillors more effective at being councillors by making them more like officers. The whole idea is that they are different and separate, and the fact that very often they have employment and experience in the private sector is part of the added value that they bring in as a different dimension to the council.

--- Later in debate ---

[Brandon Lewis]

Yes, I understand that, having been a council leader myself, and having gone through various budgets, including being able to freeze council tax back in 2005 to keep council tax low, as the Government have done consistently since coming into office in 2010. I fully understand that. I say to councils that if they want to spend and if they have reserves they are building up—councils have built up £3 billion of extra reserves in the past year alone, taking the amount to a record high of £19 billion—it is not credible for the public to expect them to be able to build up such reserves while pleading poverty. If they want to look at using that and they need to look at the capital side of their reserves, they should look at putting that into capital expenditure that will help them save revenue further down the line. That can be done, and good councils are doing that across the country and are even able to provide cuts in council tax, as we saw from some great Conservative councils in this year alone.

I recognise that, in general, providing this framework is not, in terms of the Localism Act, the end of the story. I am as keen as anyone here to see more people from more backgrounds become involved in one way or another, bringing a wider range of skills and experiences and spreading the load. However, I am clear that it is also for councils and local political parties to engage positively in their areas, to provide strong role models, to go out into their communities and to be part of them, and to demonstrate the importance of the work they do by using their new freedoms to show that they can make things better, generate an enthusiasm to become involved and then harness that enthusiasm.

That is not about setting centrally driven quotas or lists. It is not about directing councils on the support that they must provide or on how they should do things. It is not about centralising or directing councils over the allowances they pay, nor is it about us taking a vow of silence on any of those things. It is not about imposing additional levels of performance management, when ultimately the ballot box will determine.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes touched on elections every two years, and he has made his views well known around unitary councils. Where we do have examples of two-yearly elections, the turnout is not particularly higher, and it is certainly no higher than when we have all-out four-yearly elections. Again, that is something that councils have the freedom to look at, take a view on, and decide what is right for them in their communities.

Nor is this about imposing any central burdens on national or, in particular, local taxpayers without the opportunity for them to consider whether that is how they want their money to be spent. What it is about is harnessing the enthusiasm on the ground to get involved and make a community better. For example, we already have more than 650 communities applying to have a neighbourhood area designated. That is the first step in a formal process for neighbourhood planning. More are joining each week and, in that way, exercising a real local say in how they want their areas to develop.

It is about working with communities and encouraging them to see the new opportunities open to them, even if the community does not necessarily want to get involved to start with, because it is something new and they are not used to it. There is nothing to stop councillors from encouraging them to make their views known and to start to build interest, or from mentoring them and representing them in the council and other service delivery organisations.

There are many examples of councillors working in communities to help their residents take back control. This is about those councillors acting as role models for and in their communities. It is about explaining clearly the roles of councillors and the function of local government in people’s lives. We all have an important part to play in that, as do the media, as a couple of Members touched on earlier. It is about councils truly valuing the work of their councillors, supporting and empowering them and providing them with the necessary freedoms, tools and budgets as appropriate.

It is about local and national political parties engaging with people, considering how they can best encourage people and candidates to come forward, and looking at their own rules and processes.

[Mr Betts]

Will the Minister address the issue that I raised at the end of my contribution about the lobbying Bill? It was not in the report because it was not an issue then. We want to know whether the proposals will restrict councils and councillors in their role. There is an exemption in schedule 1 for MPs so that we are not caught by the provisions, but there is not one for councillors, which gives the impression that councillors will be caught by it.

[Brandon Lewis]

I was aware of the hon. Gentleman’s point, and I was going to say that we do not believe that the Bill will have a detrimental effect on councillors. His comment is on the record and I will ensure that my colleagues in the Cabinet Office look at that. We will come back to the Chair of the Select Committee with any feedback on the specific comment, but we do not believe that it will have such an effect. As I say, that is on the record, and I will make sure that he gets some feedback.

Getting people more involved is also about councils and councillors considering the skills and support that they need—Opposition Members have touched on that today, as I did a few minutes ago—and drawing on the programmes that organisations such as the Local Government Association run so well, seeking out appropriate training or mentoring opportunities and looking to identify and replicate best practice. All of us, but particularly council leaders, group leaders and lead members, have a role in encouraging members to get involved in training.

I saw this when I was a council leader. There are councils that will organise a training session, and some councillors will turn up, wanting to be involved and to learn, but often the ones who most need the support and help, whether they realise that or not, are the ones who do not turn up to those meetings. We must have the courage to admit that that happens, do something about it and encourage those people to be part of those opportunities. That will benefit both them and their communities.

Getting people more involved is also, as hon. Members have rightly said, about how councils manage the times of their meetings best to suit the pattern of councillors that they have and the communities that they represent. That is about using the flexibility that they do have.

Getting people more involved is about councils and councillors working with local employers to demonstrate the skills that they bring to their representative role: negotiating skills, analytical presentation and debating skills, a determination to succeed, the ability to work with others and, where successful, a clear track record of delivery. Those are real skills—Opposition Members made this point—that any workplace and any employer should be keen to recognise and proud to encompass in their work force.

Above all, getting people more involved is about all of us, from central Government through the whole local government sector to individuals—“councillors on the front line”, to use the Select Committee’s phrase, and those they represent—working together to make that happen.

I would not pretend, and I do not begin even to suggest, that any of this is easy. We in central Government must push even harder, I acknowledge, to do our bit, to reduce as far as possible centrally imposed burdens on local government and to continue to turn the tide from the centrally created system that, as hon. Friends commented, we have seen for so long, to locally driven action. An enabling framework must be provided to allow that, and real change, to happen.

I welcome the debate that we have had this afternoon. The way in which the role of councillors is to develop in the future, embodying the development, delivery and oversight of efficient and effective public services, and the developing role in communities and neighbourhoods, are a matter for ongoing discussion and development, and I am pleased to be involved at this stage and very happy to continue to be involved in the debate. It will be an important debate for the future of local government in our country and the councillors who work so hard for their communities within it.

[Mr Betts]

I thank you, Mr Benton, and Mrs Brooke for the excellent way in which you have chaired the debate and kept things in order. We have had a very good debate—a very positive debate. Some differing views were expressed, but generally there was quite a lot of consensus about the fact that councillors play a vital role in delivering public services and are vital for the health of our democracy. It is also very important that councils are member driven and member led. There was a lot of consensus about that as well.

There was consensus about the challenges facing councils and councillors today. It is a greatly changing world: changing in terms of the internal arrangements of councils, the financial framework within which they operate and the powers that are devolved to them—or, in some cases, taken away. There are also changes in the way councillors themselves operate. Many of them are, as we saw in Sunderland, devolving more responsibilities and more budgetary control to local level within their councils. The Select Committee saw that as a very positive move.

In this rapidly changing world, with the challenges that it presents, it is very important that councillors—not just the cabinet members, but all councillors—have the support necessary to enable them to do their jobs inside the council. I am talking about the admin support, the clerical support and the training that is necessary. That point has come across very strongly in the debate. It is one that the Select Committee highlighted and it has also received support from the Minister this afternoon.

General concerns were expressed about the lack of diversity and the need to address that. There was recognition that that is a responsibility for political parties, for councillors themselves, for the LGA—it is the responsibility of everyone involved in politics to raise the issue. Again, the Minister was supportive of that. It might be interesting to come back in four years’ time and see whether progress has been made after another cycle of council elections. That will be the test in the end of whether we have made progress—the next round of councillors who are elected.

There was quite a lot of discussion about the barriers to becoming a councillor. Again, I was pleased by the Minister’s encouragement to employers to see that having councillors as employees is beneficial. That is important. Perhaps the Government could do a little more. We may have further discussions about what more they can do to raise the issue with employer organisations and get the message across that they could be doing more to encourage that as well.

There was a lot of discussion about remuneration. I am still not sure that I like the term “volunteer”. Of course all councillors volunteer; nobody presses them to do the job as part of a work programme. We are volunteers. We are all here because we want to be, but nobody calls us volunteers. Councillors are not volunteers in the sense that they should be doing it for free, as people might do as a scout leader. There is a difference, and I think that the Minister recognised that to a degree.

Of course, most councillors are not full time. Some do only a few hours a week and, on a smaller district council, do the job perfectly well, but an executive mayor or a leader of a major authority will be full time. The hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) made that clear from his experience. In that sense, it is the job that that person has, because they cannot have another job if they are full time.

The issue is how we deal with people who are not full time, but are taking time off work. We cannot recompense people for the promotion that they might have had if they had not been on a council, but perhaps we can do a bit more to recompense people who have to take some time off work and do not get covered by the allowances. Clearly, that is a disincentive. That is reflected in the percentage of councillors who are retired and the fact that many people in work feel put off from doing council work or leave when they start to get more involved in their full-time job.

There are still challenges around, and I hope that the Minister is at least up for an ongoing discussion about them, because we want to see the diversity in all our communities properly represented.

I shall pick up one final point. I am committed, and the Select Committee has been whenever it has discussed it, to more devolution, more decentralisation and more localism—sending more powers down to local level. The hon. Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers)—he is not a member of the Select Committee, so I will probably refer to him in a cross-party way—made the point that if we are to move more powers down and have more responsibilities at local level, those powers in the end will be best exercised by those who are accountable to their communities because they are elected. That is a very important point: more powers at local level, but exercised by people who are elected and therefore ultimately accountable to their local communities. That is what councillors are, and that is why they are so important.

Question put and agreed to.