Oadby and Wigston Borough Council

Marcus Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 6th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Mr Marcus Jones)]

First, I congratulate my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough (Sir Edward Garnier) on securing this important debate. We have, as he said, spoken and corresponded about Oadby and Wigston Borough Council on a number of occasions, and it is clear from our discussions and correspondence that he has a great passion for his constituency and the interests of the people he represents. I am certainly grateful to him for giving me the opportunity to discuss such an important issue. Local government delivers essential services to some of society’s most vulnerable people, and it is therefore vital that it operates effectively.

I wish to begin by setting out the context and emphasising that local government normally functions well. There are many examples of excellent and innovative practice to be found across all types of councils. Councils are held to account through an effective system of local accountability, and where they do require help or advice, sector-led support is available.

As my right hon. and learned Friend will be aware, local government is independent of central Government. Through elected councillors—and, where applicable, mayors—councils are accountable to the communities that they serve through the ultimate sanction of the ballot box. On hearing what he has had to say today, I am sure that many of his constituents will be thinking about how their council has been run, and is currently run, and will look at that accordingly when they make their choice next time at the ballot box.

Since 2010, town hall transparency has been improved by new rules requiring councils to make public a written record of all major decisions. The public also have the right to film, audio-record, take photographs and use social media to report the proceedings of public council meetings. The introduction of the local government transparency code in 2015 requires all authorities to publish certain data about their resources and expenditure. That makes it easier for local people to act as armchair auditors and hold their councils to account. In addition, councillors hold regular surgeries with local residents, councils conduct consultations on their policies and budgets, and the activities councils undertake are subject to external scrutiny in the form of an annual external audit.

The Local Government Association provides external challenge and targeted sector-led support where it is needed. For 2016-17, my Department has given the LGA £21.4 million so that it can provide training and support for members and officers. The LGA provides policy briefings and arranges peer support from other local authorities. Options include one-to-one mentoring for elected leaders, corporate peer challenges and additional targeted support where it is required. The LGA also has an overview of performance in the sector. That enables it to offer support on a proactive basis to councils that appear to be facing challenges.

Only as a last resort would the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government use his powers of intervention, and only where there is comprehensive evidence of extremely serious and widespread systemic failings in a council would that be the case. Statutory interventions are rare: the powers have been used only twice in the last five years, and only six times in the last 15 years.

As my right hon. and learned Friend will be aware, the Communities and Local Government Committee recently reported on our interventions in Tower Hamlets and Rotherham, and it agreed that our interventions in both those authorities had been justified. It also emphasised that removing control from democratically elected representatives is an extremely serious decision.

I will now turn to Oadby and Wigston Council itself. The authority has certainly had its challenges. In particular, there have been serious divisions between the senior management team and other officers. It is, however, currently benefiting from sector-led support, and I expect to see significant improvements with the council.

As my right hon. and learned Friend correctly said, a collective grievance was submitted by nine members of staff in May 2015. The council worked with the LGA and appointed an independent investigator, Richard Penn. Mr Penn is a former local authority chief executive with many years of experience as an independent investigator. He concluded that the 214 allegations that made up the collective grievance were unfounded. He found that

“Oadby and Wigston Borough Council is in many respects a well-performing organisation that punches above its weight”.

He provided evidence to support this, including that the council has met all its statutory targets and indicators; completed several major regeneration schemes, including in the town and parks; improved its leisure offer; and redesigned its customer service experience.

Mr Penn did not, however, give the council a clean bill of health. In a supplementary report on the organisational issues arising from his initial investigation, he found that there were

“deep divisions between the Senior Management Team and the officers who took out the collective grievance”.

It was his view that the council needed to take

“urgent action in order to tackle the major challenges of not only ‘healing the wounds’ but also of ensuring that the Council has the organisational capacity and stability to face the future with confidence.”

I consider it essential that the council take immediate action to address these issues, as it is imperative that management issues should not be allowed to impact on local service delivery and the services that are provided to my right hon. and learned Friend’s constituents. In March this year, I wrote to the leader, Councillor Boyce, highlighting my concerns and emphasising the importance of working with the LGA to take effective remedial action.

I am pleased to see that since Mr Penn’s report Oadby and Wigston has worked closely with the LGA. The LGA has met the section 151 officer, the chief executive and the change management committee on multiple occasions. The council has been supported to understand the issues faced, and an action plan has now been agreed.

[Sir Edward Garnier]

Am I not right in thinking that the section 151 officer is one of the temporary staff—the agency staff—brought in? This exemplifies the problem that I am facing. I really do think we need to be quite serious about requiring the borough council not to allow this just to drift on and drift on, and to fob us off with mealy-mouthed responses. We have to focus laser-like on this council, because otherwise it will just go on and on misconducting itself.

[Mr Jones]

I thank my right hon. and learned Friend for his intervention. The Department takes this situation absolutely seriously. I hope that he will be assured from the comments that I am about to make that we will continue to take the situation extremely seriously and to monitor how the work that Oadby and Wigston is undertaking with the LGA pans out and how it improves governance of the council.

The action plan includes the following: achieving cultural change in the council, ensuring effective prioritisation, improving ways of working, and improving understanding of officer and member roles and relationships. There are clearly areas where the council must improve, and this plan sets out the improvement journey that the council now absolutely needs to make. I expect the council to implement it fully and effectively. I understand that the LGA is running a programme of sessions with members and officers, separately and together, this autumn. These will cover all elements of the plan, although they will, in particular, ensure that members and officers understand their roles and how to work effectively.

The LGA now considers that Oadby and Wigston has a thorough understanding of what happened and what it needs to do to put it right. The council’s external auditor, KPMG, has also been kept informed, and it does not feel that there are currently any matters that warrant further scrutiny from an audit perspective. It is important that the council continues to keep its auditors informed as it works to implement its improvement plan.

The LGA will also work with Oadby and Wigston to conduct a peer review, whereby officers and members of another authority will provide challenge and share learning. That is something that I have strongly encouraged. The peer review should consider whether the council has made sufficient progress against its improvement plan. I will take a keen interest in the findings of the peer review, and I encourage the council to make those findings publicly available.

Indeed, I expect the council not only to take steps to address the challenges that it has faced, but to reassure the public that its problems are in the past. The council must act in an open and transparent way, if it is to be properly accountable to the community that it serves. Wherever possible, the council should make available details of the problems it has faced, the action it has taken to address those challenges and the progress made. Oadby and Wigston has certainly had its challenges.

[Sir Edward Garnier]

My hon. Friend is being extremely generous in giving way; there is nothing more tiresome than busy little Back Benchers who jump up and down all the time. What is the timetable that he has set himself and the council so that he will be able to measure whether there has been any change in the conduct of its administration? Saying, “We hope that the following things will happen,” is good, but unless that is done by a given date and it is required to report to my hon. Friend and the Department, things will drift and I cannot afford to see that happen.

[Mr Jones]

My right hon. and learned Friend should not think that being a busy little Back Bencher is a bad thing. In fact, in this case it is extremely important, because he has raised an extremely important issue. He makes a very important point that this is about not just warm words, but making sure that the issues that the council has faced and the remedial action taken to deal with them are followed through. In that context, I need only to refer to the action that the Department took in relation to Rotherham Council. The Audit Commission produced several reports on the council and the local authority responded with warm words, but the actions suggested by the reports were not followed through properly. Subsequently, Rotherham Council found itself in an untenable position whereby the Department—this is very rare—decided that intervention was necessary. I say to my right hon. and learned Friend that I will be watching the situation extremely closely.

On timescales, at this point I am content to see the work with the LGA undertaken, but I will not be content if significant progress is not made. I think that this debate will make the council fully aware of that. As I said at the outset, local government must maintain its independence from central Government, and it must answer to its electorate. In very rare circumstances we directly intervene in local authorities, but in this case I expect significant improvement.

I ask one thing of my right hon. and learned Friend, and I am sure that he will deliver on this. If he is made aware of any additional information or additional issues that arise at Oadby and Wigston council, I would be more than glad to hear from him to make sure that those issues are being addressed. I thank him for bringing this important issue to the House, and I look forward to keeping this dialogue going with him over the coming months so that his constituents can feel confident that they are getting the service that they deserve from Oadby and Wigston council.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jones]

I thank my right hon. and learned Friend for his kind comments, and I am sure we will continue that dialogue.

Question put and agreed to.