Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth on 7 February (HL5255), what checks and balances they have put in place to ensure that the actions of directly elected city mayors, other than mayors of the combined authorities, are subject to proper and impartial scrutiny, particularly in cases where the mayor has abolished the Scrutiny Committee.

Local authority overview and scrutiny committees have powers to investigate executives’ policies and their implementation, call in decisions that have been made but not yet implemented, issue reports and draw attention to shortcomings. The Local Government Act 2000 sets out the statutory scrutiny provisions for principal councils operating executive arrangements. These councils are required to have at least one overview and scrutiny committee.

Current legislation recognises that councils have different local needs and circumstances, and different ways of delivering services, and so is deliberately non-prescriptive to allow for bespoke local arrangements.

Overview and scrutiny arrangements are just one element of the wider accountability framework for local government. The other key elements include: independent audit, complaints handling and whistleblowing procedures, statutory officers, transparency of information and meetings, and local media.