Structures and Scrutiny - A new Queen’s Speech – and the need to remember the importance of scrutiny.

The ritual State opening of Parliament obliges Her Majesty to announce the Government’s programme through the traditional Queen’s Speech. The speculation this year has been that it will focus on such issues as Prisons Reform, Adoption, unmanned drones and driverless cars! The reality is that the processes of public administration continue much the same, whilst MPs and Lords busy themselves making new laws.

What should sound an alert is whenever the word ‘Reform’ appears in a Queen’s Speech. In recent decades administrations of every hue have endlessly tinkered or reorganised public services. Sometimes the changes go unnoticed, except to those closest to the action. But there are other times when ‘reform’ takes centre stage. The reorganisation of the NHS in 2013 is a case in point. Its complete re-structuring of key delivery and support functions in health and wellbeing caused an immense upheaval and the true implications are only now feeding through, three years later. Much of this is because although structures and processes are of interest to politicians, civil servants and certain specialists, the wider public could not care less!

Of course that’s not universally true. If and when things go wrong, and the media start stirring, the vengenance of those who feel their public services are being adversely affected knows no bounds. The old adage that people do not value thigs unless they are taken away from them certainly has validity in politics. Ask any Council Leader who has had to close a library or a care home! What keeps the system relatively balanced is that our democracy is based on a carefully-constructed set of checks and balances. And the danger with new legislation is that those accountability processes are not always properly put in place. They are an afterthought, or they are made up as we go along.

We have a good example right now. A few weeks ago the Cities and Local Government Devolution Act was passed into law – a largely incomprehensible piece of law-making which will encourage Mayoral Combined Authorities in many parts of England. Not that the legislation was needed because the Treasury skilfully built upon the Labour Government’s Combined Authority concept from 2009 and just applied it differently. Hence the speed with which the Devo-Manc deal was done just before the General Election and the summer stampede that saw 34 separate bids for devolution by English Councils by the September deadline. All this was done so quickly that there was little time for any consultation, it was only afterwards that people complained. The relevant Select Committee called it a ‘democratic deficit’ but it’s fair to say that there were few riots on the streets of the prospective new Super-Councils! To be fair, hardly anyone objects to the new devolved powers. What is controversial is how they will be used, by whom and how will accountability work?

This is why today we welcome the first really authoritative review of the governance and scrutiny options that need to be put in place for the new structures. The admirable Centre for Public Scrutiny has published a comprehensive paper written by the highly-experienced and respected Ed Hammond. It is a ‘must read’ for anyone working within or alongside the new structures. It is provokingly entitled Cards on the Table, and the suggestion may be that some of them, at least, are face-downwards. In the paper, Hammond correctly analyses the different stages that Councils pass as they transition from the old system to a new Mayoral structure – and he concludes that different governance requirements arise at different stages. Eventually, however, it needs a system of scrutiny that provides more challenge to the major decisions to be taken by the new Authorities. Let’s remember that the new powers matter; they include housing and planning, transport and skills. The question is whether the public and community stakeholders will have any more interest in the scrutiny aspects than they did on the principle of devolution itself?

We live in a more transparent age, and scrutiny is becoming more visible. Far more is gleaned from following a Select Committee hearing than listening to Ministers speaking (usually verbatim from a civil service brief) about some new legislation or another. The central truth is that, in a modern democracy, oversight of how our laws are implemented is as important as what they are in the first place. Here’s an illustration. Last week the Public Accounts Committee heard evidence from Simon Stevens and the top team at the NHS about specialist commissioning. MPs wanted to know how the statutory rules obliging them to involve publc and patients in their commissioning led to actual changes in their plans. The question

wasn’t really answered.

But a truly consultative culture requires that difficult questions are posed and that those affected have the opportunity through proper public engagement and consultation to consider the answers. In years to come residents and businesses, housebuilders or planners, colleges or charities will all be impacted by changes willed by Parliament but implemented by officials. Elected Ministers and Elected Councillors are of course the democratic element, but we cannot rely on a once-every four years type of legitimacy. For effective democracy we need accountable governance and solid scrutiny.

Trigger points

• Following the Devolution ‘democratic deficit’ roundtable held in Birmingham in April, the Institute has published Briefing Note 16: Legal and best practice requirements for public engagement in English local government devolution. Click here for a copy.
• The CfPS document is Cards on the table: Tips and tricks for getting in on the action of devolution http://www.cfps.org.uk/cards-on-the-table-devolution/
• The Queen’s Speech transcript is available on https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/queens-speech-2016
• We have invited Ed Hammond to join us in a June webinar on the Scrutiny for Devolution topic, where he will discuss the CfPS paper. Date to be finalised

This is the 297th Tuesday Topic; a full list of subjects covered is available for Institute members and is a valuable resource covering so many aspects of consultation and engagement