Scrutiny will be more proactive
Panel pledges to improve process
A Windsor and Maidenhead council panel has resolved to be more ‘proactive’ in challenging key cabinet proposals – in light of historical concerns over the scrutiny process.
‘Scrutiny’ is where specific council panels comb through reports by the cabinet to make sure their decisions are sound.
Prior to the new administration, opposition councillors slammed the scrutiny process as ‘broken’, describing it a ‘tick box’ exercise – and called for a change in council culture to address this.
The people overview and scrutiny panel looks at the ‘people’ needs of residents in the borough, including health, adult and children’s services.
At the newly elected administration’s people panel on Tuesday, members discussed how they wanted to work moving forwards.
They are hoping to improve the system by looking at key cabinet papers earlier in the process of having them approved and brought into force.
In the past, overview and scrutiny panels would, if deemed necessary, ‘call in’ a matter that had already
been discussed by the cabinet, if the panel had concerns.
This is ‘costly’, time consuming and ‘slows the process’, the panel noted. They would like to ‘minimise’ chasing after call-ins for this reason.
One problem is that relevant cabinet papers ‘did not come automatically’ to the panel in the past.
Members suggested that papers coming up in future cabinets be assessed by scrutiny in advance.
Councillor John Story (Con, Ascot & Sunninghill) said: “I would’ve thought it essential that all key cabinet papers affecting this area ought to come here first.
“Irrespective of what happened in the past, I’d hope it would happen in the future.”
He added that the ‘onus should not be on the panel to decide what is important’ because the panel is not likely to know – instead, it should be on officers to bring relevant cabinet papers to the panel.
Mark Beeley, democratic services officer for Windsor and Maidenhead council, said that if this is what the panel chooses, officers can look into ‘the best way’ to make adjustments.
Cllr Gurch Singh (Lib Dem, St Mary’s) said he felt that papers should come to scrutiny even earlier – in their draft stages.
“We want to work with the cabinet – we want to speedup the process and give a paper the scrutiny it needs before it goes out to the open world,” he said.
Meeting chair Cllr Helen Taylor (TBFI, Oldfield) agreed it would be a good idea for the O&S panel to have ‘greater input into papers moving forward.’
“We’re not trying to reinvent the wheel but we’re trying to be a bit more proactive, instead of things being missed,” she said.
“The whole point of the panel is to scrutinise decisions. We need to make sure we have a process going forward where that is actually happening.”
Another proposal was for relevant cabinet members to be actively invited to the panel, answering questions, discussing parts of the agenda and offering insights that will help scrutiny.