At this month’s full council meeting, there were two backbench questions on how Bridgend Council records and responds to enquiries and referrals.
Referrals are formal requests by a councillor – whether from themselves or on behalf of residents – for a council department to take action on an issue.
Cllr. Graham Walter (Lab, Porthcawl East Central) asked for information on the number of referrals. While this figure wasn’t revealed to the full council, in his follow-up question he asked whether BCBC were considering improvements to how referrals were recorded.
BCBC taking too long to respond to FOI requests
In a separate question, Cllr. Tim Thomas (Ind, Ynysawdre & St. Bride’s Minor) asked about how the council responds to public enquiries.
In the written response, he was told there were “pockets within the authority where communication can be approved” – though Cllr. Thomas believes there are more than just pockets.
Cllr. Thomas found that of 1,882 Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to BCBC, 758 (a little over 40%) took longer than the statutory deadline of 21 days for a response to be issued.
Did the Council Leader agree this level of performance undermines public confidence in the Bridgend Council’s openness and transparency?
Officers and councillors need better performance data
Council Leader, Cllr. John Spanswick (Lab, Brackla West Central), accepted that improvements were needed to how referrals were recorded.
The current system doesn’t produce performance reports for the council’s directorates or provide similar information to councillors – though any improvements would need to be cost-effective. An option to purchase a bespoke system wasn’t taken up.
This would give a better idea of progress on answering referrals, which ones remained outstanding and how long they have been open for.
He disagreed with Cllr. Thomas that BCBC’s poor response rate to FOI responses undermines confidence in the council, but accepted the council “needed to do better”.
However, he pointed a finger at councillors who make FOI requests when they could get that information from other sources, or by asking questions to officers directly.
