Councillors have approved changes to Bridgend Council’s scrutiny arrangements (pdf).
Scrutiny is where councillors – usually in a committee – question the decisions and policies of the council and Cabinet, making recommendations for changes (if needed).
The proposed changes follow the recommendations of an Audit Wales investigation into the council’s scrutiny arrangements, as well as an external review supported by the Welsh Local Government Association (WLGA).
Although the overall conclusion was that scrutiny works well at BCBC, there are weaknesses in how scrutiny was carried out before decisions were made, as well as in forward planning.
At the moment, Bridgend Council has four scrutiny committees.
The first is the Corporate Overview and Scrutiny Committee (which focuses on the council’s administration). The other three subject scrutiny committees are (unhelpfully) numbered 1-3. This means you don’t have an idea at a glance what their remit is – which was a criticism from Audit Wales.
The favoured option (out of five put forward) – which was approved by the council – proposes:
- Four committees would be kept, but scrutiny committees 1-3 will be given proper names (i.e. Education Committee, Social Security Committee, Communities Committee). The final names are to be decided.
- The number of councillors sitting on each committee will be increased from 12 to 14.
- Committee meetings will have a time limit of 3 hours (unless agreed that this should be extended during the meeting).
- The timetable for each committee’s forward work programme – where they decide what topics to discuss and investigate – will be increased from four months to six months.
- The Corporate Overview Committee remains responsible for scrutinising the council’s budget and performance. It would have its own separate paid Chair (instead of one of the Chair of the three subject scrutiny committees being appointed to chair it, as happens now).
- A cross-party working group would be formed to take part in the budget-setting process (called BREP).
The main disagreement was on the proposed stand-alone paid Chair of the Corporate Overview & Scrutiny Committee.
Opposition groups suggested one of their group leaders – who receives an additional salary for that role – should combine that role with chairing the Corporate Overview Committee, saving the council an additional salary.
However, the original proposal went to a recorded vote and was approved 26 votes to 20.
