Having read the Gavin Jones posting, it's worth giving it context by checking out Geoff's commentary on the Rod Bluh view of excellence:
Yes, for those of you that have read
my comments on Rod's 'excellence' lecture the 'interconnectedness' of everything published by local politicians may shortly become a little clearer, or muddier than ever. I'm afraid I make no guarantees.
Originally, I was going to attempt a forensic dissection of CP2 and Real People, Real power but, having produced about 2,000 words I realised I was just scratching the surface, it was going to be a dry read....so I deleted it.
This is the quick and dirty version.
'CP2' is a hybrid offspring of a three way gang bang that's been happening between local councils, the Local Government Association and Hazel Blears' crowd: Communities and Local Government.
Hazel's civil service slaves have been beavering away at Communities and Local Government to produce the
'Real People, Real Power' white paper. This was published in July of 2008 and is a comprehensive bundle of ideas designed to 'empower' us. (Us being the electorate and our communities).
The Local Government Association, still twitching from Ruth Kelly's 2006 Government White Paper:
'Stronger and More Prosperous Communities', has examined Real People, Real Power, (A more detailed version of Kelly's offering), and after cherry picking the bits it liked from both papers has broadly welcomed both.
The LGA recently produced a briefing document for the likes of Rod 'n' Gav to peruse and, if you allow yourself a quick ganders, you'll quickly notice that the LGA, in its own words,
'supports the intentions of the Empowerment White Paper'. 'Huzzah!', exclaimed Rod & Co....or so you'd be forgiven for assuming, but I
don't think this was their reaction, and I'm not convinced that moving SBC towards 'localism' was, or is entirely popular within Tory Towers, and here's why:
At the cabinet meeting on the 12th of September 2007, adopting a 'Neighbourhood Management Strategy' was discussed. Members were also bluntly informed of alternative options to adopting the strategy:
Alternative Options
• Any alternative option will not provide the range of positive outcomes listed above. Separate initiatives would not achieve the economies of scale or the scale of impact outlined in this report.
• Do nothing – the Council would face significant risk both in terms of public perception and in inspection results if it were to do nothing. We would not be able to become a three or four-star authority.
To me this sounds a bit like a McDonalds employee worrying about getting his next star but, to be fair, Rods cabinet was still reeling from the embarrassing May 2007 'Chair of Scrutiny' debacle which had seen the chairmanship of the scrutiny committee being briefly 'handed' to the recently-resigned-from-the-labour-party Councillor David Glaholm.
Shortly afterwards Glaholm created a debacle of his own when the long arm of the law put its foot to the floor, or more accurately - the kerb, and apprehended him as he crawled along it. It was difficult to tell who was more embarrassed, Glaholm or the Tories, but the 'chair' was quietly handed back to Kevin Small of the Labour group after a heated, and somewhat fearful discussion within the Tory group. At the time, Cllr Bluh's reasoning for handing the chair back to Kevin Small, (without a public vote), was simple:
We should not seen to be manipulate Scrutiny for political reasons. We would be severely marked down in the inspection process if we were seen to be doing so.
The leadership subsequently got its act together, and had decided upon a cogent theme to present to members at the next
council meeting on the 12th of September 2007, where the Chair advised on the importance of regenerating Swindon's neighbourhoods:
He stated that to be able to address the issues of crime and community safety seriously, to improve the environmental issues within local neighbourhoods and to target the scarce financial resources for care and other people-related services more effectively, there needed to be a more localised delivery of services
The leadership had settled into it's new groove, and was now boogeying gently to the tune of 'Localism'.
Regeneration would not just be about the town centre, 'localism' would be the key to regenerating neighbourhoods, reducing crime, increasing safety and solving environmental issues.
But let's not make Batman and Robin redundant just yet, it would be prudent to keep the Bat phone easily to hand......
By June 2008, localism - the neighbourhood management initiative, had been christened 'Connecting People, Connecting Places', or CP2 for short. CP2 was being urged quickly forwards on its tottering juvenile legs as fear was, once again, raising its ugly head in the cabinet - as reported in this
SBC cabinet briefing document from the 11th June 2008.
10. Alternative Options
10.1. Do nothing and retain our current arrangements. This will incur a severe risk that Swindon will attract a low Comprehensive Performance Assessment/Comprehensive Area Assessment rating and undo the progress made since 2003.
Such under performance could lower the public perceptions of Swindon Borough Council, reduce funding and impede the Council’s other policies. A low rating might have adverse impact on the regeneration programme, especially if central government were minded to use their reserve intervention powers.
To me, this looks like either an open admission, or honest recognition at least, that as a council, they had not been performing as well as we had been led, (by them), to believe, or that the council leadership believes that to avoid 'under performing' it must constantly seek change, and only by making change can it expect to be judged as performing well. A dog chasing its own tail?
I think, for a while at least, I
will stick with my
previous comments on Rod's 'excellence' lecture, when I said:
"Perhaps Rod is quietly acknowledging that not everything in the Borough has been quite as successful as the Ivory Tower gang had previously claimed and, having stuck their collective necks out and bragged relentlessly about vision, success and delivery.....it has become much harder for them to 'improve' on the near-perfect record they have so far awarded themselves."
So, where now for the leadership?
Driven partly by fear of being awarded poor marks, the council decides it must keep on doing 'something', must be
seen to be changing things, in order to show that it's constantly moving forwards, embracing change and being progressive. Personally speaking, I think if they'd be perfectly happy to do the town centre regeneration and leave it at that, but when the realisation dawned that the town centre regeneration might be threatened by a poor CAP/CAA assessment they, a little reluctantly it appears, started work on neighbourhood management. This will probably be rebranded as 'neighbourhood regeneration' soon, and be packaged and presented as being part and parcel of the overall regeneration.
So what does this mean for us?, well, take your pick:
'It is about the Council, its partners and residents working closely together to develop strong neighbourhoods that influence local provision and delivery of services to improve the quality of life for all our residents.' say the council.
'It is about power, influence and control: who has power, on whose behalf is it exercised, how is it held to account, and how can it be diffused throughout the communities we live in. It is about democracy, and how democratic practices and ideals can be applied to our complex, modern society' says the government.
'It is about passing power to communities and giving real control and influence to more people' says the Local Government Association.
It's fairly easy to imagine that all over the country leaders of local councils are getting together with their own versions of Gavin Jones, and whittling 'Stronger and More Prosperous Communities', 'Real People, Real Power', and the LGA's own briefing documents down into something a little less threatening to them politically.
When this first appeared in Council, they were keen to get
another star and desperately fearful of being marked down and the prospect of the government intervening in 'their' affairs. I get the sense that they felt pressured into 'doing something Muttley'.
I'm not impressed with this move towards 'localism' because it seems to have been driven by fear......and because we already know that Councillors are genuinely and inherently averse to the idea of real people having any real power outside of election times.
Unless SBC makes genuine moves towards enabling proper participatory democracy in our neighbourhoods I think their idea of 'neighbourhood management' is destined to produce a castrated, impotent version of 'localism', which will not 'empower', or interest voters.
Let's face it squarely and call a spade a spade, 'neighbourhood management' is localised management
of the people and it resembles a larger, grander version of the Community Empowerment Network.
The community empowerment network failed, because it only seemed to attract interfering busy-bodies, sorry,
'community leaders', at the grass roots level and was intended to allow its 'strategic partners' to conduct 'social engineering' within targeted communities. These communities quickly learned that their 'partners' were the only participants who were empowered in any meaningful way.....and that usually meant handing social edicts downwards, which the busybodies were then supposed to distribute to 'their' flock. Messages travelling back up the chain of 'community empowerment' rarely seem to have produced meaningful results.
I suggest that there are two, immensely powerful, fears driving our Councillors to embrace localism. The first is a political fear of central government censure and intervention. Councillors
will make changes, but only just enough to keep the inspectorate classes and central government off their backs. Hence
CP2 will be adopted, but more because they are afraid not to, than because they think it's desirable.
The second is Councillors fear of a newly empowered Swindon electorate wielding a sense of purpose and renewed interest in participatory democracy. We need only to look two recent examples to determine that our Councillors, with just one or possibly two exceptions, are resolutely opposed to the very notion of voters having a direct say in how the council, and town, should be led.
It is therefore difficult to imagine that residents will be 'allowed' to influence political policy and service 'delivery' within their own communities if their own opinions oppose those of the councillors.
There's some genuinely good stuff in Real People, Real Power....and there's some real rubbish. I won't try to influence how any one else interprets it, but I will leave with with a few final thoughts on how I think our councillors will react to the political opportunities, and threats to them, contained within it.
Regardless of the intent of Government White Papers, I expect to see our councillors scrambling to ensure their position within our 'representative democracy' remains safely 'status quo', protected from an invigorated an increasingly 'upstart' electorate intent on finally taking part in 'participative democracy'.
Based on recent example in Swindon, we cannot trust local councillors to do anything other than serve themselves, and their parties of choice, where issues of democracy are concerned.
We should not expect to see the more interesting, attractive and useful aspects of democratic empowerment being easily, or even willingly adopted by local councillors.
We should expect Councillors to actively resist the more interesting, attractive and useful aspects of citizen empowerment being implemented in Swindon.
We shouldn't expect Councillors to share knowledge which might democratically benefit, or even interest us*. (See below main post for a current example).
So, for all of Rod's lecturing and posturing about embracing and not being frightened of change, I am willing to bet that Swindon's Councillors will prove to be the most resistant to it, and probably amongst the very last to embrace it and where change empowers the voter to democratically influence events
outside of election times, Councillors resistance to change will be harder to shift than chewing gum on the pavement.
Maybe they really should stick to......
.....emptying the damned bins
A Public Government Consultation is currently underway called:
Communities in control: Real people, real power - Changing Council Governance Arrangements – Mayors and Indirectly Elected Leaders.
As the title suggests, it is part of 'Real People, Real Power', and your views as a member of the public are invited.
It is disappointing that SBC, which is busily blowing it's own trumpet on 'empowering' residents, has 'forgotten' to mention that every Swindon resident is entitled, and has the opportunity now to have
another say in how the council should be led, who should lead it and how the leadership model of the council can be changed by the voters.
To save you the bother of fruitlessly searching for the Consultation Document on the SBC website, I've made it available by
clicking hereYour response must be received by 13 March 2009 and may be sent by email or post. email: email:
governance@communities.gsi.gov.ukpost to:
Changing Council Governance Arrangements Consultation
Communities and Local Government
Zone 5/A2
Eland House
Bressenden Place
London
SW1E 5DU
