The Localism Act 2011 strengthened the legal basis for councils taking a lead on local issues by confirming they have the power to do anything legal which an individual can do (this is sometimes called a ‘power of general competence’). This includes, setting up companies and projects with others for profit or to provide services. The law also aimed to strengthen the role of councillors as local leaders by removing red tape and:

• abolishing the Standards Board which, Government argued, had encouraged trivial and vexatious complaints against councillors, undermining their role as local leaders
• clarified the rules on ‘predetermination’ (this is the principle that councillors should come to decisions about planning etc based on the facts) to make it clear that local councillors are not restricted from campaigning on issues affecting their ward even if these are likely to be later subject to a formal council decision and that, even if they have campaigned publicly, they still have a legitimate right to be involved in these decisions.

The Act gave new powers to local leaders more generally (including councillors and non-councillors) in:

• neighbourhood planning – parish councils and cross-sectoral groups representing interests in a neighbourhood are empowered to lead a local planning process which forms part of the formal local planning framework
• protecting and developing community assets – local community groups are able to apply to have local assets which have social value registered to provide the opportunity to protect that value if they are sold
• challenging poor services – local community groups are able to challenge the council on the way it delivers services which may result in services being put out to tender or delivered through community-led initiatives.

The powers in the Localism Act have not been widely taken up in practice. Reductions in council spending – and public sector spending more generally – however, have focused the efforts of local leaders to find alternative ways to protect local services. Further reductions in council spending are planned each year until 2019/20. This, together with the cost of meeting increasing demand for social care services, means the survival of many neighbourhood public services will depend on the ability of local leaders to engage with communities and work in partnership.
The Council’s 4 key corporate aims: preventing family breakdown; maximising the independence of adults; sustainable neighbourhoods; and economic growth and jobs, clearly depend on the capacity of the Council to work in partnership with communities and others. Local know-how and leadership will be a key factor in this.

There are other factors – apart from legislation and funding – which affect the potential for local leadership and the citizen council. In Birmingham these include:

• the findings of the Kerslake Review of the city’s governance and organisational capability which called for local councillors to ‘concentrate on regular, direct engagement with the people and organisations in their wards and role as community leaders’ rather than ‘being sat in committee meetings at the Council House’ and which noted a confusion in the roles of council officers and councillors (with the latter managing rather than leading)
• reforms to ward committees – which allow councillors flexibility in the style and content of community engagement – and changes to ward boundaries and the creation of a mix of single and double member wards which, allowing for the reduction in the overall number of councillors, is likely to reduce the average population per ward from 28,000 to 16,000
• changes to district structures in terms of both governance and service delivery and the development of the Council’s Challenge Fund, which should increase the potential for local innovation
• the city’s track record in Community Asset Transfer based on social valuation – a practical model for enabling assets to be managed innovatively which could also provide insights into innovation in services – and the ‘co-operative council’ model derived from practice elsewhere in the country and applied in some of Birmingham’s districts
• the Standing up for Birmingham campaign and social innovation zones, timebanks and ideas for reforming bureaucracy which have emerged from it; together with the earlier Social Inclusion Process which led to the city’s network of Places of Welcome; and other local citizen-led initiatives including the Impact Hub, Street Associations, local food, arts and sports and cultural projects and a growing number of neighbourhood companies and development trusts, provide councillors with ways of working with civil society.

 

Next, you might want to:

Google ‘Localism Act’ to find out more about it from other sources

check out what the Lyons Report in 2007 said about local leadership and ‘placeshaping’

see how the Localism Act and other initiatives relate to the idea of the ‘Frontline Councillor’

read about how the role of councillors is likely to change in future