LOCAL COUNCILS AND OUR CONTRIBUTION TO THE

LOCAL COUNCILS AND OUR CONTRIBUTION TO THE NEW UNITARY COUNCIL IN COUNTY DURHAM

Introduction

This document has been compiled by the “Coordination Group” of parish and town councils (generically known as local councils) clerks with the agreement of the County Association’s Executive Committee and the mandate of local councils throughout the County of Durham.

The aim of this report is to brief the Joint Implementation Team on the issues and opportunities facing the new unitary authority in its relationship with Local Councils

Background Information

There are 109 local councils in County Durham varying from large urban town councils to very small rural parish councils. Budgets can vary from approaching £3m to £2k per annum and populations can vary from in excess of 30,000 to a few hundred.

We are however in a favourable position within County Durham as we have several large town councils all of which employ full time clerks, have a variety of support staff and are viable active authorities providing a range of services to their communities. Indeed Durham is blessed with some of the best performing Town Councils in the Country.

In addition there are 21 parish meetings where no local council exists but communities must meet together at least twice a year. Almost ninety four percent of the area and seventy seven percent of the population of County Durham is covered by a local council.

The County Durham Association of local councils (CDALC) is a membership based organisation which provides support to member councils throughout the County. 99 of the 109 (91%) local councils are members of the Association. Two Parish Meetings are also members of the Association. CDALC also currently receives funding from both the county council and five of the seven district councils in the County.

Two new councils were established on 1 April 2007 and another on 1 May 2008. The latest council created (Stanley Town Council) will, based on population, be the largest town council in the county.

Community Governance reviews are already being undertaken in Crook and Durham City areas and expressions of interest have been received from Escomb and Witton Park, Chester le Street and Consett areas. As a result of the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007 additional titles have become available such as community, neighbourhood or village council and existing local councils may chose to change their name if they desire.

In County Durham local councils are the grassroots of local democracy and provide an invaluable link between the community and the new unitary authority. Local councils are willing and able to assist the new unitary authority in making it a success. This can be achieved by establishing close working relationships between local councils and the new unitary authority.
All local councils are committed to doing the best they can for their communities and will assist, where capacity exists or can be developed, with the unitary authorities’ desire to devolve services to a more local level.

Local councils are local authorities, subject to a similar (but not identical) range of statutory requirements which apply to principal authorities. Whilst most councils deliver a large range of services to their communities some choose not to do so. Now is an ideal time to raise aspirations and the capacity of those councils who aspire to provide additional services for their communities.

A wide range of services may be provided by local councils using either their specific statutory powers granted or on an agency basis on behalf of principal authorities. An indication of the range of services currently provided by local councils is contained in appendix A.

With the government introduction of the Power of Wellbeing for local councils this will provide further opportunities for local councils to provide an even wider range of services for their community.

Both the LGR bid for County Durham and the Local Government White Paper 'Strong and Prosperous Communities' demonstrate a strong commitment to developing the roles of local councils. These roles include acting both as a voice for their local communities and as the providers of a range of public services, some of which may be delivered by a local council on behalf of the new unitary authority.

Future Support Requirements from the Unitary Authority

In order to make an effective contribution to their local communities and in particular to assist the new unitary authority, local councils will require a range of support measures to complement what they are able to arrange for themselves 'in-house'. This support will include:

i. Support and development for local council projects: Local councils wish to ensure the continuity of community development projects as well as looking to the future provision of such projects. We would also welcome relevant support mechanism from the unitary authority such as the provision of grants, commissioning of services, participatory budgeting (delegation of budgets), transfer of assets, Parish Plan funding, Parish health checks etc.

ii. Independent specialist advice and other support specific to the local councils' tier: for example on legal, procedural, management and financial matters. This can continue to be provided through CDALC with specific advice from Unitary Authority council offices. However local councils are concerned about the continuity of services currently provided by both District and County Councils to our tier. There are a range of services currently provided to local councils which it is essential are continued and beyond vesting day.

These range, for example, from human resource advice, payroll service provision, internal audit facilities, playground inspections to other service provisions such as vehicle maintenance, CCTV services, warden services etc. It is imperative that these functions will not be “switched off” on 31 March 2009 and that they will be available from 1 April 2009 until any review of service provision to be undertaken by the unitary authority is complete.

Our tier also has aspirations to use other facilities provided by the new unitary authority such as GIS facilities, use of Service Direct facilities for ad hoc advice etc

iii. Service-specific information and advice: there are initiatives where it will be either a statutory responsibility or in the best interests of the new Unitary Authority to support local councils. Examples include:
 compliance matters (e.g. Code of Conduct, electoral processes etc – please refer to bullet point 8 below)
 processes relating to statutory and non statutory consultations (e.g. development control, licensing etc)
 to assist the effective delivery of certain services (e.g. public rights of way, burials, grounds maintenance etc).

The following action areas are considered important to address and ideally should be in place by vesting day in April 2009

1. Area Action Partnerships (AAP’s) – Local councils hope to play a leading role within AAP’s once established and we would wish to see all local councils given the opportunity of having representation on AAP’s. This should offer local councils an input into policy decisions and also the ability to influence and be influenced by other members of the partnership.

2. A new look Charter between all local councils and the new unitary authority - A tripartite charter currently exists between Durham County Council, Easington District Council and local councils in the Easington Area and a Charter is in place between Sedgefield Borough Council and local councils within their area.

We would need to develop a charter based on the evidence of best practice from within the existing arrangements and from other arrangements nationally. The new Charter will provide for greater consultation with local councils, and for local councils to undertake service-delivery on behalf of the new authority.

It should also mirror the relevant elements of the unitary authorities bid and these should be reflected and honoured in the charter. Charter arrangements will also need to take into consideration Area Action Partnership arrangements and clarify the respective roles of the corporate centre.

It is likely that a lead officer and cabinet member will need to be designated, both to 'champion' the charter, and to act as a conduit between the unitary authority and the local council tier.

The following represent subsections of the charter or are related to the charter and consequently need to be addressed by vesting day April 2009.
• Capacity building/infrastructure support for the sector including the County Association with particular reference to funding. The LGR bid indicates that where there is local willingness and aspiration the new authority would support the development of new local councils through a local council support unit which would also support existing local councils with legal and financial advice, ICT equipment and staff development where desired or required. For example, the provision of a website/intranet for the Association would not only provide benefits to local councils but would also be beneficial to the new unitary authority for communication purposes etc.

In addition to the above support it is considered essential that appropriate resources for the County Durham Association of Local Councils continue to ensure its future membership needs, ensure its security and its role to interact with its members and the new unitary authority.
• A consistent mechanism for consultation and communication between local councils and the unitary authority – possibly using ICT to provide all councils with internet and e mail facilities. Perhaps the co-ordination group could continue after LGR to provide the consultation and communication mechanism between local councils and the Unitary Authority. One suggestion is to recycle any surplus ICT infrastructure from District or County councils to the benefit of smaller local councils to enable better communication links etc.

• Partnership working/joint working to provide better services for communities – we would wish to investigate the best means of partnership working between the two tiers to lead to enhanced local services and benefit for all communities in the County.

• Double taxation issues – some areas of the overlap in delivery of services have already been identified and wherever double taxation occurs resolution is required. This will require the determination of a policy position by the new Unitary Authority to establish the preferred method by which this matter is to be addressed e.g. special expenses, grants etc

• Linked to the issue of double taxation issues is the need for Precepting arrangements to be introduced which will ensure that individual local council precept demands are correctly accounted for on Council Tax demands and that arrangements are in place for the appropriate payments to be made to local councils during 2009/10. This will need to include the timing of precept information requests and payments of precepts to local councils. It is envisaged that the request from the unitary authority for precept information will be reasonable as by law the request date could be as late as 28 February.

The double taxation and precept issues need to be resolved before local councils start to formulate their budgets for 2009/10.

• Devolution of Services, Quality and fitness for purpose: if a local council wishes to undertake some service delivery for the new local authority there will need to be a mechanism established to identify that the local council is 'fit-for-purpose' and that the desired quality of service can be achieved before any services are devolved. This could be based upon the national 'Quality Parish Scheme' or a hybrid which involves elements of the Quality Parish Scheme qualifying criteria.
We realise that service delivery issues will not be finalised by April 2009 but the mechanisms for applying service devolution could be in place as soon as possible during 2009/10 which would enable the proactive councils to take advantage of this as soon as possible
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3. Arrangements for elections (including bye elections), Code of Conduct, Standards Board, remuneration issues -
• Details of electoral/co-option processes will need to be arranged in order to accommodate any local council vacancies which arise from April 2009 onwards.
Local councils support the findings of two recent government driven Councillor Commissions which both identified that election costs are a problem for local councils and recommended that principal authorities bear the total cost of any elections.
• Code of Conduct/Standards issues – there is a need to have identified a body of people to form the Standards Committees including appropriate representation from the local council sector to deal with any issues arising post March 2009.
• Similarly a Remuneration Panel system will need to be introduced to replace the current District Council Remuneration Panels. This should result in a standardised remuneration panel recommendation for the County to which all local councils can have due regard. Any recommendations of such a panel need to be in place prior to budgeting cycles to allow local councils to precept for such likely expenses.
The following action areas are also considered important but need not necessarily be in place for vesting day.
1. Community Governance Reviews – Durham City Council and the Crook steering group are currently working on Governance Reviews in their area and other District Councils may have agreed Governance Review arrangements by 31 March 2009. Other areas Chester le Street, Consett and parts of Wear Valley may not have achieved this but may wish to pursue creation of a local council post April 2009.
Arrangements should be made to ensure that any areas currently under review at 1 April 2009 are completed satisfactorily .
The Association is keen to see that where the will and desire exists that the entire County is parished and all local councils are members of the Association.

2. Service delivery, Cemeteries, Allotments, Parks etc It is our belief that the best service delivery is expected by our communities and that examples of best practice need to be used to ensure this happens. The practical operation of service delivery needs to be addressed as some services are currently undertaken by local councils whilst in other areas the same service will be provided by the unitary authority. Minimum standards must be maintained and improved upon wherever required.

3. LAA/ County Durham Partnership representation for the local council tier needs to be appropriate and we should be involved in Scrutiny arrangements.


Continuing Arrangements

Local council representatives have been identified to deal with the above action areas and are willing and able to work alongside and with any officers or workstream groups as required. The action areas identified above are indicative of the areas identified to date however others may develop during the course of the next few months.

It is anticipated that consideration and support is given to the requests made above and that they will be recognised and addressed as part of the Unitary Authority creation process.

CDALC Co-ordination Group
Includes officers from the following councils Barnard Castle, Belmont, Brandon & Byshottles, Esh, Ferryhill, Great Aycliffe, Horden, Murton, Peterlee, Seaham, Sedgefield, Sherburn Village, Shildon Spennymoor, Tow Law.