Local Audit and Accountability Bill [Lords]

Andy Sawford Excerpts

Monday 28th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Robert Neill]

Well, we could try to resolve many things by way of a judicial review, but whether that would be a wise or proportionate use of public funds, when the outcome is highly uncertain, is questionable. Surely it would be much better to deal with the problem at source, in the way that is being proposed. The Opposition appear to have little to say on this matter, and they appear to be shedding a great many crocodile tears about this aspect of the Bill.

[Andy Sawford (Corby) (Lab/Co-op)]

The hon. Gentleman has shared his thoughts on a range of publications by London local authorities. I invite him to condemn Hammersmith and Fulham council, which he would surely deprecate for publishing a magazine that not only advertises “Sofas and Stuff” on the local high street but comments on the impacts of Government policy on local residents. Will he also consider the publication from the royal borough of Kensington and Chelsea, which gives its views on the Government’s Crossrail proposals and on funding implications for the council, among other things? Does the hon. Gentleman see any difference between that—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman is new to the Dispatch Box, but I must remind him that interventions must be brief, whether they are made from the Dispatch Box or from the Back Benches.

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[Chris Williamson]

The hon. Gentleman is a big champion of vested interests in the private sector, so I am not surprised that he tries to argue that what the Government are doing is right. It is not for me to square that. If he has an issue with what the Communities and Local Government Committee has said, I ask him to take that up with the Committee. I am quoting directly from its conclusions after it looked at the matter in some detail. Do not come to me and ask me to square that. I invite him to ask the Committee to square the evidence that it took. This is the reasoned conclusion that it reached—

[Andy Sawford]

It has a Tory majority.

[Chris Williamson]

Indeed. As I understand it, those were the unanimous findings of the Communities and Local Government Committee.

The Bill is misconceived in another respect. My right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central dealt with this eloquently. In the Bill, there is no recognition of joint working, which is essential; it was increasingly important when I was leader of Derby city council. We worked to bring other public sector agencies on side with us to get more bangs for the public sector pound that was being spent in Derby, and that is even more essential as the budget at our disposal diminishes.

Therefore, I hope—my right hon. Friend made this plea—that the Government will reflect on the matter. If, as seems likely, they proceed with the Bill, I hope they will consider how the audit process could be made more relevant and up to date, given the situation we find ourselves in and the way in which public services are delivered. It does not make sense to require each public sector body to undertake a separate audit. It would be far better to recognise the fact that local authorities and other public sector agencies are working collaboratively. It is far better to have a collective audit that recognises the reality of the way in which public services are delivered in this day and age.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andy Sawford (Corby) (Lab/Co-op)]

This has been a lively debate on an important Bill and it is a pleasure to follow the contributions of many hon. and right hon. Members. The hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) spoke with experience of local government, and it may not surprise him that I want to start on a note of consensus with him and the hon. Member for Meon Valley (George Hollingbery) by saying that I for one recognise that the Audit Commission went beyond its remit. Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) made clear at the outset that we do not seek the restoration of the Audit Commission, and we understand that, to be frank, no one will lament its passing.

However, even though the Bill has been three years in the making, it is full of holes. My hon. Friend the Member for Derby North (Chris Williamson) said that the Bill is a dog’s breakfast. He made a strong speech in which he talked about the important functions of the Audit Commission, such as auditing and providing value for money in an independent way. Although we might not lament the Audit Commission’s passing, we should be concerned about those vital functions.

We must explore critical issues in Committee that are currently unclear, such as the arrangements for the future management of audit contracts and the transfer of Audit Commission functions. We do not know, for example, who will maintain the vital value-for-money tools. As a result of pressure in the Lords, not least from my hon. Friends, we have been promised improvements, such as amendments on opting into centralised arrangements for audit procurement. We can only hope that when the details are forthcoming in Committee, they meet the aspirations of their lordships and of the many organisations, including the LGA, that have pressed for those sensible amendments. It was good to hear the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke) pressing the Government on that point. I hope that she will take forward the good work of her colleague, the noble Lord Tope, in Committee.

There is doubt about the amount that the proposals will save. When the Minister responds, I expect that he will make claims about the level of savings, as did the Secretary of State in opening the debate. However, it would do Ministers much more credit if they stopped double-counting and deliberately inflating the estimated savings. We all know that most of the savings have already been banked with the axing of the Audit Commission’s inspection work and with most of the audit work outsourced.

It is disappointing that the Government ignored the advice of the draft Local Audit Bill ad hoc Committee, which, after receiving conflicting evidence on the savings, recommended that a new financial impact assessment be made. The Committee believed that only modest savings were likely and was concerned about whether a real market would develop. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central said, in the last financial year, only seven firms were appointed for the nearly 800 councils, health bodies and fire and rescue authorities that were audited by private firms, and 90% of those bodies were audited by only five firms.

The Audit Commission has raised fears that some local authorities might find it hard to attract a suitable auditor:

“In a free market, we believe there is a risk that some local authorities may find it hard to attract an auditor with the necessary skills and experience, at a reasonable price.”

It continues:

“We are aware that the firms are already considering which audits they would look to drop under the new arrangements.”

As my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North, the LGA and the National Association of Local Councils have said, that will be a particular concern for smaller authorities.

On new entrants to the market, I share the scepticism of the draft Local Audit Bill ad hoc Committee, which said:

“We heard evidence to suggest that it is not realistic for smaller firms and organisations such as mutuals and co-operatives to bid successfully for one-off audits without an inevitable impact on quality, consistency or cost.”

The Local Government Information Unit, whose evidence and advice should always be considered—I should declare an interest as its former chief executive—points out that a 10% increase in audit fees would wipe out any predicted savings. Grant Thornton said that

“it is likely that fees will increase, not decrease, as a result of the draft Bill”.

[John McDonnell]

One simple measure to expand the market might be to prevent an audit firm from being the auditor for a local authority if it already has contracts with that authority.

[Andy Sawford]

My hon. Friend made a very interesting speech and I hope that he will follow the passage of the Bill closely. I will have to give further thought to the implications of his suggestion, but if the arrangements proposed by the Government are to work, there must be an open market and a wide range of audit firms must provide audit services. We would also want that to be reviewed regularly by the audit panel. The points that the hon. Member for Meon Valley made about the dismissal of auditors were important.

Steve Parkinson of the Society of Local Council Clerks said:

“When we get to the 2017 tender exercise, I cannot imagine those fees going down, and especially for the smallest, I can see them needing to go up.”

That speaks to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North about what lies ahead. What assurance can the Minister give that the new audit arrangements will not lead to rising costs, rather than savings, for some councils?

On savings, it is welcome that, after Labour pressure in the Lords, the Government undertook to look sympathetically at a proposal for an optional joint procurement body. We welcome the assurances that the Secretary of State has given today and we look forward to seeing those proposals. Central procurement could save more than £205 million of public money over five years. That figure does not come just from the Audit Commission, but is supported by the LGA. Will the Minister assure us that he will bring forward detailed proposals on joint procurement as soon as possible? We hope to have them by this Thursday evening so that we can give them full and constructive consideration in Committee.

Joint procurement arrangements might address some of the concerns about the practicalities of requiring all councils to have auditor panels with independent members. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central said, the Secretary of State considers himself to be a revolutionary, so he must be disappointed to be associated with arrangements that everyone but him sees as overly bureaucratic.

We will table amendments in Committee on the overlap between the new audit panels and the audit committees that most councils already have. My hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) suggested that all councils should be required to have an audit committee. Most councils have one already, but we should consider his suggestion further in Committee. We will also raise the practicalities of recruiting sufficient independent and appropriately qualified members for the audit committees, which were referred to by the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole. What evidence does the Minister have that there are people who are willing and able to take on that important role?

In Committee, we will also explore the removal of auditors and the purposes for which data matching can be used. As the Bill stands, those purposes do not include the prevention and detection of maladministration and error, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington pointed out. We want to see that included in the Bill. We also want auditors to be covered by the Freedom of Information Act and will table amendments to that effect.

Does the Minister understand the concern that whistleblowers might feel uncomfortable approaching a private auditor that is employed by a local body or council? That is why we will propose that the audit committee should be named as a prescribed person in the Bill. I do not understand why the Government have resisted that. Perhaps the Minister will enlighten us.

My hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington highlighted concerns about corruption. I have read the important report that he mentioned. It is important that the new audit arrangements maintain independence, encourage probity, make appropriate provision for whistleblowers and ensure that it is possible to compare the relative performance of different authorities. He made wider points that we should explore further, including on the openness of council meetings, the use of commercial confidentiality and the role of scrutiny.

Perhaps the biggest disappointment with the Bill, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central and my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North said, is that the proposed audit arrangements do not provide for the changing way in which public services are being managed and provided. The proposed arrangements require each local authority and other local bodies and public sector bodies to conduct separate audits. However, shared services, community budgets and combined authorities all demonstrate that there is a shift towards much stronger partnership working by local authorities, including with Government Departments. It is therefore a missed opportunity that the Bill focuses too narrowly on individual local authorities, rather than on arrangements that would enable auditors to follow the public pound through the system.

Many hon. Members have spoken about the provisions on local authority publicity. We support the code of recommended practice on local authority publicity and believe that it is broadly sensible. However, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central said, there is no evidence to suggest that there are widespread breaches. No hon. Member has provided clear evidence of that today. The Government have taken no action to date under the code. Why not?

Clause 38 will allow the Secretary of State to issue a direction regardless of whether or not he thinks the authority is complying with the code. That is an extraordinary power grab that is worthy of the worst form of authoritarian government. The hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst revealed the true purpose of it. In seeking to support the Government, he listed a range of council publications, but gave no examples of where they had breached the code. The only common factor between the publications was that they were all from Labour-led councils. I know that in his heart he is a localist, as am I. Does he not agree that the way to deal with the problem is to fight the elections in those areas a little harder and to seek a Conservative majority, because it is clearly their political control that offends him, rather than the content of the magazines?

As for the wider controls on council publications, the Government suggest that local authority publications undermine the local press, but there is no evidence to prove that. Local papers are struggling for a variety of reasons. Indeed, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington said, sometimes there is a welcome synergy between local newspapers and council papers. The Conservative-led LGA has complained, rightly, that the proposals are ill considered and not based on evidence or proper consultation—points echoed in the House of Lords by the Conservative peer Baroness Eaton, and the Liberal Democrat Lord Tope.

In my area, I have received many representations from residents in the smaller towns and villages of east Northamptonshire for whom the Nene Valley News—published, despite my best efforts, by the true blue local council—is a communications lifeline. Some residents of those villages feel so strongly about the issue that they tell me they will consider voting for me and my party for the first time because of the impact the measures will have on general well-being in those villages. That is surely not what the Secretary of State thought would follow from his nonsense claims about pocket Pravdas, which he cannot substantiate. We hope the Government will see sense when we consider the Bill in Committee, and I hope we will have the support of the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole because, as she rightly said, this is using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.

When the Minister responds, will he say whether he accepts the comments made by his colleague, Baroness Eaton, a former leader of Bradford council, that the Bill centralises powers to the Secretary of State? Will he say how many local authorities in England publish magazines more than six times a year, and will he inform the House how many times the code of practice on local authority publicity has been breached? We are concerned that the third major area of the Bill on council tax referendums adds further uncertainty to council finances at a time when—as my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North said—councils face incredible challenges, and that that could lead to further reductions in essential local services.

Clause 39 means that councils may have to hold a referendum on council tax increases because of increases in levies due to agreements made in previous years or over which they have no control. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central said, we are deeply concerned about the retrospective nature of those changes—a point pressed on the Minister by the hon. Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole in another sensible intervention.

A year ago the Government signed city deals to improve transport infrastructure and boost local growth by allowing specific transport authorities to raise money for specific schemes. A year on, that agreement is being torn up. That undermines confidence in the whole city deal process across government, and harms the certainty on which sound financial planning and private investment relies. In short, it is damaging for our cities and our economy. As the LGA said:

“There is a risk of perverse outcomes that will put growth generating investment at risk”.

That is absolutely right, and I hope the Minister will address that issue and think again.

There are other complications. Authorities have no powers to reject levies, yet they are obliged to hold referendums because of large levy rises imposed on them by other bodies. The actions of levying bodies could lead to council tax referendums in some authorities, but not in neighbouring authorities because some levying bodies cross local authority boundaries. I hope the Government recognise the serious problems with those proposals.

The Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy stated:

“The entire burden of any referendum is actually placed on major preceptors and billing authorities despite the fact that they have no ability either to directly influence the amount of individual levies or require a body to reduce its levy as a result of a referendum.”

Does the Minister accept that including levies in the amount used to trigger a council tax referendum will jeopardise the city deals his own Government have approved? If a council tax referendum is lost and the levying body refuses to reduce its levy, what does he expect a local authority to do?

Despite serious problems with the Bill, I will end on a positive note. The Government propose to introduce two new elements to the Bill: on parish polls and transparency of council meetings. As the Minister would expect, the Government will have to answer the justifiable criticism—not least from our friends in the other place—that those proposals are being introduced rather late in the day and have not had the scrutiny given to the rest of the Bill. However, we support the intentions behind the proposals, and stand ready to play catch-up and assist with detailed scrutiny of those proposals in Committee. I sincerely welcome assurances that the Government will address the concerns raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central about combined authority boundaries. I hope we can do that through the Bill, but we welcome the assurance that another way will also be sought.

Finally, I thank the Minister for the helpful dialogue we have had since my appointment, particularly over the instruction to extend the scope of the Bill, and for the way he has facilitated contact with officials at his Department involved with the Bill. I hope that he is under no illusions about the many holes in the Bill, but also that he is in no doubt that the Opposition will approach Committee stage constructively.