Moving to four-yearly elections, and committing to behaviour change are key recommendations to the council following a recent LGA corporate peer challenge.
These will be discussed by the council’s cabinet next week (Cabinet, 21 February), along with agreeing an action plan. (Item 5, 21 February 2023).
Peer challenges are not inspections but are improvement focussed and tailored to meet individual Councils’ needs. The LGA offers all local authorities the opportunity to participate in a Corporate Peer Challenge (CPC) every 4 years or so as part of its sector-led improvement programme.
The challenge was undertaken in October 2022 and involved officers and councillors from other councils and LGA advisers talking to over 160 council staff, councillors, local people and businesses.
Cllr Stephen George, leader of the council, says: “We are grateful to the LGA and peers for carrying out this challenge and to everyone who participated. Peer challenges are not inspections. They are improvement focussed, and the findings and recommendations - which do not come as a surprise - have allowed us to create a strong action plan to improve the council further.
“Peers found that the Council is self-aware and has huge potential with many positive attributes and assets both within the Council and city, including the strong community ethos, ambitious regeneration projects and sound financial management.
“However, they also found that the approach to leadership, governance and decision making is impacting the council’s capacity to progress and that there needs to be a more effective councillor and officer working relationship and an organisational commitment to behaviour change underpinned by constitutional changes.
“Changing our constitution to allow better and quicker decision making and addressing behaviour is something that has long been spoken about and the recommendations and action plan give us the springboard to now do something about it, along with addressing inequalities and modernising systems.”
The nine recommendations are as follows:
Constitutional review - Complete and implement your constitutional review as a matter of urgency.
Organisational commitment to behaviour change - Underpin your constitutional changes with a clear organisational and visible commitment to behaviour change. It will be important to ensure that the councillor development and leadership development programmes are aligned with the council’s agreed values and behaviours, supporting a more effective councillor/officer working relationship.
Election cycle - Implement the proposed boundary review and, as part of this, consider changing the election cycle to whole council elections every 4 years.
Partnerships - Re-engage partners across public, private and voluntary sectors on Southend 2050. Establish how the Council will work in partnership to deliver shared outcomes for the city.
Prioritisation - Ensure agreed priorities are aligned to resources and capacity. Provide more clarity on the link between strategic priorities and delivery.
Communication - Communicate and engage with all councillors, officers and residents on agreed priorities to help build a shared understanding. Be clear about the difficult decisions required to deliver a balanced medium term financial position.
Modernise your council operating model, systems and processes - This will help support the required pace of change and transformation. In addition to modernising governance and decision-making processes (as outlined above), the Council needs to ensure business needs are driving the operating model and that the Council has the capacity to deliver this. This includes work to implement the new data strategy and Corporate Data systems (including HR systems)
Develop a consistent plan to address inequalities and disparities across the city and its neighbourhoods - The Council should challenge itself as to whether the thematic nature of the Corporate Plan and Southend 2050 will address the entrenched inequalities and deprivation within some of Southend-on- Sea’s localities and neighbourhoods.
Strengthen your voice and influence for the benefit of the City and South Essex in the wider regional agenda - It will be important for the Council to ensure it continues to exercise sufficient voice and influence on ASELA in relation to the devolution agenda.