Leader’s guide: Leading good governance and assurance

This short guide aims to help new leaders and elected mayors to consider where to focus and what questions to ask as leaders of good governance and assurance. We hope that it may also be a useful reminder for more established leaders.

All elected members are ‘charged’ with the governance of their local authority.  They are responsible for determining policy and for overseeing the way that the organisation is run.

The council leader or elected mayor has a particularly important leadership role for all aspects of the council’s corporate governance.  In an authority with the leader or mayor and cabinet governance model their cabinet also shares in this responsibility. They need to assure themselves, their colleague councillors and their communities that the council’s governance arrangements are comprehensive and effective.

By proactively seeking assurance that governance is effective – and by testing the validity and reliability of that assurance – leaders can have confidence that their council is ‘doing the right thing’. 

By the example that leaders set, other members, officers and wider stakeholders will see that good governance is prioritised in their authority. 

Some questions for you to consider:

a)   How do you foster a climate which encourages accountability and which promotes high standards of member and officer behaviour?  Having codes that promote good behaviour and which identify when breaches of integrity have occurred, take you only so far.

b)   How do elected members, the council’s staff, the wider community and other stakeholders know that you prioritise ethics, justice and fairness in the authority’s governance and challenge poor conduct if it arises?

c)   Do you – and other group leaders – meet regularly with the whips and the monitoring officer to review standards of behaviour, receiving formal advice from your monitoring officer, so as to deal proactively with any inappropriate behaviour at an early stage?

d)   Do you ensure that members of your group engage with all training and development provided by the council, and do you encourage other group leaders to do the same?

A culture of openness, transparency and disclosure should make it easy for residents, businesses and the media to hold the council to account. Clear intelligible information about how the council conducts its business, should be readily available to the public.  Only in a few instances should information be withheld from the public - usually to protect individual privacy or commercially confidential matters. 

Some questions for you to consider:

a)   How easy is it for residents to find information about decisions being made in your council?

b)   Is council information sometimes cloaked in obscure language or within a bewildering array of data?

c)   Are there opportunities for the public to ask questions, in writing or orally, at council meetings, and if so are people offered relevant advice on how to do so?

d)   Are the reports on which decisions are made available to the public?  Do they include the full range of relevant options, the advice of officers and the rationale for the decision? Are decisions made transparently?  Are they informed by evidence and the written advice?

e)   Are the right issues addressed in an open, inclusive and fair way? In councils with the committee system, do the committees cover the full range of challenges that are faced locally? Where the leader/ mayor and cabinet model applies, do all non-executive councillors have opportunities to oversee and scrutinise decisions?

f)    Do members of the cabinet engage constructively with scrutiny (where applicable) and with the audit committee (as appropriate)?

g)   Does your council’s constitution allow for independent voices to be heard – for example at audit and/or scrutiny committees?

h)   Is the depth and breadth of the audit committee’s inquiries adequate?

i)    Does the council engage effectively with all communities in your area and enable them to contribute to the development of policies and strategies as well as to suggest improvements in governance?

No council is perfect, and the best councils will have a good – and openly shared – understanding of their areas for development. Access to good quality performance information will help you understand how your council is performing in comparison with others.

As well as encouraging and enabling that self-awareness in the council, the leader should be aware of their own strengths and areas for development.  Having a mentor and developing networks outside of the council are both great ways to do this.  The LGA can help you to find a political mentor and to develop connections within and outside your own party/ group networks.

Some questions for you to consider:

a)   Is your council improving, declining or coasting?  It may be improving based on past performance, but are others, including neighbouring councils, outperforming your authority?

b)   Do you use the council’s Annual Governance Statement as a tool for honest reflection and action planning for improvement?  Is it informed by robust evidence on the authority’s compliance with relevant legislation, regulations and standards?

c)   Do elected members have a clear understanding of any material areas for improvement identified by internal or external audit?

d)   Do you hold senior officers accountable for good governance – for example the provision of good quality, timely advice, and evidence of robust internal controls?

e)   Does your council fully engage with regional and national opportunities for peer support, review and challenge?

f)      How sustainable is your current pattern and standard of service provision?   Are your mandated duties (such as child safeguarding and/ or support for homelessness) crowding out your capacity to deliver on other council priorities?

Given the pace of change in local authorities and their wider environments it is essential that the organisation continues to learn and develop.  A ‘learning organisation’ is an organisation where people, at all levels, continuously learn and enhance their capabilities. 

Governance involves critique and challenge.  However, some councils can fall into a trap where mistakes, errors and failings are enveloped in an atmosphere of negative and personalised fault finding.  This can happen between members, between members and officers, as well as within the officer cadre.  The challenge is to encourage personal and team accountability, rather than focus on how to identify people to blame for when things inevitably go wrong. 

The leader’s role includes:

• being a learner yourself, setting an example for others
• facilitating a supportive learning environment
• encouraging and empowering measured risk-taking and innovation
• promoting knowledge sharing and continuous improvement.

Some questions for you to consider:

a)   Do members feel able to speak up in their Groups to report their concerns? 

b)   Are the council’s whistleblowing channels effective?

c)   Do members have honest conversations with senior officers, in which they are able to give you robust advice, even when it may be difficult to hear?

d)   What happens when mistakes occur – are failures ‘owned’ and used as an opportunity for learning or is the focus instead on blame?

e)   Do the council’s officers take part in continuing professional development? 

We are surrounded by risks, threats, concerns, issues and opportunities in everything we do, personally, professionally and organizationally.  Senior political and managerial leaders have a key personal and collective role in the identification and management of these risks, issues and so on.  It is also critical that they have assurance that these matters are being identified, acted upon and managed.

Some questions for you to consider:

a)   Do you know what are the biggest risks that your communities face, and do you know what are your council’s biggest risks?  The latter will probably include both service-based risks and risks to the wider organisation, including financial risks.

b)   Does your council have a ‘risk culture’ in which risks are routinely identified, understood, considered and appropriately mitigated? 

c)   Are your reserves and budget contingencies adequate?Not all risks can be managed, and where this isn’t possible it may be necessary to make financial provision.

d)   Is there an understanding of the council’s cumulative risk?  Do you understand how this is changing? How close to breaking point is the camel’s back?

e)   Do elected members and officers have a similar appetite for risk?

f)    Does risk and its consequences appropriately inform members’ decisions?

This guide gives more information about the ways in which you, the wider council and residents can gain assurance of your authority’s services and of its corporate governance.