How best can we increase opportunities for communities to hold local public officials and representatives to account?
BEST to get SMART:- (Specific – Measurable – Achievable – Relevant – Timely).
This is a well used techinque in most businesses. Considering some public service and local councils are dealing with budgets equal to Ft100 index large companies it seem appropriate for there to be some clear SMART goals – that the citizens understand in holding the officials and representatives to account.
It is as important to explain the why things are being done in a certain way and to involve the public by ensuring there is a clear/fast/simply way of communicating with the official/representative responsible.
The question specifically mentions LOCAL PUBLIC officials/representative and this is what they must become, better skilled at dealing with their public. It is a downward slide when we see something that is dear to us all – like having our household waste emptied by lorries bearing the name of a council, but the emptied bin is left at the roadside for the resident to park away. Such a basic example gives us an idea of the kind of customer service, considerate service and confidence building service that all public officials need to install every day and every time they are doing their job.
1) Let us know what skills they have – All council and public body should be required to publish their people skills report each year. There should be an indicator scale showing improvement and outcomes.
2) Each employees should have a training and development plan, updated annually with the empoyee being involved in the process. The list of options, while relevant the their post, should allow for that person to do things of personal interest provide that can help improve the community.
3) Open access courses should be provided including; relationship building, facilitation in ways appropriate to diverse communities, dealing with problematic situations, developing customer service better techniques, active citizenship and volunteer motivation projects.
4) Locations where the public can meet their representative should be easy to access and WELCOMING.
5) There should be an automatic requirement that elected representative live in the area they represent. If it is a councillor then they should be required to live in the ward and if an MPs to live in the constituency.
6) Lords should be more representative of the public, with diversity an important consideration including the need to appoint/elect social housing tenants, gay and ***, young people and BME Lords. The same should apply to Government and Councils where each political party should demonstrate a commitment to have relevant representation in their candidate panels. It is accepted until a smart system is developed the actual election will be a matter for the public vote.
7) New Deal in Communities – Working Neighbourhood Fund – and Government Grants should all have a required percentage spend into people investment. This should be part of improving governance at a local level and the priority programmes should be clearly communicated to the public in explaining the reason on diversity, equality and new opportunities for individuals. The public should be able to challenge priorities.
8) NHS, PCTs, Universities, Public Transport Executives and Government “Quangos” should each have a requirement to have at least one board member elected from and by the public. This can include new and respectful opportunities for elected members to progress into such organisations. The “public posts” must have an executive salary and be time served, each representative having a three year term. The elected in each organisation should have a right to a training and development programme.
9) All Councillors, MPs and MEPs should have a peoples kitty to allocate to society development. In this the emphasis should be on the kitty holder being a part of mentoring the development opportunity which would enable the community to connect in a structured and understanding way with the representative.
10) Businesses in any Community should be allowed to invest in the community where they are placed, through a citizens list, getting business tax relief for the investment made. The list should be drawn up in terms of what activities, skills, resources and opportunities would be favourable. The community should be involved in deciding on the priorities – possibly electronic vote or newspaper postal slip. When the list is drawn up the Mayor of the area should be required to facilitate the “call to business” on investment. The businesses that take up the priority list options should get authorisation from the Council Executive to sent with their tax return enabling tax relief.
11) Volunteering is becoming extremely important in all communities. The local public officials and other representatives should be required to carry out 50 hours of volunteering per year. This should be logged on a system similar to the the V for Volunteering (young persons) V50 programme. The community should be given a day per year where there Town Hall become a celebration of community. The volunteers would be able to take part in networking and sharing of ideas during the day event – with free entry to the public.
12) Reclaim the Streets has become a topical issue. This is just one area where the local public officials and representatives can get involved to help groups that run such initatives (and other showcase projects in their locality). The connectivity will produce ownership by community and better respect would be fostered.
Not wishing to use unlucky number 13 might I go on to mention a few further thoughts:-
There are other ways to hold people and organisations to account. The problem is that in our society when we think about holding to account we mistake it with apportioning blame. It is important that the methods of holding to account are establised and for installing public understanding, showing why it is as important for the citizen to respect their elected representative as it is for the elected “ we know best” to convey their absolute commitment to listen, hear and deploy integrity.
Time served councillors and Mayors who are required to vacate after three terms. This needs to be brought in because we hear from some that generational councillorship has set into some places where family and friends have worked a selection systems that does not maintain the public trust from a wider community.
Elected councillors to vote by use of secret ballots instead of the show of hands method. This would help to avoid the critisism that the Cabinet or Committee Chairs are able to dominate the decision making.
Effective and efficient accountability that is truly customer (citizen) service focused. This should have a system that is fast and efficient in dealing with public challenges to the operations of the public services.
Better publicly connected bodies linking elected representatives to local public services. It is know there are many in community and voluntary groups who would step forward if they could believe their place on the council would enable them to have a reasonable chance of making a difference.
We also need to move away from the growing number of local participation awards, in some cases the Mayor is signing smart certificates to recognise volunteers who chalk up a set number of hours. What is required are meaningful, personal development programmes, supported by new opportunity bursaries. Then we will have SMART ways to value volunteers and other active citizens with photo opportunities of mutual respect for the elected.
This is my final contribution towards the Communities Empowerment White Paper and with this para let me make one more comment “why, in this calendar month, do we see hundereds of local councils having prospective councillors knocking on doors asking for votes and yet have any of those seeking to represent the people put in just a few minutes to contribute any idea to this forum on how communities can become empowered. Does this not say something is lacking in all political parties about how they are not investing well in their candidates and, of my goodness, with honesty should we not extend the same critisism to the lack of MP entries on these forum pages about such important questions.
I surely must agree with “cencin” who wrote “Unfortunately if something is not done soon, I think a whole generation of talent could be wasted” But what can be done? We are experiencing a generation that seems to prefer creating self-detached physical isolation. There is worry at all ages about society having dangers and by keeping away, going on line or making TV the main past-time the protection will be secured. This is part of what appears an apathy in voting – the alternative argument would be that people are stopping to go out into their community - unless they cannot avoid the journey.
Cars have become like shells of the tortoise. People can put the barrier between them and society. Inside their protective shell the person become animal like in disrespecting road signs, running red lights, taking up their speed counter and thinking the highway code is for learners only. This is a general thought but all road users will know of many days when safety is not seen to be any longer important. Conduct is of course not confined to cars, it applies across our communities and is the fabric of what needs repairing in terms of respect, responsibility, caring and consideration.
We need to build A Global Society based on Active Citizenship. Not all will participate, but there should be a multitude of opportunities in encouraging people to unlock their talent and to move away from the ever increasing blame culture. People need to be empowered to not think too much about what they can do tomorrow, but what they can truly achieve right now.
Reclaiming society, respect and responsibility is about ensuring citizens are not driven into creating detached isolation but instead has us all accountable, all of us, having the community wellbeing skills supported and invested in by government that enable us to understand and value living.
Yes, we must embrace creativity to build world class social capital. The current system demands we have the need for strong accountability, but we must ensure the burden of holding people to account does not stifle (hold back) new opportunties.
Quite simply there will never be a more important time to unlock the talent of our communities.