FOI request (FOIR-569010389)

Independence of Audit and/or Scrutiny Committee Chairs

Requested Wed 13 December 2023
Responded Tue 09 January 2024

The independence of scrutiny committees and audit committees has been identified in a number of Public Interest Reports as being an important factor in facilitating meaningful scrutiny and challenge within local authorities.

If your local authority does not have an overview and scrutiny system please answer the following in relation to the committee within your councils which has audit responsibilities.

If your local authority has an overview and scrutiny system please note that as audit committees are not formally treated as part of scrutiny it may be that they are treated differently in the council's constitution and policies.

Please confirm whether you are responding to this request in relation to scrutiny committees and/or audit committees.

If your local authority has an overview and scrutiny committee system, please confirm how many committees (excluding audit) are part of that system?

Policy on Selection and Appointment of Committee Chairs: Please provide the council's current policy on selection and appointment of scrutiny committee chairs and audit committee chairs. Please either copy and paste the section of council policy relating to the selection of scrutiny and audit committee chairs or provide a link and details of the section/sub-section within the document where we can locate this information.

Current Political Configuration of Committee Chairs/Conveners: Please provide a figure showing what percentage of current scrutiny and audit committee chairs (or conveners) are members of an opposition party to the main controlling party or controlling coalition.

Response

Hastings Borough Council has an Overview and Scrutiny committee and a separate Audit committee.

The Overview and Scrutiny committee is currently chaired by the majority opposition leader. This is currently not a constitutional requirement but Councillors have proposed a change to ensure the Chair is always from opposition. There is only 1 Overview and Scrutiny committee which reviews performance and financial data. They also have a work programme for the year to review areas of public interest.

The Audit committee Chair is always from the opposition.