Annual Assembly of Standards Committees

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Annual Assembly of Standards Committees
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Standards and partnerships

• Steve Barrow, Director of Standards, Standards
  for England
• (chair)
• Dr Stephen Brookes, Manchester Business School
• Carole Pattison, Interim Assistant Chief
  Executive (performance),
• Manchester City Council

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Session outline

• Provide an overview of the importance of
  standards in partnerships
• Why Standards for England has developed this
  partnership protocol
• How the protocol was developed and who was
  involved
• Manchester City Councils perspective
• Putting the protocol into practice Discussion

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Session aim

• For you to contribute to our partnership work by
  having your say

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Strategic objective 1

• Be a respected strategic regulator adding value
  to local governance

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We will

• Identify and deal with risks to local democracy
• Safeguard local standards
• Champion accountability in local government
  partnerships

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What is important to us

• Public trust and confidence
• Confusion affects public confidence
• Where public money is being spent, need to
  achieve
• Clear decision making
• Consistent standards for partners

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Why did Manchester get involved/support the
research?
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Background

• Our partnership
• Relationships within the partnership
• Relationships between Manchester Board and the
  Council
• Role of members in supporting this development

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Lessons learnt from participation

• Discussed issues rather than assumed compliance
• Highlighted issues not previously considered
• Gave more priority to values and behaviours
• Better understanding between partners

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Consultation and comments

• Financial probity
• Guidance on key behaviours and assessment of them
  in practice
• Scrutiny role of standards/overview and
  scrutiny committees
• The protocol should underpin the delivery of
  better outcomes

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Why a protocol?

• Good governance enables an authority to pursue
• its vision effectively as well as underpinning
  that
• vision with mechanisms for control and
• management of risk
• CIPFA SOLACE Good Governance Framework

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Why a protocol?

• Guidance
• Preventative intervention
• Level playing field between partners

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How will the protocol be used?

• Hopefully not at all
• Should be used as tool to aid better partnership
  working
• Role of our standards committee
• It could become part of our Registration scheme
• It should strengthen the accountability and
  governance arrangements of the partnerships

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Benefits?

• Accountability
• Governance
• Transparency/communication
• Trust

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Developing standards for partnership working
Reflecting values
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Session aims

• Background why, what, who and how
• What the protocol aims to achieve
• Emerging themes and issues
• Introduce the values and behaviours
• Challenges of Implementation

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Background

• What?
• Governance is concerned with systems and
  processes and culture and values
• To develop an agreed protocol of values and
  behaviours to enable more effective governance of
  partnerships to enhance public delivery

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Background

• Why?
• Partnerships provide opportunities for innovative
  delivery but have real challenges
• Differences in governance and accountability
  arrangements exist
• There is inconsistency in codes of conduct

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Background

• Who?
• Manchester City Council agreed to host
• Engaged representatives of partnerships across
  the city
• The aim is to develop a protocol outlining values
  and behaviours that will be applicable nationally
  but capable of being tailored to local
  circumstances

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How Identification of significant and
community/contractual partnerships
Action Learning
Online Questionnaire
Qualitative Data
Protocol
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What the protocol aims to achieve
The Core Values and Underpinning Behaviours
should be able to describe
What the partnership feels like
How they apply across Partnerships
How will they improve governance
How they support public confidence in leadership
and place shaping
How they contribute to joint working
How will they resolve differences and disputes
Enabling the Partnership to Enhance Delivery to
the Public
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Emerging themes and issues

• Themes
• Valuing all contributions (but taking account of
  scale of responsibilities)
• Open and simple decision making structures
• Touch where it fits right people, right
  places, right actions
• Stewardship for the greater good
• Align at all levels of partnership working

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Emerging themes and issues

• Issues
• Diversity of membership need to enhance
  equality
• Consistency of approach
• Not a level playing field with lack of challenge
• Overlaps of priorities and actions
• Needs a sense of realism as to what agencies
  can deliver
• Perception of Local Authority and partners as
  master-servant

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An example ....

• How do you define equality?
• Diversity is about the community that we live in.
  We expect
• governance to be representative but not just
  equality in
• terms of BME or gender but also in relation to
  access to
• engage
• Community representative on both strategic and
• community partnerships

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What are the values?
Achieve intended outcomes
Value and respect each other
Public interest
Building partners capacity
Aligning strategies and networks
Act ethically
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Example behaviours 1

• Share resources
• Monitor use of resources
• Encourage ideas and innovation
• Decision making consistent and transparent
• Committed to continuous improvement
• Improvement claims based on evidence

Achieve intended outcomes
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Example behaviours 2

• Whistle blowing mechanism agreed and support
  provided
• Promote no blame culture
• Support the challenge of poor behaviour
• Use appropriate and simple language
• Democratic accountability
• Dialogue open and transparent
• Declare (and address) conflicts of interest
• Purpose of meeting is made clear
• Be objective

Act ethically
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Challenges of implementation

• Plethora of organisations with differing
  cultures, aims, objectives and ways of working
• Moving beyond the so what?
• How do we know the protocol is being used and is
  working?
• Building in democratic accountability
• Building trust and legitimacy

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How will we know it is working?

• There is a commitment to values through the
  feel of the partnership
• Appropriate behaviours are being displayed by
  action as well as words
• Partners routinely use the principles of the
  protocol but without ticking its boxes

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Final word

• As one respondent stated
• It is not just about ticking the box of
  getting (the
• right people) around the table
• The following advice was offered
• Ensure fit between diversity and commissioning
• Engage all representatives with the MCC
  Partnership 3 year plan
• Take time to explain ..................

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Your thoughts
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Question 1

• How should the protocol be put into practice?

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Question 2

• How can we make sure it does not sit on a
  shelf?

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Question 3

• What role could standards committees have in
  supporting the protocol?

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Question 4

• What, if any barriers do you think there will be
  to the protocol being effective?
• What can we do, if anything, to overcome them?
• What benefits, if any, do you think the protocol
  can bring?

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Thank you

• Fringe meetings start at 18.15.
• The conference dinner starts from 19.15 with a
  short drinks reception in Hall 3

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Standards and partnerships

• Steve Barrow, Director of Standards, Standards
  for England
• (chair)
• Dr Stephen Brookes, Manchester Business School
• Carole Pattison, Interim Assistant Chief
  Executive (performance),
• Manchester City Council

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Annual Assembly of Standards Committees