Westminster Executive Meets Local Government ‘Culture’: Overview and Scrutiny in Three English County Councils

Abstract

The Local Government Act 2000 established the system of ‘overview and scrutiny’ in a majority of English local authorities. Ostensibly an attempt to transfer some of the features of the parliamentary/government decisionmaking process, the new system has not been able entirely to replace its predecessor. An analysis of three case-study county councils shows that they have adapted the overview and scrutiny system to existing political preferences, which owe much both to existing local government practice and to the prevailing cultures within the councils. Culture has influenced the structure of committees, their relationship to the executive, officer relationships, questioning, and use of the call-in function.

The Significance of Trust to the Adoption of E-Working Practices Within Local Government

“…Acknowledging, as Sandford (2006) highlights, the 'fluid 'blooming buzzing confusion' of traditions, beliefs and assumptions' which constitute the local authority culture, the study has highlightedthatthetrustisnotlimitedtotherelationshipbetweenmanagementandtheirworkers, butalsowithworkerstrustingtheirpeers.Thusthispapercontributestounpackingalittlefurther, specificallywithinthecontextofthelocalgovernmentorganisation,themagnitudeofandfactors requiringexaminationintheeffectingofculturalchange.…”

The (unexerted) competencies of municipal legislative financial committees in Brazil

“…Budgetary institutions are the formal rules that structure the budgetary and fiscal dynamics in a country. The literature has largely debated the design of these budget institutions, either at the central government level in presidential countries (e.g., Gabris & Nelson, 2013;Santiso, 2005), parliamentary countries (eg, Coulson, 2011;Coulson & Whiteman, 2012;Dacombe, 2011;Sandford, 2006;Wehner, 2003Wehner, , 2006Wehner, , 2007 or at the level of subnational governments (eg, Coulson 2011;Coulson & Whiteman, 2012;Dacombe, 2011). These institutions define the role and when (timing) each actor, for instance, executive and legislative branches, play their roles over budget dynamics.…”

“…Following the Local Government Act, several studies focused on how to transform the previous legislative commissions' role to the strong mayor model (e.g., Coulson, 2011;Coulson & Whiteman, 2012;Dacombe, 2011;Sandford, 2006). For instance, McGee (2002) presents one of the first committee feature-comparison study.…”