Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Bill [HL]

My Lords, Amendment 27 would remove the link between the salary level and the designation of a local authority post as politically restricted. We certainly support the policy behind the Widdecombe rules, which preserve the visible political impartiality of senior local authority employees. In Communities in Control: Real People, Real Power, our 2008 White Paper, we acknowledged that, with regard to the link between salary and political restrictions, change to the Widdecombe rules is desirable. We are satisfied that the removal of what can be perceived as a blunt instrument will not undermine the important principle at stake. The remaining categories of officer that will remain subject to political restrictions will, in our judgment, continue to cover the most senior officers. That is broadly why I am sympathetic to the intention behind the amendment. It is clear that noble Lords feel strongly about the need for reform along the lines proposed in Amendment 27 to make it happen more quickly, and that there is cross-party support for this. I can therefore put the noble Lord out of his misery by telling him that I will take the amendment away and reconsider it. I know that noble Lords will appreciate that, as always with these matters, there are technical drafting points at issue. There would, for example, need to be knock-on amendments to Sections 3 and 3A of the 1989 Act, which refer back to the provisions that would be removed by Amendment 27. I will come back to noble Lords on that point at Third Reading, so the noble Lord can regard that as a real victory. I am afraid that I cannot give as much satisfaction on Amendments 28 and 29, as they are much more complex. They address the relationship between being a local authority officer and a local authority member. We have talked a lot about how we want to encourage people to stand as councillors and take an active role in representing their community. Indeed, the burden of the suggestions made by the Councillors Commission related to promoting the role of councillors and so on. However, we need to be a little cautious about the amendments. Neither of the proposals in Amendments 28 and 29 was recommended by the commission after its very comprehensive investigation into this topic, and I can give reasons why that might be the case. Amendment 28 would permit officers who are not subject to political restrictions to remain working for an authority while simultaneously seeking election to it. At present, the legal position is that if such people have political ambitions or a desire to offer their services to the public as a councillor, they are free to seek election to every council in the country besides the one that employs them. However, if they think that the best capacity in which they can serve their own council is as a councillor, they are asked to give up their employment before accepting nomination for election. In effect, one has to choose whether one wants to serve as an elected member or as an employed official. If an employee has a realistic chance of being elected to the authority for which he or she works, the position is not entirely different from the one that applies to someone who has already been elected. The conflict of interest already starts to apply. The candidate will inevitably, and indeed in some respects quite properly, be looking ahead to the long term and to carrying out the duties of a councillor. From a practical point of view, the period between being elected as a member of a council and having to resign one’s employment will necessarily be very short, as Amendment 28 recognises. A person would be unable to serve any notice period. There are therefore big issues such as future income and time in this situation. Even if an employee has no realistic chance of being elected, there are grounds for objecting to permitting retention of employment by the council while standing for election. The possibility is opened up of candidacies that might be perceived as undermining the relationship between employer and employee. What if voters believed that employees were standing for election against sitting councillors as part of a strategy in pay negotiations? I am afraid that that might undermine confidence in the democratic process. Amendment 28 would not in fact permit council employees to stand for election to the council by which they are employed; it would remove the statutory prohibition but whether a person was subject to any restrictions would then be a matter of contract and employment law. That opens up the possibility of different provisions applying across the country or indeed within the same authority. It raises the prospect of party political considerations interfering or being perceived to interfere in decisions by existing councillors as to whether a council employee should be permitted to stand for election. So while I applaud the sentiment of seeking to widen the category of person who is able to offer their services as elected members of authorities, to include existing employees of local authorities is fraught with practical problems. Amendment 29 seeks to allow local authority members to take up paid employment with the local authority they used to be a member of just 12weeks after leaving office. Presently, the period is 12 months. I ask noble Lords to consider very carefully the effect of such a serious reduction in the interval between leaving office and taking up employment. On the most practical level, most posts in local authorities take at least 12 weeks to fill. The effect of Amendment 29 would be that councillors who had lost their seat would be able to put in their application for employment by the council from which they had just been unseated virtually before the ballot papers were counted. That officers of a local authority are fairly appointed on merit is a fundamental and legitimate expectation that the citizen has of those working on their behalf in their local authority. The 12-month buffer gives citizens and officers confidence that the former local authority member has attained employment through ability and honest competition, and helps him or her to be free of the spectre of having used some undue influence in winning the post. Simply put, I remain unpersuaded that there is any substantial reason for change, especially change that might damage confidence in the performance of the local authority. I am unaware of any evidence that the existence of the 12-month buffer period is acting as a disincentive for able people to put themselves forward as candidates for election to local authorities, or that reducing it to just three months would have any appreciable effect on increasing the willingness of people to come forward. So I do have a problem with the amendment. However, I hope that is overcome by my response to the first of these amendments, which I am sure the noble Lord will take in very good part.