Scrutiny guidance update
Happy New Year!
Well, 2018 came and went and you will have noticed that the scrutiny guidance is still conspicuous by its absence. Government undertook to the Select Committee that guidance would be published by the end of the calendar year.
I’m afraid I can’t provide any certainty about the likely publication date – we aren’t privy to any information from civil servants about the issue. As far as we’re aware the text has been finalised, but all of these kinds of publications have to go through a cross-Government review and signoff process, and we’re not sure whether this has yet commenced.
We do know that, across Government, large numbers of civil servants have been pulled off their normal duties to work on Brexit no-deal planning (on which we are publishing a separate blog) – whether this is the cause of the present delay, or whether it will cause a further delay, is something we don’t know either.
We are pressing on with organising our own seminar on the guidance, on 28 January, in the expectation that the guidance will by that point have been published (if not, we will rearrange). We have confirmed attendance from Government, from ADSO, from Lawyers in Local Government and from SOLACE – a draft agenda is now available. As you’d expect the seminar is proving popular so – despite the uncertainty over the publication date – we hope that you’ll join us. We have a fairly large venue but as ever space is limited, and we expect that once publication actually happens we will have a flurry of signups.
About the Author: Ed Hammond
Ed leads CfGS's work on devolution, transformation and on support to councils and other public bodies on governance and accountability.
