A group setting up how Bristol City Council will run after 2024 has pledged to be more transparent with monthly public meetings. Twelve councillors have been meeting regularly since May, when Bristol voted to switch from a mayor-run council to a committee model instead.
From the new year, the committee model working group will meet every month in public, revealing the debates which will shape how the council is run after the next local elections in May 2024. The pledge comes after criticism of the group meeting so far in private.
Labour Councillor Helen Holland, cabinet member for adult social care, chairs the working group responsible for setting up the new committee-run system. She gave details of the group’s latest work during a full council meeting.
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Cllr Holland said: “An enormous amount of background work has been taking place, with information gathering and hearing from expert witnesses, to shape our approach to the next stage of the process. These inputs have been invaluable to our work and to framing the questions we all need to be asking ourselves over the next year.
“This report very accurately reflects those areas to be worked through — and also hopefully reassures those who would love to believe that there’s a secret plan somewhere in a dusty drawer in this building, that the council is just waiting to pull out and reveal to an unsuspecting city.
“Learning from others and discussing in the working group, we have a much clearer picture of what needs to be put in place before May 2024, including beginning to scope possible numbers of committees and numbers of members on those committees. The stakeholder engagement that we’ve held has been very informative.
“The working group plans and welcomes the opportunity to hold our meetings in public from the new year onwards, with a meeting a month. Working together, the city will come up with a system that works for Bristol, that keeps the city moving forward with decisions being made in a timely way.”
The working group has heard evidence from the Local Government Association, the Centre for Public Scrutiny, Sheffield City Council which recently changed to the committee model, and Brighton City Council which also uses the committee model. Mike Jackson, the former chief executive of Bristol City Council, gave evidence a few days before he left his job.
In October, the working group faced questions about whether it was a “mistake” to hold their meetings up until now in private, behind closed doors, nor publish any minutes. But next year, a raft of public consultations is planned, to gather the views of Bristol on exactly how the council’s governance should change after May 2024.
Green Cllr Guy Poultney, who also sits on the working group, said: “People clearly care about how the city’s run, but they don’t engage because very often it doesn’t make the slightest difference to what the council does. Bristol chose to scrap the mayoral system, and it was a clear steer that people want change.
“The council needs to start listening, and listening sincerely, to what people want. Meetings need to be open, transparent and local. Councillors need to make decisions quickly and effectively and on behalf of the people they represent. We have to put these principles at the heart of the new system.
“Some of you might feel that what’s been presented in the council papers is light on design, and you’re right, it is. It’s light because we haven’t listened enough yet. A lot of people currently feel that the chance of what they have to say making the slightest difference to a decision being made is massively outweighed by the hoops they have to jump through.”
