Wednesday 15 February 2023
General Update
Sir
I am pleased to present my annual update on the work of the Scrutiny Management Committee.
The Committee agreed early in this new term to reaffirm the importance of holding regular public hearings as a central feature of our work, as required in our mandate. This resolve was reinforced following the acceptance by the Assembly of the Government Work Plan. It is very important that Committees are effectively scrutinised regarding their progress against this Plan. I am therefore delighted to report that nine public hearings were held in 2022. Hearings with Committees for Health & Social Care, Policy & Resources and Education, Sport & Culture are scheduled to take place in March & April and this cycle will continue in 2023.
The Committee also resolved early in this term to bring in more members of the Assembly as Panel members to assist on these hearings, again as set out in our mandate which says: To promote and facilitate the participation in scrutiny of the widest possible range of States' members and persons independent of the States. We believe this is beneficial both to those members who have kindly participated thus far and to the SMC who are able to make use of the different talents and interests amongst Members of this Assembly and the wider community.
I would like to thank all our guest Panel Members to date, both States Members and indeed other members of the public, who have assisted the Committee. I would encourage all eligible States Members to offer their support to sit on public hearing panels or 'task and finish' review panels. I can also confirm that my Committee will continue to broaden the participation of suitably experienced people in political scrutiny throughout the remainder of this term.
Following the significantly increased autonomy and delegated authority which was granted by this Assembly to the Policy & Resources Committee in 2021 to facilitate the implementation of the GWP, the SMC established its Government Work Plan Scrutiny Panel designed to specifically focus on the progress made against the priorities identified in the Government Work Plan. The SMC believes that it was appropriate that this change to provide significantly increased autonomy and delegated authority was matched by a corresponding increase in the level of ongoing Parliamentary scrutiny throughout this political term and hence this Panel was formed to meet this need. I wish to thank Deputies St Pier and Gabriel for providing their input to sit as Members of the Panel. It is intended that the membership of this panel will evolve over the term.
The SMC has continued to livestream its hearings, and this has been very well received. The Committee believes it has already proven particularly valuable in encouraging wider public engagement in the work of government, making it far more accessible. This assertion is backed up by the evidence which shows that live streamed hearings are viewed consistently by many more people than were able to previously attend in person. The livestream also creates a useful resource for politicians, the media, and members of the public. It is our intention therefore to continue to livestream hearings wherever possible.
In addition to Committee hearings, we carefully considered and scoped a number of topics for potential review. As Members are aware the SMC are currently undertaking a significant review of the work of Agilisys, focussing on performance and value for money. It is intended that this review will be completed in the second half of 2023. Recent events have confirmed the view of the Committee that this area requires scrutiny. In order to deliver this review effectively the Committee has appointed a panel of members with very significant private sector expertise across a variety of information technology disciplines and I would like to thank those people for committing their time and energy to assist the Committee in this essential work. The panel comprises myself, Deputy John Dyke, Mr John Davidson, Ms Anita Kilby, Mr Mike Ozanne and Ms Camilla Smillie.
My Committee has also recently announced that it will conduct a review of Island Wide Voting, to be undertaken with representatives of SACC. The Review will evaluate the success of the changes made and it will consider the demonstrable and perceived advantages and disadvantages of the Island Wide Voting election process. It will seek public feedback from the community and the douzaines. The review will feed into the Reshaping Government review (Priority 4 of the Government Work Plan). For the avoidance of doubt, it will not propose any changes to the method of electing States' Members for the 2025 election.
In the last year the Legislation Review Panel has continued with its work diligently under the chairmanship of Deputy Dyke. Since the beginning of this political term some Members of this Panel have expressed a view that they believe the amount of legislative scrutiny undertaken in Guernsey could and should be increased. The LRP Members recognise that some progress has been made in the machinery of government changes over the last twenty years. Nevertheless, some LRP Members believe further additional steps should be taken to strengthen this essential parliamentary function. It is acknowledged however, that the current system, although certainly lacking in resources when compared to alternative approaches undertaken elsewhere, is a relatively speedy and low-cost approach to providing meaningful legislative scrutiny. The current Panel Members are keen to ensure that this matter will be considered during the reshaping of government review and the SMC will fully engage with that process.
In any complex public service organisation, financial scrutiny is an essential part of the assurance process. This is the role of the SMC's Financial Scrutiny Panel, which involves reviewing the Annual Accounts and considering the work of Internal Audit in order to determine areas which might benefit from further investigation. This work has continued in 2022. Much of this work is by its very nature not visible externally but it remains an important contribution to the overall accountability of public services to the local population.
Nevertheless, I consider this to be an area that requires further strengthening and to that end my committee will be drawing up proposals to submit to the P&R reshaping government workstream which will consider the re-introduction of a separate Public Accounts Committee, served by the existing Scrutiny staff resource.
I would also make one further point on financial scrutiny - when replying to my comments on the 2022 budget in November of last year, Deputy Helyar stated "Communication is very much a theme of the work that went into the Budget, and indeed communication is a theme of what many of the Members have just said. Indeed, Deputy Burford has just mentioned updates. I am very happy to commit to such updates as are necessary to keep Members informed - and if I am not keeping up with that, then remind me" (TUESDAY, 2nd NOVEMBER 2021) so I will take this opportunity to remind Deputy Helyar that these regular updates have not taken place and therefore I would repeat my previous plea for regular financial updates to be provided to the Assembly which are surely now more important than ever.
Sir, I thank members for their attention and will be happy to answer questions.
