On 15 July, Shropshire Council was issued with a Best Value Notice from Whitehall. This notice is the strongest formal warning the government can issue before deciding whether to take over a council. The notice took the form of stern letter from Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government is demanding changes “at pace” in the way the council deals with its problems with finance, management, governance, scrutiny and culture. If the government is not satisfied that the council can meet the challenges quickly, it will appoint administrators to run the council and elected councillors will lose all control.
I would score the council overall as two-and-a-half out of five because it is not yet showing clear evidence of improvement in some areas.
Finance
3 out of 5 and improving. Recent council reports suggest that the relentless slide into financial catastrophe has been slowed, maybe even averted. The council has a new chief finance officer (Section 151 officer) with a refreshingly honest view of the council’s financial position. Reporting of the financial position to councillors is more frequent and more complete than under the previous administration. Forensic examination of the council’s accounts has identified areas of expenditure that weren’t taken into account during the last administration.
It is not yet clear whether the council has a grip on escalating adult social care and children’s care costs. Current projections suggest that there will be just £5m left in reserves at the end of the financial year. If care costs cannot be kept under control, the council will need to dip further into Exceptional Financial Support (EFS, see below) There is a large enough EFS facility to cover allow overruns for a year or two but that cannot go on indefinitely without the government stepping in.
The council may well have to repay £39m in grants to the Department of Transport for the North West Relief Road which was spent without an inch of road being built. The previous administration bought three shopping centres in Shrewsbury above market value and we have not seen accounts for that expenditure for a while.
I have no doubt that the current administration is determined to bring costs under control but we will only be able to judge its success at the end of the financial year next March.
Management
2.5 out of 5.
The council has a large bureaucracy to support its functions but I am not convinced that it is a effective, economic and efficient as it could be.
The historic problem at Shropshire Council has been weak council leaders and officers who thought they ruled the roost. Certainly that was the case during the last years of the Conservative administration, when executive officers seemed to have been running rings around councillors.
I am not certain how much this has changed. The recent problems over litter bins shows that the council management has struggled to get a grip on everyday essentials.
The council is about to appoint half a dozen new executive managers to try and get a grip on its performance and costs. It will be next summer before we know how effective they are. With the government hovering over the council, it is not clear it has that much time.
Governance and scrutiny
2 out of 5.
Council meetings are less adversarial and aggressive than they were under the Conservatives. Gone are the days when the council leader would rotate on her chair hooting at an opposition statement. Gone are the days when that sort of behaviour was ignored by the chair of council. The current chair is firm and follows the rules, but that is not where the council’s governance is failing.
Scrutiny, historically weak at the council, is weakening under the Lib Dem administration. A recurring pattern is emerging.
The decision to close the adult day care at Helena Lane was an ideal subject for scrutiny and I had expected it to go there. But the decision was made by cabinet without scrutiny, and that was before a 1,000 plus petition opposing the closure was debated by councillors. Ruth Houghton, the portfolio holder for social care was adamant. The decision had been made.
Shirehall is to be sold off against the recommendations of a scrutiny task and finish group. Not liking the group’s recommendations, the administration appointed a consultant to conclude that a sale of the site will provide much needed cash for the council. The recommendations of the task and finish group were totally ignored.
The closure of Meole Brace park and ride is a major decision that will lead to increased traffic in Shrewsbury town centre and reduced shopper footfall. It’s a decision that severely damages the Shrewsbury Movement Strategy. It should have gone to scrutiny but that wasn’t allowed.
I am very doubtful that the scrutiny function at Shropshire Council is effective despite Heather Kidd’s pledge that “scrutiny will mean scrutiny” under the new administration. Without effective scrutiny, the council will struggle to improve its governance.
Culture
4 out of 5.
By culture the government means officers working together and with their staff in a cohesive and constructive way. Councillors too. But there is a lot of history to unwind. The first Conservative leader of the council sacked all staff and would only re-employ them if they accepted lower wages. Staff were allowed to take generous redundancy even if they were essential to the council’s operation. Staff were transferred out of the council to a private company, ip&e and transferred back again when it failed. It has taken a long time to repair the damage to morale but at last Shropshire Council is beginning to look and feel like an effective, happy organisation under the new chief executive.
My main concern is that it is difficult to build teams when most of the council’s staff, for whom I have a high regard, work from home. Some seem more like contract workers or consultants.
Councillors work together more effectively than they did under the last administration. When the Conservatives were in charge, they insisted every committee was led by a Conservative. That is no longer the case. Political contest still exists but it is not the combative, sometimes abrasive debate that occurred under the last administration.
Overall evaluation
I can’t honestly assess Shropshire Council as scoring more than 2.5 out of 5 on Best Value criteria. The council’s biggest weakness is the way the leadership seeks to avoid scrutiny or overturns scrutiny conclusions. Scrutiny is an essential mechanism to ensure good democratic governance.
If Whitehall returns in a year’s time or sooner, the question will not simply be whether the council has balanced its books. It will be whether it has demonstrated that major decisions are being properly tested through effective scrutiny and transparent governance.
Exceptional Financial Support (EFS)
The government says it is concerned about the significant deterioration of the Council’s financial position since its first receipt of Exceptional Financial Support (EFS) in February 2025. In all, Shropshire Council has been given access to £192.8 million EFS, the largest government loan to a local authority in the country. Council tax payers will be paying off this debt, with interest, for decades.
