As West Northamptonshire and North Northamptonshire unitary councils register their first full year in existence, James Smith looks at the progress made since the demise of the ill-fated county council.
Having worked in local government finance for a number of years in Northamptonshire, the first anniversary of the creation of West and North Northamptonshire councils is a landmark date. It represents the first year of a new beginning in the county to join up its local authority services, providing an opportunity to be more efficient and remove the silo working of the past and to improve the way local public services are delivered.
This feels the right time for a period of reflection, remembering the challenges that I and other members of the finance team had in the planning stages of local government reorganisation. All the while, still managing to keep the lights on in our host councils (the issues didn’t go away), through to working in the new organisation, and ensuring it had sound financial controls, reporting and governance in place.
The reorganisation was recognised as “the biggest change facing local government in Northamptonshire in over 40 years”. Following an adverse Best Value inspection of the county council in 2018, the Secretary of State granted a locally led invitation for the principal authorities in Northamptonshire to develop proposals for unitary authorities that would be “right for the communities and people they serve”. The proposals had to demonstrate an improvement in local government and service delivery across the area, be based on a credible geography and command a good deal of local support.
A local joint proposal was developed and consulted on that resulted in government legislation being eventually passed to replace the seven districts and county council, and create a West Northamptonshire unitary council serving the areas of Daventry, Northampton and South Northants, and a North Northamptonshire unitary authority serving Wellingborough, Kettering, Corby and East Northants.
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Stabilising the financial position
Having worked in the county council prior to my current role within West Northamptonshire Council (WNC), the years prior to local government reorganisation were relentless. There was a considerable amount of work undertaken to stabilise the council’s once precarious financial position, working with government-appointed commissioners on governance and reporting improvements, reviewing and bringing back in house a complicated back-office shared service arrangement, turning around a loss-making arm’s length company, and even setting up a Children’s Trust following a statutory direction from the Department for Education. And this all took place while, like all local authorities, we were responding to a worldwide pandemic.
During the unitary planning stages and the lead up to vesting day, it is worth remembering that no two unitarisations are the same. While you can learn from other finance colleagues who have gone through similar experiences, advising broadly which areas to pay attention to and what the potential pitfalls are to avoid, there was still an element of uncertainty and trepidation from the people involved because there were a lot of new demands placed on them.
However, the unitarisation was guided by the inhouse “Future Northants” programme team that provided direction and management, with a governance framework that utilised subject matter experts and senior officers overseen by joint chief executives and elected members. There were hundreds of actions that required reviewing, with different approaches considered and then reaching agreement on the best course of action (or the most pragmatic) to ensure “day-one readiness” and the creation of two sustainable organisations.
It’s worth remembering that no two unitarisations are the same. While you can learn from other finance colleagues who have gone through similar experiences, there was still an element of uncertainty and trepidation from the people involved because there were a lot of new demands.
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Pandemic impacting progress
Covid had impacted the amount of transformational activity we could progress, and many things we wanted to get on the front foot were not possible, so the programme focused on a “safe and legal” operation from day one.
Shadow s151 officers were in place for each new unitary to lead a virtual team of finance staff, making the best use of skills, experience and capacity throughout all the existing organisations, while the legacy s151s focused on the closure of each authority.
The county council finance team was key to much of the financial planning for both new unitaries, as we took the lead on budget and balance sheet disaggregation, treasury management and the provision of key support to the 2021/22 budget setting and the medium term financial planning process.
There was a real collaborative effort from all involved during the shadow phase to set the first ever unitary budgets, made even more challenging as no new management teams were in place for the unitaries at this time, only the statutory officers.
By March 2021, both budgets were set and approved, and all members of the finance team were aware of which council they would be working for in the future, and I could focus on my new role within WNC.
Matching skills and experience
I wanted to give the finance team as much certainty as possible, so a priority was setting out what the new WNC finance team structure should look like, and mapping across the finance staff transferring, trying to match the skills and experience to the new job roles. Team members were briefed on the vision for the council and the finance department, the culture that we wanted to cultivate, and the design principles for the new finance structure. After this meeting, the draft structure was informally shared, and comments were encouraged to check that people were comfortable in their allocated roles and the structure of the team was sound.
Comprehensive feedback was received from the team, and this was incorporated into a revised structure. We received a number of positive comments due to the early engagement and the shape of the new structure, and were able to accommodate where people had asked to work in a different department. This process was important as the team were able to contribute to the planning process and then could start to focus on their new roles.
Throughout the year a significant amount of time was taken on working through legacy issues, budget and disaggregation anomalies and responding to queries that predated the new authorities. Audit work was another priority activity. There was six sets of financial accounts (yes, six!) that still needed to be closed from the legacy authorities that were all considered together, creating a concertina effect, with lots of interaction with external audit colleagues.
A finance training programme was rolled out to ensure staff were comfortable with using the financial system and understood their financial management responsibilities.
The detailed budget build continued to be reviewed and refined through a zero-basing exercise to reflect how WNC managers wanted to deliver their services, which meant the budgets started to settle and we were able to report a balanced year-end financial forecast.
We decided early on that the 2022/23 budget setting would be a collaborative effort. We used a series of “star chamber” sessions that brought together finance, members and senior officers to review the health of each directorate budget, discuss issues and opportunities to pinpoint areas of investment, and to formalise efficiency plans for future years. This process enabled a widespread organisational understanding of the budget, which was subsequently approved by full council in February 2022.
Looking back over the last few years, the weeks and months have flown by in a blur. Upon reflection, perhaps this is not surprising considering what has been achieved in Northamptonshire, and the sheer amount of change that has taken place. I look forward to continuing the journey in the future.
James Smith is assistant director of finance and strategy (deputy s151) at West Northamptonshire Council.
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