COSLA - Scotland's untouchables ?

Some of my recent musings had me wondering about the hinterland of COSLA [the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities], the organisation which claims to be the 'voice' of the 32 Councils in Scotland.


I offered an illustration of how COSLA's response to government proposals on specific equality duties was, on the one hand, reactionary and defensive, and on the other hand, how the COSLA response was at odds with quite a few responses submitted by individual Councils.

I did offer COSLA a chance back then to explain just how their bell could toll for 32 Councils when my analysis showed it [their bell] was cracked.  Back then I had zero, zilch, nada, nic, rien, faic, lutho and nihilum of an answer.  You'll be flabbergasted to know that remains the case.


As well as offering COSLA the chance to explain their cracked bell, I offered my analysis and findings to Nicola Sturgeon, Cabinet Secretary in the glorious government of Scotland and who occasionally can be reminded she has responsibility for equalities.  I suggested:

I have conducted a simple analysis of what the 22 councils submitted directly to government. Amongst a number of patterns and trends, one strong pattern which emerges is that generally speaking Councils are in favour of using a template in local government for reporting on employment data so that comparison and benchmarking can take place. COSLA counsels against comparisons being made.

In broad terms there appears, as I have suggested, to be a dislocation between what COSLA is saying on behalf of Councils and what Councils themselves are saying direct to government.  When your officials are analysing the response to the consultation on the regulations for the specific duties, it thus begs the question – who is COSLA speaking for and just how much weight is government attaching to the COSLA submission? I look forward to your thoughts on this.

Clear? Straightforward? I thought so.  Nicola's answer?

"The Scottish Government has not sought clarification on the provenance of the COSLA response or any other response. If you would like to know more about how COSLA operates and who it speaks for you may wish to contact COSLA directly."

A big kiss-off from the Cabinet Secretary.  

a big kiss-off from the Cabinet Secretary

In the same missive to the Cabinet Secretary I also suggested that the culture and practice of consultation left a lot to be desired, as there appeared to be no checks done on what the provenance was of any of the submissions.  Who was claiming to speak for who, and how much was a response the work of one person or did it genuinely reflect the views of an organisation and its constituency?  This is an issue addressed to some extent by the Westminster government and respondents are asked to provide some indicators on the provenance of their submissions.


This would add accountability, improve transparency, reduce the democratic deficit.  Good things to reach for ?  I offered Nicola the case that :

In a wider context this ....... does ...... reveal the need for some modification and modernisation of the government’s routine approach to consultations. I would urge consideration being given to the profiling of respondents being expanded slightly beyond its present form to capture some measurable sense of provenance of the responses being submitted.

For instance, has the Board or governing body of an organisation submitting a response formally signed off that response?

If the organisation is a public body, has the response been the subject of internal and/or external consultation with relevant stakeholders? If so, can some quantification of those actively involved in shaping a response be undertaken and recorded?

If the organisation is a third sector body, has the Board signed it off, has the membership or constituency represented by the body been actively involved in shaping the response and if so to what numerical extent?

By adopting this kind of tweaking to the respondent profiling, it would become clear just who for example COSLA and others were actually speaking for.

In return, Nicola's thoughts on ideas for bringing greater transparency to the consultation practice of modern government is :

"You made a number of wider points about consultation arrangements and suggested that we might consider whether it is possible to capture some measure of the provenance of responses submitted to consultations.  Thank you for raising these issues.  We have no plans at this stage for amending our arrangements."

Another big kiss-off from the Cabinet Secretary.

Another big kiss-off from the Cabinet Secretary

If you reckon there is a need to improve how government consults on policy and then changes it [or not, as the case may be] you could always tweet Nicola to let her know you think COSLA and others need to be more transparent and accountable in how they seek to influence our government.


Tweet to @NicolaSturgeon

You could also tweet COSLA and suggest it needs to be more open about what it does and who it does it for.



Tweet to @COSLA

Equality Minister falls from grace

Michael
McMahon  MSP

On 23^rd February, Michael McMahon MSP, lodged a question for Nicola Sturgeon, Cabinet Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Cities Strategy.  Michael has a deep interest in equalities and, mindful of the Equality Act 2010 and the latest draft of specific equality duties on which Nicola’s staff will be dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s, he asked :

To ask the Scottish Executive how the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Cities Strategy will ensure that all NHS boards engage with people and organisations representing the protected characteristics and that their daily experiences of discrimination in the NHS are built into the equality outcomes to be published by each board by 31 December 2012. [S4W-05904]

By 6^th March, Nicola’s civil servants had laboured hard in the prolific and well-manured vineyards of government, strained every sinew in exploring the boundaries of innovative communication, and had clearly scoured the highways, byways and backwaters of our NHS, all the time stopping only to nourish themselves on nothing but the stalest of bread and lukewarm water, all so that she could say to Michael :

The regulations which cover the specific requirements that will be placed on listed public authorities have not yet been made. When they do come into force we expect that they will be accompanied by guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

Once this guidance has been developed the Scottish Government will work with the Equality Team at NHS Health Scotland to consider what further support or guidance may be required.

An approximate translation of those anodyne phrases is :

‘we have done bugger all, and we have bugger all plans to do bugger all more, because we don’t believe that the NHS discriminates anyway’

do a few years processing CAP grants to sheep
farmers in Orkney, so that they can end up being
 a middle-ranked grunt writing gobshite like this
 for their political masters

Hard to believe isn’t it that highly paid civil servants can take pride in perverting transparency, accountability, and the concept of democracy through providing ministers with a form of words which deliberately seek to avoid answering the questions?  That they can plough through school and university to obtain a decent degree education, persuade an interview board to give them a job in the civil service so that they can serve the public and make a difference, resist the siren voices of the merchant banks and their promises of obscene bonuses on top of fat-cat salaries, do a few years processing CAP grants to sheep farmers in Orkney, so that they can end up being a middle-ranked grunt writing gobshite like this for their political masters? 

It gets better, or worse, depending on how you define democracy and government.

Michael put a number of related questions to Nicola :

To ask the Scottish Executive what checks the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Cities Strategy will put in place to ensure that the equality outcomes to be published by each NHS board by 31 December 2012 (a) are fit for purpose, (b) comply with the guidance to be published by the Equality and Human Rights Commission and (c) are fully accessible in one NHS web-based resource. [S4W-05905]

To ask the Scottish Executive what baseline data relating to levels of discrimination in the NHS the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Cities Strategy will use to monitor the effectiveness of NHS boards in setting equality outcomes. [S4W-05906]

To ask the Scottish Executive what guidance the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Cities Strategy will issue to members of NHS boards to ensure that (a) governance arrangements, (b) accountability and (c) transparency in the setting and delivery of equality outcomes is (i) regularly considered at board level and (ii) placed in the public domain as well as in one central NHS web-based resource. [S4W-05907]

To ask the Scottish Executive what guidance the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Cities Strategy will issue to members of NHS boards to ensure that (a) governance arrangements, (b) accountability and (c) transparency in the setting and delivery of equality outcomes is (i) regularly considered at board level and (ii) placed in the public domain as well as in one central NHS web-based resource. [S4W-05908]

To ask the Scottish Executive what (a) central and (b) accessible resource the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Cities Strategy will establish to allow people and organisations representing the protected characteristics to compare performance across all NHS boards in setting and delivering equality outcomes. [S4W-05909]

6 times Parliament and elected members
 were given a vigorously executed V-sign
 by a minister who has the lead on equalities

All clearly designed to get our NHS ready to do much more than go on fearfully ticking a few boxes, to be doing a lot more than just enough to keep the enforcers at bay, and instead offer an exciting, innovative, confident example of how we can all show discrimination the red card and celebrate equality of opportunity being much more vibrant than the tired old cliché it has become.  


And the fragrant Nicola’s response [as drafted by her trusted and loyal civil servants] to all of these ?

                       

 I refer the member to the answer to question S4W-05904

 by her dissembling, her duplicity,
and her dissimulating,  ........ a
massive fall from grace in her
right to retain any integrity on equalities.

5 times.  Well, 6 times.  6 times Parliament and elected members were given a vigorously executed V-sign by a minister who has the lead on equalities [I know, you couldn’t make this up].  6 times Nicola was given the chance to offer real hope to people who experience discrimination in our NHS on a daily basis that on her watch things would change.  6 times Nicola was given a chance to show how Scotland could be different, more radical, more innovative, more determined than the rest of the UK to deliver equality in the lifetime of young BME people regularly excluded from the opportunities of mainstream society and regularly abused when they dare to cross the line.

Instead, with each and every one of those 6 opportunities, by her dissembling, her duplicity, and her dissimulating, Nicola chose to crush the hopes of people from the major equality communities in Scotland and completed a massive fall from grace in her right to retain any integrity on equalities.

Tweet to @NicolaSturgeon

For whom does the COSLA bell toll ?

COSLA, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, is the representative voice of Scottish local government and also acts as the employers’ association on behalf of all 32 Scottish Councils.  I didn’t write that.  It is what it says on the COSLA web site. 

'voice of Scottish local government'

Seems straightforward, doesn’t it?  Speaks for 32 Councils when something important needs said.  Good idea.  Tidy.  Transparent.  Accountable.  Good for democracy.

Well, maybe not.

Late last year our Brigadoon-loving government consulted on changes to its plans for specific equality duties in Scotland.  I have previous form on this subject and you will find lots of context to this elsewhere in the blog.

Copies of who said what on the draft specific duty proposals are available to insomniacs to read via this link.

A big issue on which public bodies [including 32 Councils] will have to seriously up their game in these specific equality duties is in how they gather data on their workforce, how they analyse it to identify where and how they are discriminatory as employers, and what action they will take to eliminate the discrimination, and deliver evidence of equality of opportunity for all people who routinely encounter discrimination in Scotland.  They will need to do this in partnership with people who encounter discrimination and publish what they are doing so that they cannot hide behind the usual closed doors of public sector decision making. 

Seems straightforward, doesn’t it?   Good idea.  Tidy.  Transparent.  Accountable.  Good for democracy.

In the consultation last year, question 8 asked :

Do you agree that authorities subject to the specific duties should be required to report on progress on gathering and using employment information, including an annual breakdown of information gathered, within the mainstreaming report.

And the cheerleading ‘voice of local government’ said ?  In the third paragraph of their answer they said :

Councils also strongly believe that local context must be factored into any understanding of the data. Across Scotland, different local authorities serve very different communities, and are subject to different job markets, employment opportunities and other circumstances that will make any attempt at comparisons difficult and misleading. Because each is different, it is very unlikely that one standard reporting format will therefore be possible. [my italics]

COSLA cranked up the ‘Jaws’ theme
 music to 11, clutched its lavendar-drenched
lace doily to its dowager bosom,
and gasped for the smelling salts
to be rapidly uncorked

Trying to explain this reluctance to encourage real transparency and accountability through offering data in a way which allowed apples to be compared with apples, COSLA suggested that it would be ‘difficult and misleading’ to do so.  COSLA also counseled against use of a ‘standard reporting format’.  In answer to a related question [6] COSLA cranked up the ‘Jaws’ theme music to 11, clutched its lavendar-drenched lace doily to its dowager bosom, and gasped for the smelling salts to be rapidly uncorked :

We also consider it imperative to avoid a situation that allows for ill-conceived league table style analysis between councils.

Something about this strident protesting on the part of COSLA started to smell whiffy and iffy.  I dug further.  Initially, I did a quick compare and contrast between COSLA’s response and that of four randomly selected Councils – Glasgow, Dundee, Edinburgh and Midlothian.  You can read this analysis for yourself via this link.

None of those four Councils agreed with COSLA on the dangers shrieked out in answer to question 6.  All said yes to the proposal.  Two of the four called for guidance, and one said they ‘fully supported the approach set out’.

On question 8, where COSLA counseled against standard reporting formats and said comparisons would be ‘difficult and misleading’, the four Councils took a different view and agreed with the government’s proposal, and with Midlothian Council saying explicitly :

‘The introduction of a standardised reporting template would be beneficial as it would greatly help when comparing and benchmarking against other public bodies.’

By now I was needing to throw open all the windows to dispel the thickening stench of disinformation rising, steaming, from the COSLA pages.  Just who were they speaking for?  Clearly not these four randomly sampled Councils.

I kept the windows wide open, wrapped myself in my sheepskin-lined denim jacket, topped off with my leather, and a scarf, and started digging through the festering pile of consultation responses.  The sacrifices I make in the name of transparency and accountability.  There were 22 responses from Councils.  I built a simple analysis of what they said and you can read that via this link.

Out of those 22 Councils, ten offered an explicit comment similar to this one from Aberdeen in response to question 8 :

‘We would propose that consideration is given to a standardised reporting template for local authorities so as to enable ease of comparison and benchmarking between local authorities.’

I could find nothing remotely resembling the hysterical warnings of COSLA in any other Council’s response.

Being a reasonable kind of person, I asked one of the four Councils who the COSLA bell tolled for if it did not speak for them, pointing out the differences in responses.  I got an exquisitely and delicately be-jewelled Faberge-egg construct of double-speak back, and even that was only after I was forced to explain who I was and who had commissioned my analysis before the Council staffer would respond to my basic question.

an exquisitely and delicately be-jewelled
 Faberge-egg construct of double-speak

I sent a similar request to COSLA, asking just who had been involved in building the COSLA response, attaching my analyses, generally querying the provenance of the response, and wondering if there was an explanation which would explain the serious dislocation of views between the COSLA response and that of individual Councils.  To date I have had zero, zilch, nada, nic, rien, faic, lutho, and nihilum. 

Being unwilling to flog long-expired Metropolitan Police resources, I have closed my windows, buried the COSLA response in the recycling dump, and passed my analysis map on the whereabouts of this toxic mess over to the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Equality, and Cities [but not equal pay] and asked her to ensure that her government’s own analysis to the responses takes a peek, from within the safety of a gas mask, at the dubious provenance of the COSLA response.

And next time you are watching or listening to local news bulletins in Scotland, have waded through the latest murder story or Glasgow football news, and hear a COSLA spokesperson declare that local government thinks this, believes that, or might even if the wind is in the right direction deliver small miracles, just remind yourself of what you have read here today.

Tweet to @COSLA