A few years ago I wrote about the evolving role of backbench councillors as community leaders. Here in Lambeth I hoped that the cooperative council, model which we were embarking on, would provide space for councillors to take on a greater place shaping role in their wards.
But, as you all know, times in local government have been hard, and we have had to make some tough decisions. Since 2010 we have lost 50 per cent of our funding from government.
Since then I have also become the cabinet member responsible for many of our most visible frontline services, such as our libraries and parks. For the first few years of the cuts we made a choice to protect our frontline services.
However, the continuing pressure on our budgets means that the council as an entity just is not in the strongest place to do as much as we would want to with the over 100 very individual community assets we own, from parks to community libraries, heritage assets to buildings used to provide arts programmes.
It is a difficult time to come into the job.
However, what we were able to do was recognise the position we found ourselves in. We looked around and saw just how much residents value these assets, how ambitious they are for them, and how determined they are to see them survive.
So we decided that we needed was to create an environment where residents could step forward – with the council as an enabler rather than necessarily the provider. This led Lambeth to explore some of the biggest devolvement of power in our history.
We have now invited community groups and the third sector to step up and help us protect our community buildings, parks and libraries by taking on responsibility for owning them or running them.
And step up they did. In Lambeth we now have hundreds of residents who in their spare time are offering to manage parks, run libraries and take on beautiful buildings which we are simply struggling with. They have come up with fantastic locally tailored ideas to maximise income and are able to identify all those small pots of money, which can be bid for.
Where community-managed options are not feasible we are looking at creating parks management boards, chaired by a local councillor. This will bring together residents and stakeholders like one o’clock clubs or sports pitches, into one group who help monitor the contracts for the park and help move the park forward with ambition and enthusiasm.
Enshrined in this devolving of power is the changing dynamic that backbench councillors are more than custodians of what the council does or simply policy and performance scrutineers; we are the important democratic link which not just the council can call upon but the myriad emerging providers of public services and custodians of our community assets. As things get ever tougher for Labour-run local authorities and as we seek to return to power nationally in May it is time to work out the ways in which we will be making sure public services are defended in future.
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Jane Edbrooke is a Labour councillor in Lambeth. She tweets @JaneEdbrooke
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Great idea!