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The ‘rotten culture’ report and what it means for Liverpool City Council

Alice Sjöberg

A report detailing a ‘‘deeply worrying’’ and ‘‘dysfunctional and intimidating culture’’ in which ‘‘secret cabal’’ are in control of Liverpool City Council has led to government-commissioners being sent to the city to over-take parts of the City Council. 

Earlier this year, Government Secretary of State, Robert Jenrick, appointed Max Caller to inspect Liverpool City Council (LCC) working according to the Best Value legalisation. This report is the consequence of several police investigations and arrests, including the arrest of then mayor Joe Anderson, which lead to his suspension of the Labour party. The arrests were all on suspicion of fraud, bribery, corruption, misconduct in public office and witness intimidation. Since his arrest in December 2020, Anderson has denied having done anything wrong and has not been charged with any offences.

These allegations were made six weeks before the local election where Labour is expected to continue its dominance in Liverpool.

The Report

The report, which was published on the 24th March, painted a picture of a ”dysfunctional culture” that ”undermined the city’s economic development”, which Jenrick told the House of Commons. In his statement, he mentioned the key points from the report, highlighting how the LCC has failed to follow through with its Best Value duty. They also described LCC as bankrupted.

Jenrick said that ‘‘the report identifies multiple apparent failures by Liverpool City Council in complying with its Best Value duty’’. The Best Value legalisation states that ‘‘a best value authority must make arrangements to secure continuous improvement in the way in which its functions are exercised, having regard to a combination of economy, efficiency and effectiveness’’. In regards to the report on LCC, Caller focused on management, regeneration, highways, contracts and planning at the council in the past five years.

In the report, it is stated that LCC’s recordkeeping is ‘‘patchy’’, especially regarding the quality and coverage. This is a particularly big problem in the Regeneration Directorate.

‘‘This includes a failure of proper and due process across planning and regeneration, including worrying lack of record keeping, indeed documentation had sometimes been created retrospectively, discarded in skips or even destroyed,’’ Jenrick told the House of Commons.

Jenrick also mentioned that there’s an ‘‘overall environment of intimidation’’ where ‘‘the only way to survive was to do what was requested without asking too many questions’’.

What happens now?

For at least three years forward, it’s been decided that Government-appointed commissioners will oversee ‘‘certain and limited’’ functions of LCC. This decision has been backed by the Labour party, who agrees that it’s the best solution.

‘‘We support his intention to appoint commissioners, not at this stage to run the council as he says, but to advise and support elected representatives in strengthening the council’s systems. This is a measured and appropriate response,’’ Labour’s Steve Reed told LabourList.

Reed continued by emphasising that the government-commissioners does not mean a ‘‘tory takeover’’ and that the commissioners only would intervene if the council leaders fail to implement their improvement plan.

In response to the report, the Labour party also announced they will launch a review into the Liverpool Labour Party.

This will be the first time the Government has ever directly intervened in the day-to-day running of a place the size of Liverpool. This will also be the first time in 38 years that the Conservative party will run parts of the city. A Liverpool seat last had a Conservative MP 38 years ago, and the last Tory councillor lost his seat 23 years ago.

The Liverpool take-over will be the fifth time the national government will have had to step in and appoint commissioners to overtake parts of a local authority’s function.

What do Liverpudlians say about this?

As a response, the people of Liverpool are angry that the Labour party agreed to let the Tories gain control of the LCC. For years, the city has been known for being a left-leaning city, without a single chair belonging to the Conservative party. The fact that Tory commissioners now will be sent to the LCC have shocked a lot of Scousers, especially since it was approved by the Labour party.

Several people also expressed annoyance for the fact that Jenrick was the one behind the investigation, since he has previously approved a controversial housing development after being in contact with Tory donor Richard Desmond, with whom Jenrick later exchanged text messages with. This led to the Labour party calling for an investigation over Jenrick and how he had spent the government funding, not focusing his work on improving the housing in the poorer areas of the country, and not having enough funds left to do this.

Since this is a similar situation that the LCC is in right now, people have turned to Twitter to express their confusion and annoyance that Jenrick is the one wanting the government to send commissioners to help the LCC because of his complicated history.

Even though Liverpool, for a long time, has been known for doing their own thing, the next three years will certainly be a big adjustment for a lot of people.

Alice Sjöberg

Image courtesy of timajo via Pixabay. Image licence found here. No changes were made to this image.

I'm a 22-year-old trainee journalist, studying with News Associates. I am also one of the Lifestyle editors at EJ.

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