The LGA is rightly proud of its sector-led improvement programme, delivered through the Improvement and Development Agency for Local Government (IDeA), a company board I chair as a virtue of my chairmanship of the Improvement and Innovation Board. Over the last year, especially as an active member peer myself, I have found myself increasingly considering how we do our very best to ensure the peers we use are at the top of their game. Many have specific specialisms, be it experience as a leader, cabinet member or committee chair, or with other experience to bring - however aside from this, we also draw on their wider knowledge within local government. This could be from the type of council they lead, whether it is rural or urban, experience within a combined authority or dealing with specific scenarios. It would be impossible to find the perfect peer for every assignment, but what we can do is ensure we best equip them for every scenario and also support a system of wider awareness, particularly as local government is always evolving. This very much informed my thinking as I prepared for my second member peer conference, this year in Bristol.
Following a welcome by Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees, building on the previous year's keynotes from experienced government commissioner Max Caller and experienced council chief executive Pat Ritchie, this year we had similarly experienced government commissioner Tony McArdle and experienced commissioner and ongoing chief executive Gavin Jones to talk about their experiences. We had a range of sessions before a bit of a pre-dinner experiment, with my brilliant predecessor as Improvement and Innovation Board chairman Peter Fleming facilitating mostly humorous discussions on a range of quick fire subjects linked to sector-led improvement.
Day two started with insight into the improvement journey of Torbay Council, before more breakout sessions and then political group gatherings. This was our first two-day conference for a while, and certainly feels like this is appreciated by attendees, as well as providing more scope to really get into some of the most important topics as well as spending time together. I'm already busy thinking about next year...
