Yahoo News Why is Michael Gove dragging heels on finding truth about council crisis? Birmingham deserves better
Nearly a year ago Birmingham City Council's Labour leaders announced the council was on the verge of going bust. They were imposing a spending freeze across the board as a result - and that was just the start of a spiral of chaos.
So why are we still waiting for an urgent public inquiry to expose the truth about what has happened here, and why Brummies are now paying the price?
By September last year, the city council's fate was sealed. Birmingham was, to all intents and purposes, broke. Two formal Section 114 Notices emerged just weeks apart, confirming the council could not present a balanced budget without outside help.
With a £300 million and rising deficit, an equal pay bill that could yet be anything from £250m to as much as £1 billion, and no reserves left, it's all gone horribly wrong since the 'glory days' of the 2022 Commonwealth Games.
Since last spring, several senior council officers on £100k plus salaries have been disappeared without a word of explanation (all of them seemingly 'resigning' their positions) while commissioners paid for out of Birmingham's meagre funds have been imposed on the city to oversee 'improvement and recovery'. Councillors who were part of the troubled Labour political leadership team that brought the city to its knees, and those meant to scrutinise its affairs in opposition and through a network of overview committees, have all largely remained in place, seemingly blameless for the unfolding catastrophe.
And yet for the city's 1.1 million residents, there has been no escape. Budgets for everything from youth services to early help for troubled families have been ripped up, hundreds of frontline jobs are being axed, and a mass land and property sell-off is under way that threatens our cherished heritage.
READ MORE: Why did Birmingham City Council chief executive suddenly quit and other unanswered questions
Families of young people with special needs are being told they can no longer get their disabled kids transported to college, citizens who are disabled or elderly and rely on the lifeline of local day centres are being warned some will close, and libraries and youth clubs will shut down.
We now have the frankly ridiculous scenario of councillors who voted in favour of a devastating budget that was bound to lead to mass closures and funding cuts now lobbying to save the very things in their own communities that they knew would be hit. "Save our library/day centre/transport funding" they chant, then tell us they had no choice but to vote through the budget that is the cause.
A massive tax hike has been imposed, totalling 21% over this year and next. That's before we see the long term impact on statutory services that will inevitably see rising demand from children and adults at risk in the years ahead.
The pain doesn't stop there. Angry female support workers and their allies have been on strike at city schools because they are still waiting for payouts owed to them by the council under equal pay legislation. And all this before the city imposes a fortnightly bin collection service next year, at a time when flytipping is at a high and recycling at a miserable low.
Here at Birmingham Live we have been pressing for answers. We have published repeated stories exposing the craziness of an equal pay bill that nobody understands, highlighted discrepancies in what people say in public and what went on behind the scenes, and taken every opportunity to challenge senior officers, politicians and commissioners.
But the resounding message we keep getting is that 'a public inquiry will look into that' or 'that's a question for the inquiry'.
Back in February we publicly called for the inquiry to take place without delay. In an article headlined Blameless Brummies are paying price for council fiasco - the 13 questions that must be answered I set out critical unresolved questions.
To their credit the council's Conservative group took the time to provide an answer to each of them, which will be incorporated into a future article dissecting what we know so far. But a public inquiry will have the powers to do what we cannot - the ability to compel people to provide evidence and answers, and to look into confidential papers and minutes. It's the only way we will ever know the truth.
So why is it taking so long?
For that we need to turn to the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whose boss is Secretary of State Michael Gove. He has so far been lukewarm on making a Birmingham inquiry a priority, despite announcing he was going to order one back in September 2023.
He said it was a critical part of the intervention he was announcing and was required to "investigate the root of the issues faced by the local authority." He said of Birmingham council then that it had a record of 'ineffective, inefficient and unaccountable government. It is failing in its basic duties.
"Where local leaders fail, it is residents who are let down. This cannot go on." And he added: "I do not take these decisions lightly, but we must protect the interests of residents and taxpayers of Birmingham and provide assurance to the sector."
We have since been asking when an inquiry will happen, who will run it, what its powers will be and what its terms of reference will be. So far we have been fobbed off with the same response - we will get further details 'in due course'. Last week, in a repeat of the response we had in February, we were told: "We are developing proposals around the scope of such an inquiry, to ensure it addresses the fundamental questions and options for moving forwards to deliver best value for Birmingham’s residents."
The statement failed to answer any of the questions posed - including one asking if there was truth in the 'coincidental' leak to the right wing Telegraph newspaper that Gove was seeking a police chief to run the inquiry. It was a handily timed leak on the eve of the finely balanced West Midlands mayoral election and I wrote about my frustration with that here.
READ MORE: Blameless Brummies are paying price for council fiasco - the 13 questions that must be answered
Right now, amid a tsunami of negative stories about the Government, it must be rather pleasant to have a financial meltdown and example of financial impropriety at a Labour-run council to rely on to offset a tiny bit of it. It is the councillors alone who have failed the people of Birmingham, says Gove, and his Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has said the same. Former mayor Andy Street joined in during the run-up to the election that he narrowly lost.
It will be a useful narrative to rely on in the run up to a General Election too, when Conservative MPs in the West Midlands are fighting to keep their seats against Labour rivals.
There is undoubtedly plenty of evidence to support laying much of the blame at the feet of the city's Labour politicians. Labour has been the ruling party on the city council for more than a decade and has ultimate control and say over council affairs.
They have clearly failed abysmally to learn from the Kerslake Report of 2014, which highlighted multiple issues of governance and toxicity within the council. The lack of political accountability since this latest financial crisis blew up has been astonishing.
Councillors have pointed at predecessors, officers and austerity - anywhere but at themselves - and bemoaned their largely part time, amateur status as an excuse for not being across all of the critical financial and IT issues.
But there is certainly more to this mess than meets the eye. What if it turns out that Birmingham's political leaders had been lied to and were deliberately misinformed about critical issues, as some of them have claimed? What if errant individuals defied political orders, then buried mistakes? What if Government officials, or auditors, or those paid to provide oversight and assurance, had not done their jobs?
What if equal pay failings were used to mask a profound breakdown in how the council's Oracle finances, bills and procurement system was operating? What if this is not 'just' about a failing Labour council, but something more profound about the shocking state of our welfare system and social care, and the impact of a Conservative Government devaluing local government for over a decade?
Birmingham needs to know the whole truth. We need accountability before healing can really commence. If that leads to individuals being found out for incompetence or neglect, wholesale change in political personnel, disciplinary action, or damage to personal reputations, so be it. If it uncovers damning, or even criminal, evidence of wrong-doing, bring it on.
Brummies are now paying the price for failure. We demand that overdue inquiry, and we need it now. Mr Gove, are you listening?
