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Agency's online guide to beat town hall secrecy

A news agency boss has updated his online resource for journalists wanting to investigate the finances of their local council.

Each year, local authorities are required by law to open up their accounts for public inspection for 20 working days, providing journalists with a potentially rich seam of stories.

Last year, former regional press hack Richard Orange created an online guide which aimed to list the timings of the inspections so journalists would not miss out.

But many authorities refused to reveal when they were holding the audits, with some not even publicising the fact on their own websites.

Councils are obliged to publish only a single statutory notice in a newspaper on one day of the year advertising when the books are open for inspection – but few journalists or members of the public spot them.

Now Richard, who runs Orchard News, has decided to name and shame those authorities using the Freedom of Information Act.

“What is new this summer is that we are chasing up and identifying authorities which do not post the information on their own websites,” he said.

“We are using FOI to obtain the statutory notices and are publishing these ourselves so that journalists, journalism students and taxpayers can get a ‘bird’s eye view’ of the inspection regime.

“Frankly, the fact that so many councils and police authorities feel that they can get away with issuing one public notice in one newspaper on one day of the year is indicative of an insular and secretive Town Hall mindset.

“But if more media people had taken an active interest in this statutory provision in the past, local authorities would not be dragging their feet.”

Richard is runnning a workshop about public inspection access rights at the Centre for Investigative Journalism conference being held at City University, London, next Sunday. More details are at tcij.org

His tips for council documents which could yield good stories include:

  • Contracts, invoices, bills and receipts relating to council-run publications.

  • Expense claims submitted by councillors for the financial year, including receipts, bills and invoices.

  • Bills and invoices relating to phone calls made by councillors using council-issued mobile phones.

  • For police authorities, invoices which show how much has been spent on payments to registered informants.

    Comments

    Richard Orange (09/07/2009 12:00:31)
    Just a quick postscript and thanks to Paul for the write-up: We are also encouraging journalism students around the UK to submit questions and probe the accounts to get scoops for local media – as the legislation requires that requests must be made by persons resident in the particular area.

    Paul Simon (13/07/2009 14:57:29)
    The wider issue here is less the secrecy of local authorities and much more the continued failure of local reporters to be bothered to familiarise themselves with council agendas and decision-making (including financial decision-making) processes and timetables.
    There are many good and fair stories to be had by properly scrutinising agenda papers and even, heavens, attending the occassional committee meeting!
    But most reporters are chasing too many (inconsequential) stories to be able to find the time to do this – to their detriment, that of the councils themselves and the publics they serve.