Being involved in scrutiny can involve long hours, hard work and is not something that will ever get you rich. It can have a very positive impact on people's lives though. And I'm talking in particular on the lives of people who for whatever reason are not able to speak out on issues that affect them - for example, children.
This was brought to my mind again today with social work and child protection back in the news both locally and nationally.
Locally, because a new independent chair of the Local Children's Safeguarding Board has been appointed. I wish Stephen Barber, the new Chair best of luck with his new role. The role and remit of the Board was reformed after failings were identified with the child protection service in Reading and Wokingham.
The Lib Dems campaigned successfully for the Board to be extended to include opposition members - to improve oversight and accountability.
The Council's press release issued yesterday says Mr Barber has over 30 years experience gained from working in several London Boroughs.
I hope he can draw on this experience to improve safeguarding in Reading and across Berkshire - it is much needed.
Nationally, because the interim report by the government's social work taskforce was published today after pressure was put on the Labour government to do more to tackle widespread failings at local government level in child protection and to prevent tragedies such as the death of Baby Peter in Haringey and in Reading, the death of Trae-Blue Layne.
The report makes interesting reading highlighting many problems that are familiar in Reading such as staff shortages.
Recruiting and retaining high-quality social workers is still a major problem in Reading and RBC is having to rely on a high-number of agency staff. This was obviously not helped when the University of Reading decided to close the School of Health and Social Care - an important local training facility.
Lib Dem MP for Hornsey and Wood Green, Lynne Featherstone has led the campaign for better child protection in this country.
As is well-known, Reading and Wokingham came in for heavy criticism from Inspectors a few months ago.
My colleague Kirsten Bayes has been leading on ensuring that the Labour-controlled Council in Reading puts things right that had gone so badly wrong in child protection.
Recently she raised concerns about the quality of data held by the local authority.
Kirsten takes her corporate parenting responsibilities very seriously. You can find out more about what it means to be a corporate parent here, but it essentially means all councillors have a specific responsibility to ensure children in care are properly safeguarded by local authorities.
This important role also extends to protecting vulnerable adults - an area less press attention tends to be focussed. I have successfully called for all councillors to be trained to spot potential abuse of adults in Reading.
I'm not making a party political point here - issues like child protection must not be party political, they are too important, but the two opposition parties have really risen to the challenge of the need for Members to take a more active role in scrutinising the Council's plans and policies in relation to child protection.
There is clearly still a long way to go if Reading Borough Council wants to meet the high standards set by councillors, inspectors and residents.
From a Lib Dem point of view this is part of a general drive to see more openness and accountability in the way the Council is run and decisions taken.
Scrutiny of this important service had been sadly lacking in the years when the ruling Labour Group held the Chair of the Education & Children Services Scrutiny Panel.
As I've regularly commented on this Blog, scrutiny of services and decisions has improved markedly across the Council since the elections last May and Labour was forced to give up it's chairs of scrutiny panels.
Scrutiny has helped drive improvement in adult social care services where previously performance has been regarded as weak by inspectors - so much so that the Lead Member himself credited scrutiny with helping to improve the service (he told me recently).
Other Panels such as the Culture & Sport Scrutiny Panel have also shown their teeth since the change in the political balance of the Council. For a recent example check out the comments of Cllr Warren Swaine and others on the financial affairs of Academy Sport!
Effective scrutiny is also about ensuring that we are topical issues in the public interest are discussed and debated in public - as has been seen recently with our regular item on housing and the credit crunch and our recent meeting on the performance of First Great Western Trains.
Better scrutiny in Reading has also helped to evaluate council policies to see if they are working and if necessary - as in the case of the private rented housing scrutiny review - made specific recommendations about how council policies should be changed for the benefit of local residents.
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