This week the government has announced it intends to abolish the committee system for local councils in England. The government is set to force councils to operate under the top down, ‘strong leader’ (Leader and Cabinet) system. This system led to the disastrous decisions made by Sheffield City Council to cut down healthy street trees and attempt to put citizens in prison for protesting. The Leader and Cabinet system which places decision-making power in the hands of the few was resoundingly rejected by Sheffield voters in our hard-won, city-wide referendum in May 2021.
The government’s announcement rides roughshod over the settled will of Sheffielders, and our democratic right to decide the way our council works. In fact the government proposal will remove the rights of people everywhere to decide the way their council works.
Despite Sheffield’s resounding vote for change, the government arrogantly tells us what is best for us, what they will allow us, and how we and our city are to be ‘managed’. We are now only to be allowed the local governance arrangements that suits a government forcing through centralisation of local government into its hands – not the right to choose how our local governance works, that we fought to win, and that we then democratically decided on as a city.
Sheffield’s position is unique. There is no other council or city where local citizens themselves took collective action, won the right for all the people of Sheffield to decide the way our council works via a city-wide referendum, and fought for local governance change to the committee system. Our collective and community action in Sheffield was, and remains, the largest ever citizen-led mobilisation in the country demanding local governance change to a committee system.
The government announcement is not about better ‘devolution’, nor about better local democracy and accountability to local people. The government announcement is about its own ideological preference for so-called ‘strong leaders’ under executive governance systems, and that suits central government not local people. This is demonstrated in the exception it makes for the few councils that run with a directly elected mayor – these arrangements will be allowed to continue. It is also demonstrated in the tired myths and lies about committee governance that the Minister’s announcement casually peddles, and that have no basis in fact. The announcement flies in the face of ‘devolution’ and local democracy, because Sheffield has already made its clear democratic choice known.
The government also says it does not want to waste local taxpayer’s money by requiring unnecessary system change, but the opposite is true. It specifically wants to waste local taxpayer’s money in Sheffield to make just such an unnecessary change, when the people of Sheffield have made a clear democratic choice and rejected our failing ‘strong leader’ system.
We’re not going back, and we want government to recognise and respect Sheffield’s unique position, and the settled democratic will of residents and communities across our city. The reasonable expectation (laid down in statute) is that our clear and collective, city-wide referendum decision remains in place for a minimum ten years. And that any attempt, after ten years, to revert back to more undemocratic, unrepresentative ‘strong leader’ governance must also be supported by a city-wide referendum.
We recognise the efforts and investment put in by our council to develop Sheffield’s modern committee system. Citizens in Sheffield know that our council has not changed and improved as much as they think they have. However, the choice of local committee governance made by Sheffielders has undoubtedly played a key role in the reinvigoration and improvements in our council that we do see.
We call on all in our council to defend the settled will of Sheffielders clearly expressed in our local governance referendum, and that was wholly won by Sheffield citizens and communities exercising democratic rights. We call on all in our council to defend the positive progress made under Sheffield’s committee governance, to decision-making, and to local democracy and accountability.
We call on government to recognise the unique position of Sheffield, respect our city’s democratic decision, and to rethink its intended re-imposition of a governance system that failed us in Sheffield. We expect government to do far more than simply issue one-size-fits-all edicts according to its own centralising agenda and preferences, and to actually listen to and respect the settled will of the people of Sheffield expressed clearly in a democratic city-wide referendum. We want government to stop planning for the wholly unnecessary waste of Sheffield taxpayers money in a useless and profoundly depressing return to a local governance system local citizens and communities have roundly rejected. To press on would be a profound breach of democratic trust in the face of the settled will of citizens and communities in Sheffield.
Sheffield can’t go back.
It’s Our City!
28th June 2025
For more information contact: Ruth Hubbard 07800 743 221 rhubba4@gmail.com
Background
Leader and Cabinet / Committee systems of local governance
The Leader and Cabinet system the government says it intends to impose on councils is, by definition, an executive form of local governance. This places almost all decision-making powers in the hands of the so-called strong leader (and the strong leader’s special, chosen few in the Cabinet).
It was precisely this that Sheffield resoundingly rejected.
Instead, Sheffielders actively chose a committee system – all 84 councillors elected across our city have the legal right, and formal power, to play a role in council decision-making on behalf of those they serve – us, the voters.
It is only the committee system that can deliver this.
No attempt to preserve other (perceived or actual) committee-system benefits, inside a top-down Leader and Cabinet system can, or will, replicate this basic legal and democratic right of voters – to be meaningfully represented in local decision-making. Leader and Cabinet governance, by definition, places decision-making power in the hands of the few.
Sheffield’s campaign for change
Our collective and community action in Sheffield was, and remains, the largest ever citizen-led mobilisation in the country demanding local governance change to a committee system.
We acted in the wake of the national and international disgrace brought to our city by the behaviours of our council ‘strong leaders’ (in the Leader and Cabinet system) during Sheffield’s street tree dispute. But we also uncovered many other examples of damaging and disrespectful local decision-making across Sheffield enabled and exacerbated by Sheffield’s top-down, ‘strong leader’ governance.
As local citizens we worked together, and made common cause across our differences. And we utilised (little known but powerful) community rights enshrined in the Localism Act 2011 to win the right to decide the way our council governance worked. We had approximately 20,000 citizen to citizen conversations about local governance – out on the streets and in our parks and other public spaces (and at community events) across every ward of the city. The resulting petition was signed by more than the required 5% of Sheffield’s local electorate and forced our council to hold a city-wide referendum. Sheffielders resoundingly voted for change, to a committee governance system in which all 84 elected councillors would have the power to play a role in city decision-making, not just the chosen few.
The legitimate expectation (laid down in statute) was that whatever local governance system Sheffield voters chose meant that this must remain in place for a minimum of ten years. After the minimum ten years, any attempt to revert back to a more undemocratic, unrepresentative ‘strong leader’ governance system would also have to be supported by a city-wide referendum.
Sheffield transitioned to committee governance in May 2022. No system of local governance is perfect and whilst local citizens still want to see more improvements some things are clear. It is clear that the transition to, and early development of, our modern committee system has played a key role in reinvigorating our council (both members and officers) and supported significant improvements in decision-making, council culture, and local democracy and accountability. (And there is no evidence to support tired myths and lies that the committee system is unclear or wasteful, nor that council decision-making is slower.)
Sheffield can’t go back.
It’s Our City!
28th June 2025
For more information contact: Ruth Hubbard 07800 743 221 rhubba4@gmail.com
Links
It’s Our City! website: https://itsoursheffield.co.uk/
Statement made by Jim McMahon, Minister of State for Local Government and English Devolution, 24th June 2025: https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-statements/detail/2025-06-24/hcws736
Sheffield City Council Response to Statement by the Minister of State for Local Government and English Devolution, 25th June 2025: https://www.sheffield.gov.uk/news/2025/council-response-statement-minister-state-local-government-and-english-devolution