West of England Mayor Dan Norris branded "absentee landlord"
The accusation came during a meeting about a controversial bus wrap, labelled a "complete scandal"
Last updated 10th Sep 2024
Metro mayor Dan Norris has been branded an “absentee landlord” in charge of the West of England Combined Authority (Weca) while taking a second job as a newly elected MP.
It came during a debate by councillors into the ‘Birthday Bus wrap’ debacle, which was described at the meeting as a “complete scandal”.
As reported last week, external auditors Grant Thornton found the saga exposed “significant weaknesses” in the combined authority’s value-for-money arrangements.
A “damning” report by the finance watchdogs upheld last year’s finding that £10,000 of taxpayers’ cash was spent unlawfully to plaster a double-decker with huge images of Mr Norris – now also Labour MP for North East Somerset & Hanham – and his dog for “political gain” against government guidelines
It had been intended to promote the Birthday Bus free travel scheme but officials in the mayor’s office were able to “bypass key governance controls and financial controls” and circumvent oversight by senior officers in the wider organisation responsible for the programme that would have prevented the purchase of the bus wrap, auditors concluded.
B&NES Cllr Toby Simon (Lib Dem, Bathwick) told Weca audit committee on Monday, September 9, that the report’s findings highlighted serious issues with Mr Norris’s working style.
He said: “I was rather shocked to read that the mayor isn’t regularly present in the combined authority office.
“The mayor uses his political adviser as an intermediary when communicating with senior officers.
“The mayor doesn’t meet regularly with all of the directors and that included a previous chief executive.
“The mayor operates a central government ‘red-box’ style of communication with officers where the majority of items are done in writing, insufficiently supported by informal discussions.
“And the mayor doesn’t give enough guidance to officers on his priorities, so he ends up vetoing recommendations at committee.
“So this adds up to an ‘absentee landlord’ mayor who picks favourites in the office and can’t work effectively with stakeholders.
“Obviously rot sets in at the top and it’s really important that Weca is effective.
“The mayor is, from these accounts, demonstrably part of the problem in the difficulties it has had.”
Cllr Simon said these included a major warning to Weca from government in March over the poor state of professional relationships between the metro mayor and leaders of the three councils who comprise the combined authority – Bristol, South Gloucestershire and Bath & North East Somerset.
Whitehall’s ‘best value notice’ orders the local politicians to get along, and Weca must show significant progress within a year or face further sanction.
Bristol city Cllr Jonathan Hucker (Conservative, Stockwood) told the meeting that the unlawful payment was an “extremely serious matter”.
He said: “The fact that the payment was made and the way that the issue has been handled since is frankly a complete scandal.
“This report is incredibly damning.
“The organisation is obviously dysfunctional on so many levels.
“The primary responsibility for that is the political leadership and in particular the metro mayor.
“I’m not terribly optimistic that these issues will be fixed because the metro mayor now has another job.
“You would have thought, given the issues highlighted, that the metro mayor would want to roll up his sleeves and fix those issues rather than take another job alongside being metro mayor.”
Cllr Hucker said he was “extremely disappointed” that Bristol City Council refused to attend an emergency public meeting to discuss the issue when it came to light last December, after then-Labour city mayor Marvin Rees called it “improper”.
It meant that while the leaders of the other two unitary authorities decided the payment was “clearly unlawful”, they did not feel they could make a formal ruling without any representation from Bristol.
Cllr Hucker said: “That is extremely unsatisfactory. In effect no decision was taken on it by the unitary authority leaders who were there.
“Will it be coming back to a meeting of the unitary authority leaders or the Weca committee?”
Weca strategic director of resources Rachel Musson replied: “The statutory duty was discharged in terms of holding the extraordinary committee and for the meeting to be held.
“There was no explicit requirement for a finding to be made but the committee was clear on the outcome of that meeting.”
South Gloucestershire Cllr Ben Burton (Conservative, Frenchay & Downend) said Mr Norris taking on a second job as an MP could directly impact his focus and time needed to address the serious concerns and could even make the situation worse, such as officers working in “silos” with poor communication between them.
Bristol city Cllr Paula O’Rourke (Green, Clifton) said: “I’ve been a councillor for eight years and I’ve never read a report quite like this. It is alarming.”
Weca chief executive Stephen Peacock said the first meeting of the independent ‘best value improvement panel’ was held last week where all Weca committee members confirmed their commitment to improvements.
He said: “This organisation has trebled in size in four years, during which we had a global pandemic.
“There are a lot of things within the organisation that need to improve and change.
“It’s not the full story but it’s part of the story.
“A lot of that stuff is rightly an internal matter.
“The most identifiable external benchmark of when we are far enough into that journey of improvement will be the government lifting the best value notice.”
Mr Norris has declined to comment in response to this latest report, but has previously denied any wrongdoing, telling Hits Radio he was elected as regional Mayor to be a figurehead for the West of England.
Weca management said in Grant Thornton’s report that the mayor’s office no longer exists following the departure of almost all officers working there.