About this event

Local Authority Companies – How to Make Them Work

There are estimated to be several hundred local authority owned companies performing a wide range of functions and their numbers continue to increase. Many have been long standing successes - but some have not, failing in very public ways.

In this webinar, three highly experienced public commercial lawyers explore the background and future of local authority-owned companies. We will examine the pressures and complications they face, the factors behind their creation and look at how councils can best manage their external companies to avoid the pitfalls that have led some to fail.

It will examine:

  • When you need to establish a company including when might it be useful or desirable to set up a separate entity?
  • What corporate forms can LA authorities take?
  • What additional pressures are LA companies under compared those in private ownership and how can these be addressed?
  • How should the performance of LA-owned companies be evaluated?
  • What factors often cause LA companies to fail?
  • How should the relationship with the Council be managed and what Governance issues commonly need to be addressed?
  • What effect might the Procurement Bill have on existing and proposed LA-owned companies?

Speakers

Perry Holmes

Perry is Director of Legal & Governance (Monitoring Officer) at Wiltshire Council. He has substantial experience as a senior leader in the local authority sector for over 15 years. He has worked at County, District and Unitary councils. He leads a varied set of teams at Wiltshire Council including Communications, Executive Office, Customer Services, Registration, the Coronial Service, the Lord Lieutenancy, as well as Legal and Democratic Services. He is part of the Corporate Leadership Team reporting to the Chief Executive and is the Council’s Solicitor and Monitoring Officer. He has significant expertise in local authority governance.

He recently completed an MBA with distinction and focussed his research project on the governance of council companies. He conducted a governance review of Wiltshire’s Stone Circle companies which has been shared as an exemplar by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy to other Councils. He has modernised and improved the approach to elections at Wiltshire and built succession planning and resilience into his teams. He has introduced a new performance management process and led a nationally unique campaign for positive conduct and democracy which was supported by conduct icon Jackie Weaver.

In his spare time he is a keen cyclist and cook, and supporter of his beloved Nottingham Forest.


Peter Ware

Recognised by Chambers and Partners and Legal 500 as a leading expert in public law and procurement, Peter is the head of Browne Jacobson’s Government practice. Specialising in contentious and non-contentious procurement matters, Peter supports public and private sector clients to get the very best out of their regulated procurement activity.

Prior to joining Browne Jacobson, Peter was a special projects adviser for Nottinghamshire County Council – meaning he really understands the pressures faced by in-house counsel when leading major projects.


Rob Hann

Rob is a legal director and Head of Local Government at Sharpe Pritchard. He has worked for several local authorities and was head of legal at 4ps/Local Partnerships for nearly 20 years, leading the development and roll-out of the local government PFI programme for local government across England and Wales. Rob is also the author of several major law books on local authority charging, trading, companies and partnerships.

Rob is known for his extensive knowledge of public law, procurement, vires and the laws relating to large scale and high-value PFI and PPP projects. Having worked for many years at the centre of local government policy development and programmes, identifying and removing obstacles to major projects, Rob can use this experience to benefit clients and to pursue new initiatives efficiently and effectively.

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