Video transcript: Trust and confidence – what elected members need to know
A transcript for a video about building and maintaining trust and confidence in a council as an elected member.
Your council has a vital role to play in your local community. As elected members, you can’t be successful if your communities and stakeholders lack trust and confidence in you.
Trust and confidence erode when bad things happen, like when public money is spent on things that don’t stand up to public scrutiny or a fraud occurs.
As governors, what do you need to keep an eye on?
Trust and confidence isn’t just something you can measure and then tick off as done. It’s implicit, and constantly built up over time through:
- Competence –having the right processes and governance in place to give your community confidence that you are spending their money the way they expect.
- Reliability – your council’s performance needs to be consistent. You need to ensure your council complies with its obligations, and that you are following the rules and the law.
- Honesty – you need to act with truthfulness, integrity, and openness when spending public money. Doing the right things in the right way.
Our website has guidance for supporting good internal processes.
You can also contact the Office, or your appointed auditor, if you have any questions – we’re here to improve trust and promote value for you and your communities.