Commentary on provisions of Act Schedules Schedule 3: Overview and scrutiny committees
Schedule 3 inserts new Schedule 5A into the 2009 Act. It places a requirement on all combined authorities to establish one or more overview and scrutiny committees and sets out the way in which such committees will be comprised and operate.
	New Schedule 5A provides that an overview and scrutiny committee for a combined authority has the power to review and scrutinise decisions made, or action taken, by the combined authority and, in the case of a mayoral combined authority, the mayor on behalf of the combined authority. The committee may also make reports and recommendations in respect of the discharge of functions of the combined authority and about any matters that affect the authority's area or its inhabitants. An overview and scrutiny committee will be able to call-in a decision which has been made but not implemented, direct that the decision cannot be implemented while it is called in, and recommend that the decision be reconsidered. Paragraph 3(2)(h) gives the Secretary of State the power to provide for a minimum or maximum call-in period. An overview and scrutiny committee may require the members and officers of the authority to answer questions before it. A police and crime panel may have scrutiny functions over any general functions of the mayor which have been arranged for the deputy mayor for policing and crime to exercise, ensuring scrutiny of these functions is undertaken by the appropriate body.
	Provisions about the membership and structure of an overview and scrutiny committee for a combined authority are also included in new Schedule 5A. Paragraph 2(1) provides that an overview and scrutiny committee may appoint one or more sub-committees to discharge its functions. The Schedule provides that the majority of members of an overview and scrutiny committee must be members of constituent councils of the combined authority area and the membership may not include any member of the combined authority. Paragraphs 3(4) and 3(5) of new Schedule 5A provide that the chair of the committee must be either an independent person as defined in the order made by the Secretary of State or a member of a constituent council who is not of the same political party as, in the case of a mayoral combined authority, the mayor, or, in the case of any other combined authority, the largest political party on the combined authority. The Secretary of State may make further provision by order about matters including membership, voting and the chair.
	New Schedule 5A also requires a combined authority to appoint an audit committee to review and scrutinise the authority's financial affairs, and review and assess the authority's risk management, internal control, corporate governance arrangements, and the economy, efficiency and effectiveness with which resources have been used. It requires that at least one member of the audit committee be an independent member as defined in the order made by the Secretary of State.