What makes for effective scrutiny? At the Centre for Governance and Scrutiny this is a question we are frequently asked, but it's a difficult one to answer.

In truth, the way scrutiny works is unique to each council – driven as it is by councillors and their priorities. Approaches and ways of working that work fantastically in one place might be a disaster if transplanted elsewhere. For this reason, we often find ourselves disappointing people when we find ourselves unable to reel off a list of authorities that do scrutiny ‘really well'.