Support for Elected Members
Role of councillors
Councils play such a fundamental role in creating the environment for communities to prosper and to enable the healthier choice to be the easier choice. Because councils can directly influence town planning, employment opportunities, social support, transport, education and housing, we need to ensure the impact on health and wellbeing we make is a positive one, one that ensures health inequalities are addressed and not widened.
The role of the councillor is therefore very important in terms of influencing the positive health of communities and ensuring the gap between our more affluent communities and individuals and those not so well off, isn’t widened. This can be achieved through policy making prioritisation and targeting; scrutiny for positive health and wellbeing outcomes, representation those least well off and championing the inequalities agenda, community leadership role and the role in partnerships.
The Obesity Time Bomb: Why it’s everyone’s business - An Elected Member Briefing Note
This briefing (external link) aims to provide councillors with some background to the complex problem of obesity and highlight why councils have a fundamental role in addressing this huge societal problem. It offers illustrations of how council services can contribute and presents the argument that a locally-based whole system approach is required so that an action by one organisation doesn't have a counterproductive effect elsewhere.
How do councillors improve health and community wellbeing? Short guide and full reference guide
Following the May 2007 elections a high turnover of elected members was predicted and the Local Government health improvement programme in NHS Health Scotland began working on the development of a short health and wellbeing guide for councillors.
This short guide was very well received. A full reference guide was also developed to support the use of the short guide and was pre-tested with a number of elected members at the launch event and received positive feedback.
Although there have been some policy changes since the guides were produced, the content in the full reference guide still contains some very useful information and illustrations to back up the previously published short guide.
Evaluation of elected member health improvement short guide
In 2008 the Local Government health improvement programme in NHS Health Scotland commissioned an evaluation of the short booklet entitled ‘How do councillors improve health and community wellbeing'. We would like to thank elected members and others for their excellent responses and engagement with the evaluation process.
A total of 199 online responses were received (84 per cent arising from elected members, with responses received from all 32 councils), in addition eight qualitative interviews, with 7 elected members and 1 council officer were conducted.
Updated 14 December 2011