We are an independent, community-based public interest group. We are not an online newspaper or a blog. Our purpose is to research, monitor, analyse, scrutinise and evaluate issues affecting the welfare, rights and quality of life of residents, and to make our findings available in the public interest.
Our work seeks to strengthen informed public debate, effective public services and democratic accountability. We examine the policies, decisions, performance and practices of public authorities and other bodies where their actions affect local communities, asking not simply what has been promised or reported, but what is actually being delivered, how effectively, for whom, at what cost and with what accountability.
Central to our approach are five connected principles: Access • Governance • Transparency • Accountability • Assurance. We apply these principles when examining the effectiveness of public services and the systems through which they are delivered. Our approach is evaluative and evidence-based: we distinguish evidence from opinion, test policies and assurances against outcomes, and draw where appropriate on the findings of regulators, inspectors, auditors, Ombudsmen and other authoritative sources. We recognise good practice and improvement where the evidence supports them, examine weaknesses and unanswered questions critically, and seek clarification where the evidence does not justify a firm conclusion. Our purpose is not criticism for its own sake, but to establish whether systems work in practice, whether organisations learn from failure and whether improvement can be demonstrated.
Our objectives are to:
- Promote social justice by encouraging fairness, equality, transparency and accountability in public life.
- Monitor public policy and decision-making, identifying where policies, decisions or practices may adversely affect residents, particularly those who are vulnerable, disadvantaged or under-represented.
- Highlight deprivation and inequality, with particular attention to neighbourhoods identified through the Index of Multiple Deprivation and to wider factors affecting social and economic wellbeing.
- Inform and educate the public through research, evidence-based analysis, evaluation and commentary that contribute to informed discussion of local and national issues.
- Encourage civic participation by helping residents understand how public institutions operate, how decisions affecting them are made and how decision-makers can be held accountable.
Our publications put these objectives into practice through examination of issues including governance, public services, education, safeguarding, health and social care, housing, planning, policing, equality, public expenditure, democratic accountability and community welfare. Where appropriate, we bring together evidence from different services and organisations to consider whether apparently separate problems point to wider issues of leadership, governance, coordination or assurance.
We work collectively and independently to help ensure that residents’ concerns are heard, public money and services are properly scrutinised and decisions affecting communities can withstand informed examination. We do not approach our work with predetermined conclusions, and our assessments remain open to reconsideration when credible new evidence becomes available.
Our independence is practical as well as organisational. Harrow Monitoring Group does not receive, seek or wish to claim public funding, grants or other external financial support. Our activities are undertaken using our own resources, enabling us to examine public bodies, policies and services without financial dependency on the organisations or institutions whose work may be subject to our scrutiny.
Harrow Monitoring Group is wholly independent and is not affiliated with, aligned to, or part of any political party.
Transparency and privacy
Harrow Monitoring Group operates on the principle of openness. Communications sent to us, and communications sent by us, may be treated as part of the public record and may be quoted, reproduced or published in furtherance of our public-interest work, subject to applicable legal obligations and any confidentiality expressly agreed in advance. Anyone corresponding with Harrow Monitoring Group should therefore understand that their communication may be used or published as part of our research, analysis, reporting or scrutiny.
We respect the privacy of visitors to our website. Harrow Monitoring Group does not itself use cookies to track, profile or monitor individual visitors, nor do we use website visitor data for advertising or marketing purposes.