Terms of reference include: to formulate and review a corporate plan of objectives, programmes and priorities; overall responsibility for resources; performance review; to advise on major policy changes and their resource implications; review committee and departmental organisation and functions; policy coordination between committees; appointments to committees and outside bodies as well as Chief Executive and other officers; general purposes and urgency matters.
The new County Council established a hierarchical committee structure with Resource and Programme Committees subject to the overall policy guidance of the Policy and Resources Committee. The separate Resource Committees were reconstituted as subcommittees of the Policy and Resources Committee in January 1976.