A report for the equal rights watchdog examined the role of local strategic partnerships and local area agreements in promoting equalities.
Source: Hilary Russell, The Role of Local Strategic Partnerships and Local Area Agreements in Promoting Equalities, Research Report 63, Equality and Human Rights Commission
Links: Report
Date: 2010-Nov
A report examined the role of local government in supporting health improvement and tackling health inequalities, and analyzed the structure of support needed locally to deliver effective action for communities.
Source: Janet Sillett, All's Well that Ends Well? Local government leading on health improvement, Local Government Information Unit
Date: 2010-Nov
A report said that local government should make promoting well-being central to its activities. Action was needed across a range of areas: to set out an overarching vision for well-being locally; to design in well-being evidence across the range of service specifications and commissioning processes; to use community empowerment to promote well-being; and to focus on the well-being of local government staff as a key route to improving it more generally. Local authorities also needed to measure well-being outcomes so that they could track their progress.
Source: Jody Aked, Juliet Michaelson and Nicola Steuer, The Role of Local Government in Promoting Wellbeing, Local Government Improvement and Development
Links: Report | Summary | NEF press release
Date: 2010-Nov
An employers' organization said that action was needed to address the 'glacial progress' in sharing services in local government if the government's deficit reduction targets were to be met.
Source: Shared Services in Local Government: This Is the Time, Confederation of British Industry
Date: 2010-Oct
A report examined what local government could do to tackle the social conditions that led to health inequalities.
Source: Fiona Campbell (ed.), The Social Determinants of Health and the Role of Local Government, Improvement and Development Agency
Date: 2010-Oct
The coalition government announced the abolition of local area agreements (introduced in 2004 in order to allow councils with their local partners to define their own priorities and select the most appropriate targets from a set of national performance indicators). The government criticized the 'bureaucracy' surrounding the system.
Source: Written Ministerial Statement 13 October 2010, columns 20-21WS, House of Commons Hansard/TSO
Links: Hansard | Speech | Public Finance report | Inside Housing report
Date: 2010-Oct
An article examined the opportunities and challenges that local authorities in England faced in carrying out their new responsibility for funding the education and training of young people aged 16-19.
Source: Jonathan Payne, 'Scoring opportunity or hospital pass? The changing role of local authorities in 14-19 education and training in England', Journal of Education Policy, Volume 25 Number 4
Links: Abstract
Date: 2010-Aug
A report said that public services could be made cheaper, simpler, more effective, and more transparent by making locally elected people responsible for allocating public money and taking decisions about local services. Local councils or groups of councils should be responsible to local voters and to parliament for spending on frontline services under a new system of 'place-based budgeting'.
Source: Place-Based Budgets: The future governance of local public services, Local Government Association
Links: Report
Date: 2010-Jul
A think-tank report said that co-production of local public services offered the best chance of making the new government's 'Big Society' a success. It called for a radical shake-up in the way services were delivered, so that users became equal partners. Only co-production could break through the 'doing to' culture of mainstream public services that sapped power and confidence from the people they were trying to help.
Source: David Boyle, Anna Coote, Chris Sherwood and Julia Slay, Right Here, Right Now: Taking co-production into the mainstream, New Economics Foundation/NESTA
Links: Report | NEF press release | NESTA press release | New Start report
Date: 2010-Jul
A report examined how the 'Total Place' initiative fitted within the broader academic literature on leadership and change.
Source: Keith Grint, Problem, Purpose, Power, Knowledge, Time and Space: Total Place final research report, Local Government Leadership
Links: Report | LGL press release
Date: 2010-Jul
A think-tank report said that plans by the new government to decentralize public services needed to be coupled with minimum guarantees, so that poor and excluded groups did not end up with sub-standard provision. Localism could provide the best model for delivering services in a way that was more democratic, more cost-effective, and more efficient: but local councils should not be allowed to go too far with 'no frills' models of service provision.
Source: Phil McCarvill, Equality, Entitlements and Localism, Institute for Public Policy Research
Links: Report | IPPR press release
Date: 2010-Jun
A new book examined how the Freedom of Information Act of 2005 had enabled the public to contribute to local decision-making and debate local issues.
Source: Richard Chapman and Michael Hunt (eds.), Freedom of Information: Local Government and Accountability, Ashgate Publications
Links: Summary
Date: 2010-May
A paper examined models for the successful integration of local councils and primary care trusts. Many PCTs were not large enough to remain viable in the longer term, and integration with a local authority could increase management capacity.
Source: Integration of Councils and PCTs: A discussion paper, Office of Public Management
Links: Link removed by OPM
Date: 2010-Apr
A study examined whether people felt that they could influence decisions in their local area. People's feelings of influence were strongly related to feelings of being consulted, being listened to, and views being acted on. Poor or inappropriate consultation had a negative effect. A priority for citizens was outcomes – real improvements in their area, or real evidence of action to tackle problems. Direct involvement in decision-making did not necessarily drive feelings of influence.
Source: Rachel Newton, Anna Pierce, Liz Richardson and Matt Williams, Citizens and Local Decision Making: What drives feelings of influence?, Urban Forum
Links: Report
Date: 2010-Apr
A report examined community empowerment using 2008-09 Citizenship Survey data: whether people felt that they could influence local and national decisions; whether they would like to be more involved in decision-making; what would make it easier to influence decision-making; and how people would influence decisions if they wanted to. It also looked at people's trust in institutions and what activities people actually took part in (civic activism, civic consultation, civic participation, and volunteering).
Source: Eleanor Taylor and Natalie Low, 2008-09 Citizenship Survey Empowered Communities Topic Report, Department for Communities and Local Government
Links: Report
Date: 2010-Apr
Researchers examined the impact and effectiveness of the commissioning role of local authorities in England in different circumstances.
Source: Scott Dickinson et al., Local Authority Commissioning Pathfinders Study, Research Report RR231, Department for Children, Schools and Families
Date: 2010-Mar
A report said that many local authorities in Scotland were putting price above quality when commissioning public services from the voluntary sector.
Source: Government and the Third Sector: Relationships at Local Level, Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations/Voluntary Action Scotland
Links: Report | SCVO press release
Date: 2010-Mar
A survey of local area agreements in England explored how they were helping partnerships to achieve positive outcomes for local people.
Source: Scott Dickinson et al., Report on the 2009 Survey of All English Local Area Agreements: Long-term evaluation of local area agreements and local strategic partnerships, Department for Communities and Local Government
Links: Report
Date: 2010-Mar
The government set out plans for a fundamental shift in the way public services were delivered at local level in England. For the first time all local spending from across all local agencies was being looked at as a whole, in order to focus on designing services around the needs of the customer and cutting out waste and duplication. Government funding would be distributed through a 'single pot' to the best-performing areas, and areas would be allowed to retain money from the savings they made.
Source: Total Place: A whole area approach to public services, HM Treasury/Department for Communities and Local Government
Links: Report | DCLG press release | Total Place press release | LGA press release | IOG press release | NAVCA press release | Guardian report | Charity Times report | Children & Young People Now report
Date: 2010-Mar
An article examined the 'mismatch' between the language and rhetoric used by central government departments to promote particular policy options and initiatives, and the experiences of third sector organizations engaged in such programmes. For both parties in the process the relationship/experience was uncomfortable. The diversity, size, ethos, and shape of the third sector were not fully understood by public sector agencies; and the implications of the governance and decision-making processes were not fully grasped by either party.
Source: Matthew Jackson, 'Matching rhetoric with reality: the challenge for third sector involvement in local governance', International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, Volume 30 Issue 1/2
Links: Abstract
Date: 2010-Feb
A report highlighted the key barriers to delivering shared services across different local authorities.
Source: Stop, Start, Save: Shared service delivery in local government, Deloitte & Touche LLP
Links: Report
Date: 2010-Jan
A report examined the management of shared services partnerships by public bodies.
Source: Paul Jackson, Sharing the Gain: Collaborating for cost-effectiveness, Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy
Links: CIPFA press release
Date: 2010-Jan
A report examined the negotiation and implementation of the first round of multi-area agreements (MAAs), focusing on why localities decided to create a partnership, what they hoped to achieve, and the implementation challenges for local partners, Government Offices, and central government.
Source: Hilary Russell, Research into Multi-Area Agreements: Long-term evaluation of LAAs and LSPs, Department for Communities and Local Government
Links: Report | Summary | Local Government Chronicle report
Date: 2010-Jan