mudhook

Another report on Cornwall county council, this from the Audit Commission. This is the comprehensive performance assessment (CPA) for 2007 and the council scores three stars and is “improving adequately.” Read it here.

Thirty seven percent of councils have more stars and seventeen percent fewer; seventy nine percent are improving better than Cornwall and none worse.
Here are two recent assessments of Cornwall county council.

Cornwall county council: the parrot is pale

One star Cornwall

None of these is excellent overall. None gets into the Vorsprung Cornwall thread. Note that these are not about Cornwall suffering from external and distant agency; these are assessments of internal works. I’m whistling to keep my spirits up.

How soft my posts on the shortcomings of Cornwall county council seem now that the Improvement and Development Agency (IDEA) has reported on it.

The report is here and is disturbing. Its ominous opening sentence is: “Cornwall county council is faced with a significant number of serious problems.” The report also says that the council has a “low level of self-awareness” and is unaware or in denial about the challenges it faces. That’s polite talk for they’re losing and don’t know it.

The county council, which becomes a unitary council in 2009, faces an Audit Commission comprehensive performance assessment in May/June this year and asked the IDEA to do in effect a dry run.

The main observations of the report are that collectively the county council falls short in corporate performance, that is the various parts of it do not work together as a corporate whole as well as they should; that its performance in several spheres has declined; and the obvious point that the council’s reputation depends upon its delivering its promises in its unitary proposals.

Not everything is poor, some people’s work and understanding of what needs to happen is noted very favourably.

Some of the harsh comments are:

+ The council faces service failure if it does not improve its corporate performance.

+ The council should better communicate to the people of Cornwall what the council stands for, what its overarching purpose and vision are: “there is a general perception that the council is invisible outside of county hall.”

+ The council’s ratings for services from external assessments have “slipped downwards” and the external overall assessments of the capacity to improve are too low. These are singled out: the Direction of Travel judgement of December 2006 said the council was “not improving adequately”; the judgement for children’s social care was “not improving adequately”; the council’s score for Use of Resources fell from 3 to 2 stars; and both the recent inspection reports for Supporting People in 2006 and Older People in 2007 gave only one star.

+ On the move towards a unitary council the county’s partners “are unclear about the plans and who is involved in managing the change.”

+ “Collectively there is an absence of a strong performance culture at corporate level, with the status quo being the preferred option.”

+ The council’s self-assessment suggests that it is unaware or in denial of the problems it faces

And on and on and on…

It is dismaying reading, a detailed catalogue of failure or poor performance or weaknesses over many areas with change and those keen for it stymied. I read it as a forecast that unless there is a sea change the county council will move from failure to disaster. The parrot is not dead yet but is looking very pale.

Although the report does not say so, I think it shows the ruling Liberal Democrats as a party that is letting down the people of Cornwall in county government. Let us hope that things can only get better, as they sing. The report was made in summer 2007 so perhaps since then the council is out of the slough and marching to the sunlit uplands and the delectable mountains as we speak and come the spring the Audit Commission assessment will be glowing. Yes, I hope so.

Oh, there’s one amusing comment. The council should “listen and be seen to be listening to local stakeholders.” I’m not sure what a stakeholder is; does it include members of the public in Cornwall, those people whose views the council chose not to notice in the unitary debate? Probably not.

This follows on from this post of 7 December 2007 on next year’s formula grant for local government.

An official council paper presented recently to the county executive says candidly that the increase from central government in the formula grant over 2007-08 is “much higher than expected and sees Cornwall close to the higher end of shire county increases.” The paper goes on to point out that this means about £6.2 million more than county council budget planners predicted Cornwall would receive. The paper adds that the following two financial years to 2010-11 exceed, to a lesser degree, the county council’s predictions of funding.

This is a welcome frankness about how well Cornwall with a 8.5 percent increase has done out of the settlement and puts the earlier political wailing in context. The average increase for the shire counties is around 5.7 percent.

The paper goes on to point out that the Cornwall largess still leaves the county council with a deficit of nearly £5 million on current spending plans.This is a serious problem.

The Liberal Democrat council has made some curious spending choices in the near past and has at times appeared incoherent about its route. Can it improve? Not enough, I think, and that’s a pity because, Labour being out of the possibility of power in Cornwall at present, the alternative is the godforbid Conservatives.

I shall look at the effect of the damping mechanism on Cornwall’s funding later.

The annual assessment by the Commission for Social Care Inspection (CSCI) of the performance of Cornwall county council’s adult social services has just given the council one star (out of a possible maximum of three) for 2007 and described its delivery of outcomes as “adequate.” Of the 150 England authorities assessed by CSCI for 2007 I count forty eight getting three stars, seventy four getting two stars, and twenty eight, including Cornwall, getting one star. Cornwall is in the bottom, ie worst, fifth group. For adult services in 2004 it got three stars, in 2005 two stars, and in 2006 one, a downhill katabasis.

The full CSCI report is here but it does not fully explain the reasons for the council’s decline in the performance ratings. The county council’s response, which strikes me as overly upbeat, is here. The prospects for improvement by the council are assessed by CSCI as “promising”. I really hope that’s a judgement that proves to be right.

The minister responsible for local government finance in England, John Healey, said in the Commons debate on the local government finance settlement for the three years 2008/09-2010/11 that “there is a certain regular choreography about the annual settlements” (Hansard 6 December 2007, column 986). And so there is. The dissatisfied, who always far outnumber the satisfied, complain and the debate in the Commons and outside has overflowed with complaints.

Complainants grumble about the general inadequacy of the funding or the unfairness of it for their area.

Next financial year central government is giving local government in England £70.4 billion.

I cannot say whether those billions are enough to provide satisfactory services overall but those who believe it should be more do not say where any extra funds should come from. More taxes? Efficiency - which often turns out to mean fewer paperclips or sacking people or ending or curtailing services?

As for parochial complaints, Healey tellingly said, “every council regards itself as uniquely disadvantaged by central government funding decisions, and every council has a special case unique to its circumstances” (Hansard 6 December 2007, column 990). Indeed, and Cornwall fits his satire well.

On cue, Cornwall county council, has expressed disappointment at the funding saying that although central government is giving Cornwall additional money, it is not enough for the county’s pressing needs. I put below a link to a similar response from London councils. Again, I can’t say whether Cornwall and the others have a case.

Overall, the increase in funding in the formula grant (which covers revenue support grant, redistributed business rates, and the police grant) next financial year against this year averages in the inner London boroughs 2 percent; shires in the the south east, that pampered ogre of Cornish nationalist mythology, between 3.7 and 2 percent; shire counties in England 5.7 percent; and Cornwall 8.5 percent. General (not local government) inflation is about 2 to 4 percent. Whatever one might say about 2008/09 local government funding, it would not be convincing to argue that Cornwall is uniquely disadvantaged by it.

The Commons debate is here.

Details of the financial settlement from the Department for communities are here.

And here is the response of the councils in London: “London is hardest hit by ‘devastating’ three-year funding announcement.”

This is an updated version of the unitary update post of 24 October 2007.

Here is the timetable for a decision on Cornwall moving to a unitary council, as given in the House of Commons on 15 October (Hansard column 862W): first the local government bill has to be passed; after that a decision on Cornwall (and the other unitary candidates) will be taken by the government in late November or early December; then the draft implementation orders will be put before parliament; if they are passed the implementation orders will be made at the end of 2007.

On 5 December 2007 the government said it had decided that Cornwall, and some others, should be a unitary council. The elections to the new Cornwall unitary county council will be in 2009. The name of the new council is still to be decided.

The effect of a judicial review is not apparently included in the above timetable.

The Liberal Democrats are doing the grievance thing again.

They are complaining that Cornwall does not get a fair share of central government money (the “formula grant”) for local government services in Cornwall, that Cornwall’s formula grant is less than the national average, that Islington gets more funding, and that Cornwall loses money by means of “damping.” I think Islington is mentioned because it can at a push be presented as Tony Blair territory.

First, the formula grant, simply.

This is basically what the money given by central government to local government authorities is called. It is made up of non-domestic rates (business rates) collected locally, pooled centrally, and then redistributed; the revenue support grant for such things as pay and services; and, now, a dedicated schools grant. The various amounts paid to each authority are worked out by formulas which aim to reflect the particular circumstances of the authorities taking account of levels of deprivation, number of pupils, the composition of the population, and so on. See here for details about the working out of the Cornwall grant. Housing and in effect police services are paid for by other funds. And on top of this central government money the local authority raises more money by levying a council tax.

Second, how much are we talking about?

For 2007/08 Cornwall county council gets a formula grant of £127.970 million. The district councils in Cornwall also get formula grants.

What is damping?

That formula grant of £127.970 million is after an amount is taken away from Cornwall county council’s central government funding for “damping.” This is a mechanism for redistributing money among authorities to ensure each one gets a minimum grant increase, in effect and intention a mechanism for minimising changes in grants received. This damping device strikes me as a civilised response, protecting people from a sudden and large loss of central government money. Cornwall gave up £6.7 million for damping in 2007/08. I should have thought Liberal Democrats in Cornwall would approve of the mechanism but apparently not.

Does Cornwall get less than the national average? I am unsure what this national average means since the grant to local authorities reflects their different sizes of populations, the different make-ups of their populations, and the different needs of their populations. Average is a problematic concept with so much reasonable variation. For the one aspect where average is meaningful the 2007/08 Budget Book published by Cornwall county council says on page 16 that the percentage increase in the formula grant for Cornwall for 2007/08 is “above the English average” increase: see here.

Does Islington get more than Cornwall for the formula grant? Oh yes, for 2007/08 it receives £146.776 million. Is this unfair? Well, I discussed the unfairness issue when the Cornwall Libdems complained about Islington getting a larger dedicated schools grant than Cornwall. Islington has a larger proportion of pupils on free school dinners and more measured deprivation. Again, I should have thought Liberal Democrats supported equalising help for the worst off, but again apparently not.

The Liberal Democrats in Cornwall are sounding like a party that is not in favour of redistributing wealth. Before David Cameron came along we usually called such a party Conservative.

Does Cornwall get a fair share of the money? Look at the way the grants are worked out and decide: see here. I believe it largely does; Cornwall is not bled dry by the rest of England.

For example, in the redistribution of the business rates (part of the formula grant), Cornwall receives back £102 million more than is collected from the county. This gain dwarfs the damping loss. Islington, by the way, gets back £15 million less than it collects.

Have you read about the £102 million gain for Cornwall on Liberal Democrat or nationalist websites? There’s really quite a lot of positive news for Cornwall that doesn’t get a mention on them, isn’t there?

The results of the consultation with people in Cornwall through leaflet and questionnaire by Cornwall county council are now available in a report by PFA, Bodmin on the county council website.

There were 665 unique responses but the leaflet was not delivered to some areas.

The report begins with a warning: “the many and varied responses received on the questionnaire are open to subjective interpretation.” As I explained in this post, perhaps that is what the county council wanted in choosing this sort of consultation rather than a straightforward yes/no vote on their proposals. However, PFA have helpfully produced quantified answers.

On the first question about support for a unitary council if it is financially sound, 49 percent said No and 34 percent said Yes. On the other two questions about more local decision making there were comfortable majorities in support.

Thus, most people – well, 49 percent – opposed the unitary council proposals or the principle of a unitary council.

In its response to the report Cornwall county council does not mention the 49 percent of opponents though it does reproduce the figures, more comfortable for it, of the other two questions.

This isn’t a response; it is the politics of an ostrich.

The county council has put up another response to the unitary issue on its website, a leaflet called Towards one Cornwall . Here it is casually dismissive of the
71 000 people in Cornwall who voted in the district polls. It does not, of course, mention the 49 percent opposed to the unitary council in its own survey; rather it says “the vast majority of people have been confused by the conflicting messages” about the unitary council. Oh come now, voters are well used to conflicting messages in any election and well able to make up their minds. I do not believe the county council would be talking condescendingly like this if the majority had supported the proposals. Perhaps we see here a new Liberal Democrat approach: an end to all elections because the voters get confused.

Of the 81 percent vote in the district polls against the unitary proposals, the county council says it “carefully considered” it and then dismisses it as insignificant. This is shameful.

It really isn’t worth spending any more time on Cornwall county council. It has thoroughly discredited itself through the high-handed way it has handled the unitary issue and the Liberal Democrat party finds itself seriously tainted by all this.

The Audit Commission has published its assessment of county and equivalent local authorities. Cornwall scores an overall 3 on a scale of up to 4, the same as last time. These are the detailed scores for the categories assessed:

Corporate assessment 3, Use of resources 2, Children and young people 2, Adult social care 2, Environment 3, Culture 4, Fire and rescue 2, Financial reporting 2, Financial management 2, Financial standing 3, Internal control 3, Value for money 2.

The county council’s direction of travel, whether it is getting better or worse, is subject to review.

The overall 3 is good but those scores of 2 are unimpressive results and they include the ones which directly affect people, the young and the elderly, the vulnerable. The cuts in the 2007/08 budget will make improving them much harder. The county council should now explain how it plans to do better, much better.

The council wishes to become a unitary council replacing all the district councils in Cornwall. It says if it runs all Cornwall it will save money: look at those financial scores and wonder at the confidence.