IT would be churlish not to doff caps to Sefton’s maximum four star rating by the Audit Commission, announced on Thursday – particularly when it was languishing on only two stars not so long ago.
This was the set of reports, of course, that branded Liverpool ‘the worst local authority in the country’ on account of it’s rating of one for its ‘use of resources’ (ie. financial management). Whilst deserving of its plaudits, I note that on important individual measures (e.g. housing, environment, children’s services) Sefton’s scores were three on four across the board. There’s still room for improvement.
I must profess a large dose of ignorance about the actual mechanisms of the Comprehensive Performance Assessment (CPA). Not everyone agrees with them. Sme may detect a whiff of sour grapes but one critic is Liberal Democrat leader on the Local Government Association, Richard Kemp – a prominent Liverpool councillor. I gather the approach is highly managerialist and both looking through the assessment results for our region’s councils and the top and bottom 10 rated ones in the country, I can see little pattern based on size, type (met borough, unitary or county council) or political control. If anyone can detect a ‘narrative’ about what’s hot and what’s not in English local government I’d be grateful for their thoughts.
One thing is clear – finance is held to underpin all else. And on that front, the crunch is near. Sefton’s cabinet and full council meets on February 28 to finalise its budget and council tax demands for 2008/9. Watch this space and the pages of the Visiter for updates…
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