Local government

About local e-government

e-Government is of course part of a bigger picture and one element of a partnership between local and central government to improve public services. Over the last year in particular, there have been significant developments in other elements of the partnership that must serve to provide a focus for the positioning of outputs from the local e-government programme.

These include:

  • The SR2004 Public Service Agreement requires Communities and local Government to "improve the effectiveness and efficiency of local government in leading and delivering services to all communities" by 2008
  • The results of the 2004 Spending Review in July 2004 incorporated a target for efficiency gains in local government of 2.5 per cent per annum, to deliver at least £6.45 billion by 2007/08. It is a further requirement that at least half of this is cashable
  • In June 2004, we published the leaflet 'The future of local government' to help stimulate the debate about a vision for local government. This was followed at the end of July with 'The future of local government: Developing a 10-year vision' which contributes our ideas to the debate
  • At its heart is a vision of central and local government working together to deliver better outcomes for people and places, including real challenges for local government in terms of political and managerial leadership, improving citizen engagement and participation and improving service delivery
  • The framework for the Comprehensive Performance Assessment (CPA) from 2005 will be markedly different from when it was first introduced in 2002. Whilst there will still be distinct service and corporate assessments, there will be a much greater emphasis on measuring authorities' performance against the shared priority themes. The framework will also have a much greater focus on local authorities' delivery of value for money and their approach to cost-effectiveness and efficiency

Over the coming year the local e-government programme must:

  • Take account of the changing policy climate in order to ensure that programme outputs deliver impact and provide a sustainable legacy 
  • Influence the emerging political debate in key areas

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Central-Local concordat

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