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- 'Leading by Influence: Managing in complex partnerships'
Phil Woolas MP
Minister of State
Minister for Local Government (May 2006 - June 2007)- View Phil Woolas 's profile
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'Leading by Influence: Managing in complex partnerships'
| Date of speech | 11 October 2006 |
|---|
Transcript of the speech as delivered.
This is an interesting time for all the leading lights of local government to be meeting. Just a matter of weeks before the Local Government White Paper, and a matter of months before the final recommendations of Sir Michael Lyons' Inquiry and - a little further away - the outcomes of the Comprehensive Spending Review.
I have two messages for you today: 1. That we are serious about devolution and 2. To ask you if you are up for the challenge. You will be well aware of our general directions of travel in the White Paper and our agenda to devolve power to both local government and citizens. And I will say something about these in a minute.
But I think it is helpful to just look briefly at where we have come from, by way of setting the White Paper in context. We could very briefly sum it up as follows. The Government has invested a lot of money in local government - by 2007/08 a real terms increase of 39 per cent in Government grant since 1997. The volume of money and investment in Local Government has been significant.
At the same time we put in place a pretty heavy-handed top-down performance regime. Local government responded and began to improve its performance in many ways - not least in delivering better quality services and in managing its performance.
To continue the travelling metaphor, now we need to move on, to a new devolutionary era. In this era, the focus is on place - not on individual players and providers. It is on the positive difference you are making for your area - not on the detail of how you and your partners might be doing it.
Local government must be the place shaper and place maker. That means working across the whole landscape, not just being confined to silos of service delivery or particular spheres of influence.
Most of you are chief executives of councils from up and down the country - from cities, from towns, from urban areas and from rural areas. Now we want leaders of those places, not just of councils. The Leadership Centre is publishing a new booklet - 'The Politics of Place' - here at the conference and I recommend you look at it. In fact when creating the vision for Communities and Local Government it was the policy of the place that shaped our thinking.
We are confident in the devolution agenda, and we are confident that Local Area Agreements can help deliver this devolutionary agenda. Ruth made this crystal clear at the LGA conference in July when she talked of making it a habit. But the question is - Are you up for it too? My biggest fear is that you are saying you want devolution, but you are not up for it in reality.
If you read page 106 of the Labour Party Manifesto, under Councils: more freedom, less bureaucracy it outlines the Government's commitment to devolution. "Strong communities ultimately require strong local government. We will give councils further freedoms to deliver better local services, subject to minimum national standards…..and we will dramatically simplify the many funding streams available to local areas through Local Area Agreements." The whole of HM's Government has signed up to the idea of Local Area Agreements, indeed at his Party Conference speech the Chancellor, Gordon Brown, said
"it is right that local councils, not Whitehall, should have more power over the things that matter to their community and from economic regeneration to public transport the empowerment and strengthening of local councils and local communities is what we must now do."
This is a serious agenda, and I welcome that.
At the LGA conference I summed up devolution as moving from an era where I get the blame and you get the credit, to one where you get the blame and I get the credit. That is what leadership and responsibility are all about and it comes with the territory of devolution. There are no easy targets for passing on the blame or excuses to make. Places need strong, strategic and accountable leadership. Devolution is about giving local leaders the tools and the freedom to shape places to be successful for the people who live and work there. This is about empowering local government.
I know some councils are certainly up for devolution. Those councils have looked for every opportunity for taking the lead and making a difference. Opportunities through local area agreements and through other powers and freedoms we have given to local authorities in recent years.
For example, my officials are currently talking to Stockton about an Advanced LAA with more flexibility on some funding streams. In turn they would look at their governance arrangements to give greater democratic accountability. Stockton is also one of the authorities working on the Tees Valley business case following the summit in May. We know Tees Valley is looking for greater control over local delivery so they can improve their economic performance and growth.
Derbyshire has already been using the increased flexibility of their LAA to target funding where it is most needed to tackle inequities for children and young people. As a result they have exceeded their target for 'not in employment, education or training' (NEET) by over 15 per cent - against the national trend. They have also been able to set aside a new £50k fund for children's services initiatives by the third sector so they can fund small-scale innovations quickly.
The London Borough of Lewisham has pooled funding streams for SureStart, Connexions, Teenage Pregnancy and the Children's Fund. Together with two new freedoms agreed with DfES this has meant they could target pockets of deprivation and groups like 8-13 year olds where there was a gap in provision.
LAAs are already giving most of you considerably more financial flexibility. In the 87 latest LAAs around £700 million of central funding was pooled - and much, much more aligned locally. 47 of these LAAs shared £45 million pump priming to deliver their stretch targets. If they do deliver, they will win a further £485 million between them. Similarly, there will be pump-priming and reward grants for many of the LAAs being signed off next March. So far the pooled funding comes from an average of 9 funding streams per LAA. This will rise to 20 or more next April. We are making progress.
But there are still some local authorities which are not in the 'thinking bigger' category, who are not seeking fundamental changes in culture. For example when we asked councils what enabling measures they wanted, quite a few asked for freedoms they already had. This doesn't suggest to me that they were making the most of opportunities or looking to push forward the boundaries.
Then there are others where the standard response is that "more money will solve all our problems". Let me make it absolutely clear - we are not putting tax up. Nor will we allow excessive increases in council tax. What we will do is deliver a period of financial security through the movement towards 3 year settlements. I believe that this will impact on your ability to deliver better public services locally.
This means more personalised services built around delivering the combination that suits individual lifestyles and meets the needs of each citizen at a particular point in their life. This service 'DNA' will certainly not come from one provider, so silos must be a thing of the past. And it will certainly change as an individual's life moves on, so the offer must be flexible not static. We are talking about services that are people driven, not provider driven.
Speech by Phil Woolas MP on 11 October 2006.
