Search results

The large scale and far reaching functions of local government in the United Kingdom today are eloquent proofs of the universal demand for local services of high quality and wide coverage extending into almost every sector of life from literally the cradle to the grave. In the cities of Britain local government is often found to employ more people than any other single organisation. There are some 25,400 councillors in Britain and around 2,500,000 employees. The total expenditure of local authorities in England and Wales for 1984–85 was estimated at £24,323,000,000.1 The services provided include departments for development and planning, art galleries, libraries, museums, engineers, building surveyors, environmental health, architects, estate surveyors, housing, leisure and recreation, social services, economic development, education, transport, highways, trading standards, fire brigade, and police. In addition each local authority has departments mainly concerned with services to the other departments: the chief executive or secretary, personnel and management, solicitor, treasurer, and central purchasing services. Each of these departments has several important subdivisions, and clearly all require a constant inflow of information, and increasingly it is recognised local authorities generate large quantities of important information which can be used more widely with benefit within the authority, as well as outside.

This paper aims to trace the hybridising of financial and service expertise in English local authority budget control to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the contexts that gave rise to hybridisation than do previous accountability research frameworks.

Using practice theory, this paper interprets the findings from a field study of Newcastle City Council and a review of relevant local authority regulation for England, stretching back to the 1980s.

The hybridisation of financial and service expertise has entailed major changes to the practices on which local authority management depends, fuelled by a changing societal role of local authorities. Frequently, local authorities are no longer providers of public services but enablers who purchase services and manage arms-length contracts. This paper identifies some of the ways in which three structural elements that underpin local authority management practices have evolved to give rise to novel practices.

Even though this paper’s research into changing regulatory frameworks, rules and evolving local authority financial practices is based on institutional changes in England since the 1980s, the fieldwork element which fleshes out certain implications for local authority practices has focused on Newcastle City Council. Future research could fruitfully examine these issues in other local authorities.

The hybridisation of financial and service expertise has contributed to reshaping local government beyond the rules that are put in place for regulating the sector by giving rise to new practices. Recent key developments include new service delivery arrangements, for example, through council-owned subsidiaries or third-sector organisations. It is important that, in an austerity context, new risks to “off the books” service quality is matched by new control and audit arrangements. Moreover, the professional bodies that service local government should recognise the new forms of hybridisation of finance and service expertise and ensure arrangements for the changing skill sets of those involved in service provision.

This is the first paper to analyse the emergence of hybrid financial expertise in the public sector with reference to distinct structural elements of the relevant practices.

During the last 15 years, local authorities in many OECD countries have been introducing competition for the provision of services, placing less emphasis on the direct provision of services and more on the strategic planning of service provision. Often this has involved encouraging both private firms and voluntary organizations to become providers of local government services. Analyses the emergence of enabling in two European countries, Ireland and the UK, and argues that local authorities in both countries are reluctant enablers. With reference to the UK, examines the implications of the CCT legislation, the key factor in the development of enabling and compares this to the emergence in Ireland of a trend towards contracting out.

Considers the role of marketing in an increasingly profit‐oriented local authority. Discusses the problems involved when a public service espouses marketing principles, but concludes that only marketing can make most effective use of the scarce resources available to local authorities.

Reviews the history of political and professional debates on the optimum size of public library authorities in the UK. Discusses conclusions on size in the major legislation and reports on public library policy prior to local government reorganization in 1974. Considers the effects of the 1974 local government reorganization and examines the subsequent continuing debate. Concludes that in the light of further impending modification of the UK local government system, further research is required into the structure and size of a public library service.

The statement of service performance is a mandatory report provided by local governments in New Zealand. Despite 20 years' reporting experience, the Office of the Auditor-General (2008) criticised the poor quality of these reports. Past theoretical literature has attempted to develop a framework for the accountability expectations of documents provided by public-sector entities (Stewart, 1984). The purpose of this paper is to measure the consistency of the statements of service performance about wastewater services made by New Zealand local governments with the accountability expectations, using an accountability disclosure index. The paper reveals a moderately high level of consistency. “Probity” and “legality” accountability disclosures are high while “process/efficiency” and “performance programme-effectiveness” accountability are less emphasised. The results suggest that accountability expectations provide a useful tool for evaluating statements of service performance.

I would like to begin by taking a general look at the official publications of local authorities, not only at what they are, but also at who uses them and what they are actually used for. In addition, I would like to try to make a rough assessment of the recent attempts to increase access to them, particularly emphasising the positive improvements that have taken place over recent years — and also to try to identify the shortcomings that remain. In examining the changing patterns of the publication of information recently, we should not only look at developments such as the Access to Information Act and the abolition of the Metropolitan County Councils, but also take a wider view, examining, for instance, whether increasing emphasis on value for money techniques in individual local authorities and the aim for objective decision making has altered the information and documentary requirements of local government and the value placed on them. Finally, and most centrally, I would like to look at the existing role played by local government information services in this area, and perhaps speculate on what can be achieved in the future. I would like to approach this by making a number of key points and then, hopefully, we can discuss those you feel of most value. My contribution has the broad title ‘Local government information services’. David Mort of the Centre for Local Economic Strategies will take a look at the information services provided by outside organisations for local authorities. The distinction between our contributions is, I hope, fairly clear and I will attempt to restrict myself to discussing the information services provided by individual local authorities while David will look at the wider scene. There is, of course, a grey area of information services which do not fall exactly within the boundaries of this definition and I will very briefly mention a number of these later, but first it might be useful to begin by having a very brief word about our sponsors. This seminar is a joint venture by the Aslib Planning Environment and Transport Information Group (PETIG) and the Standing Committee on Official Publications (SCOOP). SCOOP was formally set up at the beginning of 1983 and is a direct descendant of the Library Association/HMSO Services Working Party which was established in 1971. It might be helpful if I briefly summarise a number of the formal arrangements under which SCOOP operates in order to set the context for my contribution. The Committee's principal aims relate to UK national and local government official publications and these are to improve access and availability to such documents, to identify and propose solutions to problems of access and to provide mechanisms for the exchange of views between members of the library community on matters of common interest concerning UK official publications.

The starting point for this paper is research undertaken for the British Library by the author and Margaret Lomer during 1981 and 1982. The principal reasons for carrying out that research were the concerns expressed by public librarians as to changes which had occurred in the management and organisation of local authorities from the mid 1960s to the mid 1970s (ie approximately the period from the reorganisation of London local government to the reorganisation of local government in the remainder of the country). The changes which were of most concern were part of the movement towards “corporate management” and which involved the creation of conglomerate “programme” committees and directorates by amalgamating existing service committees and departments. Some librarians felt that the inclusion of the library service within a programme structure represented a diminution in status and was likely to have an adverse effect on the service. This concern was heightened by Peter Shore's ultimately ill‐fated proposals for Organic Change in 1979 which resurrected the desire to find the best, or most appropriate, location for the library service within the management structure of the local authority.

Great Britain is a laboratory for new techniques of public management; it is therefore an interesting place to look at for people willing to get involved in large public organisations. The French ‘institute for local studies’, trains future professionals, selected after graduation or after a working experience, in order to take high positions in local authorities nationwide. Three pairs of trainees belonging to the 2012–2013 group spent two weeks in three local authorities in England, with the purpose of analysing the performance management in these organisations.

British and French scholars dedicated to public organisations provided the six trainees with a global view of local government and reforms in the United Kingdom. After that, each pair exchanged information with the local authority they would visit; during the two weeks they spent there, an officer followed their works. They interviewed numerous professionals, elected members and unionists, attended meetings and events. Back in France, they presented their findings in several documents. The original subject was measuring and managing performance; in fact, the three pairs went farther and looked over many aspects of the organisations’ functioning.

Local authorities are facing important budget reductions and appear fragile; they put forward the idea of resilience to express the necessity of using all their resources to deal with a difficult situation. Elected members have a role of political initiative, but they also focus a lot on control, which is much more developed in Britain than in France; managers experience a very difficult period, with a lot of threats on their jobs, teams and projects. In this context, professional networks are very important; peer review is an interesting example of the role of professional exchanges in the search for new solutions. At last, unions don’t seek conflicts but try to accompany changes, lessening their negative consequences on people.

This work is not an academic one but an approach of the reality of organisations analysed by professionals or future professionals of the public sector, in a kind of ‘peer review’ between different countries. This international dimension is interesting, seeing that few in-depth comparisons between local authorities are made, especially between France and Britain.

Index by subjects, compiled by K.G.B. Bakewell covering the following journals: Facilities Volumes 8‐17; Journal of Property Investment & Finance Volumes 8‐17; Property Management Volumes 8‐17; Structural Survey Volumes 8‐17.