Good and Getting Better - Mid Beds Score Four out of Five!


“Mid Beds District Council has a strong focus on meeting its customers' needs and succeeds in delivering good value for money to local council taxpayers.”
 
Just one of the major conclusions the Audit Commission inspectors made following their inspection of Mid Beds District Council.  They have awarded Mid Beds a ‘Good’ rating (4 out of a possible 5) in their Comprehensive Performance Assessment (CPA) after Mid Beds volunteered to be inspected.
 
The Inspectors found that Mid Beds achieves good outcomes for local people.  There has been strong improvement in waste management, affordable housing, minimising departures from the local plan, improving customer access, and in improving Value For Money. Below are just some of the good outcomes for Mid Beds’ residents:
 
· Over £1.5m in efficiency savings achieved over the last two years.
 
· Our customer service strategy has delivered significant improvements, including additional Citizone Points of Presence, a single point of contact phone number and the customer access portal.
 
· Leisure facilities across the district are good and participation rates for local people are well above average.
 
· The Council is helping to tackle disadvantage, for example we provide transport vouchers to enable young people in rural communities to access leisure services.
 
· We have exceeded our target by securing agreements with developers for 695 affordable homes in the district.
 
· Good working relationships with local Registered Social Landlords are resulting in better outcomes for local people on homelessness and anti-social behaviour issues.
 
· Performance on waste management has improved and continues to do so with better than average results in minimising waste and increasing recycling from 12% in 2003/04 to 29.5% in 2005/06. This has risen again to c.35%* in 2006/07.
 
· Our Street Scene services are strong. There is good joint working with parish and town councils to deliver grounds and play area maintenance services effectively and achieve good value for money.
 
· Processing times for minor and other planning applications have improved steadily over the last three years.

· The Council have been successful in securing funds from new developments beyond planned targets. We have secured £97m for a range of new community facilities since 2004/05.
 
 
Jaki Salisbury, Chief Executive of Mid Beds District Council said:

“Providing good services and excellent value for money for our residents has always been at the forefront of everything we do. It’s good that all the hard work of our staff and Councillors has now been formally recognised.” 
 
Councillor Tricia Turner, Leader of the Council added:

 “I am pleased that Mid Beds has got the recognition that it deserves for all the improvements made and substantial financial savings achieved. We have worked tirelessly on improving the services we provide, while meeting tough Government set targets and taking on new responsibilities such as Licensing.  Despite all this, we still remain one of the lowest Council Tax charging district councils in the country and we will continue to seek to improve and address areas raised by the inspectors for improvement.” 

 
Along with our ‘Good’ rating, Mid Beds received a comprehensive report from the Audit Commission highlighting our strengths, including:

  • Resources have been moved into areas of high priority and this has helped the Council to make service improvements.
  • The Council has good capacity to deliver its current objectives. The calibre and capability of councillors and staff are sound, and internal relationships throughout the organisation are good.
  • Processes for decision-making are transparent and effective.
  • ICT (Information Communication Technology) capacity is very good and is now starting to be used to make a real difference to service delivery.
  • Overall service performance is significantly better than average.
  • Performance in delivering vfm (value for money) is particularly strong and local council taxpayers are well served.
  • Work with partners in improving the health of local people is good. Life expectancy is better than average and is improving more quickly than the national average rate.
  • Performance on maintaining the local environment is good. Performance indicators on local street and environmental cleanliness compare well to the best performing councils.
  • The state of the local environment is a key element of ensuring good quality of life for local people and the Council has a positive impact.
  • There are some good outcomes in the quality of many new developments through good use of planning guidance.
     

Some areas were highlighted for further attention:

  • Greater coherence is required between the vision agreed with partners and the Council's own aims and objectives.
  • The Council needs to maximise the opportunities presented by growth and increase the environmental and economic sustainability of the area.
  • The council needs to continue its progress with performance management, by setting clear outcome targets in the Community Plan, linking Community Plan targets with corporate targets and setting more specific High Level Targets.
  • The full CPA report is available here.

 
- ENDS -
 
 
Notes To Editors
 
1) The purpose of the Corporate Assessment is to assess how well the council engages with and leads its communities, delivers community priorities in partnership with others, and ensures continuous improvement across the range of council activities. 

2) It seeks to answer three headline questions:

  •  What is the council trying to achieve?
  • Does the council have the capacity to deliver its ambitions?
  • What has been achieved so far?

These are divided into five specific themes, each receiving a score, which is then also given a weighting. 
 
The five specific themes are: Ambition; Prioritisation; Capacity; Performance Management; Achievement and Improvement. 

3) * - denotes c.35% recycling figure for 2006/07 unaudited

Further information available:


If you require further information please email Catherine Ruvolo-Communications Officer or telephone 01462 611014 or Fax 08703432150.

Linked documents:

* Download CPA final report July 2007 (application/pdf; 125kb)