Redrawing councils map to save money ‘too simplistic’
Deloitte expert calls on authorities to revisit agenda to share systems
REDRAWING the councils map of Scotland to save cash and improve frontline services is too simplistic and would not enhance the role of local government, one of the world’s leading accountancy firms has warned.
Deloitte said an overhaul of Scottish councils should not start with either expanding or reducing the current number of 32 authorities.
It comes amid mounting speculation that local boundaries could be altered within the next few years.
In a new report directed at the country’s top council officers, the firm said Scotland had spent too long “tinkering around the edges of the challenges faced by local government” and was now at a crisis point.
Writing in today’s Herald, Angela Mitchell, a partner at Deloitte’s Scottish operation, called on local authorities to revisit the stalled or abandoned agenda to share systems and infrastructure across local organisations, which she said “would cut costs, create resilience and ... deliver better outcomes across the public sector”.
Cosla, the body representing most of Scotland’s councils, described the proposals as outdated and said many of the ideas were already being put into practice.
A senior local government source described the plans as “looking like a fairly crude sales pitch”.
Over the next few years the Scottish Government is expected to overhaul local government.
Within the current parliamentary term a bill is planned which aims to “refresh local democracy by giving more power to local communities, review the roles and responsibilities of local authorities with an aim to transform our democratic landscape, protect and renew public services and refresh the relationship between citizens, communities and councils”.
Ms Mitchell said that the reform of local government had previously stalled due to a fear of failure by senior officers and risk aversion amongst political leaders that they could face a backlash within the electoral cycle due to job losses.
She said the Christie Commission, set up to address pressures within the public sector by focusing on prevention, had not achieved the intended success.
Ms Mitchell also said concerns over job security and “pay-flat-lining” were key factors affecting local authorities’ ability to undertake change and modernise services.
She added: “Anything that is not continuing with ‘business as usual’ comes with personal and organisational risks. The risk-averse culture within local government means people do not want to take a chance of failing. Local politics get in the way of change and we’re also caught in a perpetual electoral cycle in Scotland. But time has moved on. Councils are at a crisis point and there are more and more pressures on services. Issues like elderly care will not be going away.
“In England we’re even seeing some authorities cutting services rather than collaborating with other councils. Scotland can’t get caught in that trap.”
A Cosla spokesman said: “It would be wrong to think that many of the ideas put forward here have not already happened. This is an often quoted, simplistic and slightly outdated approach to reform. The idea that shared services etc is the silver bullet is simply wrong.
“Councils are up for reform. For a long time we have advocated the need for change and for reform to happen. But we would push for the scope of sharing to go wider.” THE retirement age would have to rise above average life expectancy in 162 Scottish neighbourhoods if state pensions increases are to be maintained at current levels, MPs have warned.
Maintaining the so-called “triple lock” would see the pensionable age rise to 70.5 by 2060 and it needs to be “retired”, the Commons Work and Pensions Committee said. It notes that is higher than people on average are expected to die in a number of areas north of the Border.
Glasgow alone has 62 neighbourhoods where male life expectancy is below 70.5, with the lowest – the Parkhead West and Barrowfield area – down to just 62.5.
Committe chairman Frank Field MP reiterated its call for the “triple lock” – which guarantees the state pension rises by average earnings, the consumer price index, or 2.5 per cent, whichever is the highest – to be scrapped, saying it had “done its job”.
The committee said research it had commissioned from the Institute for Fiscal Studies found that if ministers were to index pensions to a “smoothed” earnings link – protecting the value of the pension when inflation outstripped earnings – it would save 0.8 per cent of GDP a year.
Mr Field said: “With the triple lock, the only way state pension expenditure can be made sustainable is to keep raising the state pension age. This has the effect of excluding ever more people from the state pension. Such people will disproportionately be from more deprived areas and manual occupations.”
‘‘ Local politics get in the way of change and we’re also caught in a perpetual electoral cycle in Scotland