Themes & Trends in Signed-off Round 2 Local Area Agreements (LAAs)

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Themes & Trends in Signed-off Round 2 Local Area Agreements (LAAs)Vicki Goddard, Policy Officer

18th April 2007

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Outline of this presentation• Background to this research

• Plus points and caveats

• Main overall findings from blocks and themes

• Main Yorkshire & Humberside (Y&H) findings from blocks and themes

• Taking the findings forward

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Background to this research 1

• Round 2 LAAs signed-off 23 March 2006

• Uploaded them on to IDeA Knowledge (/laa)

• Potential great source of collective information for different uses

• Scoped a project around this

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Background to this research 2• Commissioned later than planned

• Four objectives – for IDeA use but happy to share research

• Commissioned Warwick Business School in September 2006

• Individual templates and collation approach

• Final report submitted January 2007

• Spreading the word and using the findings

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Plus points and caveats

• Unique, detailed source of who’s working on what

• Assists helpdesk queries and provides evidence for policy development

• Only based on signed-off, positive Agreements – what, not how or why

• More similarities than differences

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Main overall findings from CYP 1Not surprisingly, strongly linked to national policy (Every Child Matters):

• Be Healthy (75% - especially linked to diet and exercise)

• Stay Safe (68% - especially substance abuse)

• Enjoy & Achieve (62% - especially educational achievement)

• Make a Positive Contribution (57% - especially volunteering)

• Achieve economic well-being (60% - especially NEETs)

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Main overall findings from CYP 2Additional key themes at regional level include:

• Improved outcomes for looked after children

• Promote learning/provide best chances

• Narrowing the gap in targeted communities (Y&H)

• Reduce teenage pregnancy

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Y&H overall findings from CYP

• Educational attainment mostly focused on Key Stages

• Be healthy generally about sexual issues, diet and exercise

• Economic well-being (N)EETs

• Looked after children featuring in these three areas

• Early years – a focus for one LAA

• CYP issues evident in other blocks:

• HCOP: infant mortality and breastfeeding

• EDE: 16-19 achievement

• SSC: young offenders

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Main overall findings from HCOP 1Again, not surprisingly, strongly linked to national policy:

• Improved health

 Being healthy

 Well-being

 Tackling health inequalities

 Promoting independent living

 Access to care and services

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Main overall findings from HCOP 2Additional key themes at regional level include:

• Reducing health inequalities (Y&H)

 Promoting healthier lifestyles (Y&H)

• Reducing smoking and exposure to tobacco smoke (Y&H)

 Improving life expectancy/ reduce mortality

• Independent living for older/disabled people (Y&H)

 Improving health generally

 Reduce obesity

• Improving mental/emotional health

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Y&H overall findings from HCOP

• Key themes: independent living, access to services, tackling health inequalities

• Wider, related themes: decent homes and financial security

• All five LAAs have health issues in other blocks

• For example SSC: substance misuse, domestic violence and violent crime

• Three LAAs linking premature mortality with life expectancy

• Rural issues implicit in four Y&H LAAs around transport and access to services

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Main overall findings from SSC 1

Again, not surprisingly, focuses on two mandatory outcomes:

• Reduce (fear of) crime/harm caused by illegal drugs, antisocial behaviour• Empowerment and influence over decision-making and service delivery ‘Stronger’:• Based more on local, diverse indicators • Voluntary & Community Sector involvement - support, strengthened capacity and increased volunteering)• Rural areas - access to service/facilities, transport/mobility, village halls, housing and quality of life for those in greatest need

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Main overall findings from SSC 2Common areas of national and local concern include:

• Drugs and alcohol• Respect (Y&H)• Community cohesion• Clean/green/safe areas (all)• Improving quality of life in most disadvantaged areas• Crime• Housing (Y&H)• ‘Closing the gap’ (Y&H)

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Y&H overall findings from SSC

• Good balance between safer and stronger aspects

• Safer – reducing (fear of) crime, road safety, fire deaths

• Stronger – cleaner/safer/greener and closing the gap (5/5 LAAs)

• All have targets on re-offending• • 4/5 have targets on domestic violence

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Main overall findings from ED&E 1Regional priority issues –focusing on enhancing the economy overall:

 Business support/development (all regions)

• Reducing worklessness/increasing employment (Y&H)

 Skills development (Y&H)

 Inward investment (Y&H)

• Targeting disadvantaged groups and neighbourhoods (Y&H)

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Main overall findings from ED&E 2Regional priority issues –focusing on enhancing the economy overall:

 Y&H targets on NVQs, Key Stages, (N)EETs

• Y&H also focusing on implicit ED issues e.g. transport, access to services

• Little mention of pay and workforce strategies BUT

• Y&H tackling travel access to jobs, sickness absence, money management

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Main overall findings on cross-cutting issues 1 • 24 additional themes identified as cross-cutting

• All regions tackling:

• strong/cohesive/sustainable/inclusive communities

• inequalities/narrowing the gap

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Main overall findings on cross-cutting issues 2

• The main cross-cutting issues ‘beneath’ those two are:

• arts/culture/sport

• health/substance abuse (not just included in HCOP block)

• community engagement and empowerment (related to it being mandatory?)

• VCS/volunteering

• Service user access/satisfaction

• Cross-cutting issues focus on local circumstances and priorities.

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Governance – Similarities Across LSPs 1 Specific, strengthened executive group below the LSP Board

 Typically comprises senior managers from public sector services, businesses and the VCS, usually drawn from respective LSP Boards

Beneath are (often LSP) thematic partnerships, task and sub-groups

Work to priorities and outcomes of Sustainable Community Strategies

Role of district LSPs often presented in broad terms

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Governance – Similarities Across LSPs 2• Theme groups mostly accountable for addressing targets but also:• leading on action and implementation plans• delivering, commissioning LAA/target interventions and any interventions• monitoring and evaluating progress and making recommendations Some LAAs detail devolved responsibility for operational planning, delivery and change to service providers/ commissioners

• Local authorities often lead the four standard blocks, partly due to the influence of central government initiatives• Y&H structures seemed more self-confident and established than some regions

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Enhanced partnership working – key issues 1• Success depends on existing strength and maturity of the partnership

• Private sector involvement is rare and district council involvement varies

 Communication across partnerships is being tested via the LAA process: • Sometimes strengthened - partners more involved in managing performance

• Sometimes testing capacity, e.g. right info to right people in right language

• Performance data – providing timely (quarterly) data is still an issue for individual organisations, as well as collating data between organisations

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Enhanced partnership working – key issues 2 Capacity and support – PCT reorganisation still impacting on LSPs

• Council/elected member role:

• Time to manage developments after LAA sign-off

• Some councillors’ negative views of unelected, un-scrutinised bodies

• Keeping partners on board

• Districts’ impact: delivery/management roles, organisation and relationships

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Voluntary & Community Sector involvement

 Communications and awareness

• Consultation/engagement

• Governance, representation and responsibility

• Commissioning/delivery

• Capacity

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Performance Management Issues – Often… 1

• Relates to current arrangements

• The responsibility of the local authority

• Scrutinised at the highest level

• Districts hardly mentioned beyond membership of PM groups

• Responsibility for targets is clear but not how to deal with underperformance

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Performance Management Issues – Often… 2• Partner teething troubles with existing council PM systems

 Emphasis on data collection (additional, major task) - little/no time for use 

 Data requested in different formats, definitions and timescales

 Neighbourhood /sharing worklessness data are particularly difficult areas

 Different public sector cultures around performance management means - alignment and culture shifts needed

• Information is sparse in some policy areas and too detailed in others