Self Assessment Report: Equality Framework for Local Government

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EFLG Self Assessment: Interim Report

Introduction:

In April this year, the Equality Framework for LocalGovernment (2009) replaced the Equality Standard for Local Government

(2001) as the national standard forassessing Public Authorities progress in

mainstreaming the equality. The new Framework, whilst aiming to build on

and develop the work councils have done under the Standard, brought alongconsiderable changes and challenges that require the Local Authorities to brace

up and focus on local and current social realities. Most notable of the changes

that this new framework introduces, include: a broader definition of equality;five areas of performance (as against four in the Standard); reduction in the

number of required actions (from 167 of the Standard to 97); three levels of

achievement (as against five levels in the Standard) and evaluation by self-assessment/peer-challenge.

The three levels of achievement recognised by the Framework include:

the basic Developing level, which corresponds with the level-1 and level-2

under the Standard; the intermediate Achieving level, which is equivalent to

the level-3 of the Standard and the highest Excellent level, corresponding

with the level 4 & 5 of the Standard.

The Framework provides for the migration of an Authoritys

achievements under the old Standard such that the Authorities that were

recognised to be at level-1 or level-2 under the Standard will be recognised asthe DevelopingAuthorities under the Framework; the Authorities recognised

to be at level-3 under the Standard shall deemed to be at the Achieving level

under the Framework; the Authorities recognised as at level-4 under the

Standard shall be treated, transiently, as moving towards excellence and,

finally, those at level-5 under the Standard shall be recognised as Excellent

under the Framework.

The NCC, under the Standard, was recognised to have had achieved

level-3. Therefore, under the Framework it shall be migrating and recognised

as an AchievingAuthority.However, in order to ensure that it achieves its

much cherished goal of beingand being branded asan Excellent

Authorityby 2010, NCC decided to make a robust start in the implementation

of the Framework by undertaking a self-assessment exercise to confirm if it in

deed was at the Achieving level. Accordingly, an exercise was undertaken

internally and a survey, modelled precisely in terms of the achievement

journey prescribed by the Framework, was administered withinNCC.


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Nevertheless, the ultimate objective of this assessment was to gauge thegap between its current status and the Excellentstage so as to enable NCC

to workout a tangible road map to guide it towards its much cherished goal.

The Methodology:

The survey instrument for this self-assessmentagainst

Achieving levelcomprised of a close-ended questionnaire, consisting of 32

questions (listed in the annexure attached herewith), spread over the five

performance areas (PA), highlighted by the Framework. The first 03

questions of the questionnaire dealt with the first PA i.e. Knowing your

communities and equality mapping; the next 09 questions covered the second

PA i.e. Place shaping, leadership, partnership and organisationalcommitment; the subsequent four questions concerned the third PA i.e.

Community engagement and satisfaction; the following seven questions were

about the fourth PA i.e. Responsive services and customer care; and, finally,

the last nine questions addressed the fifth PA i.e. A modern and diverse

workforce.

Every question in the questionnaire had four possible responses: 1 or 2

or 3 or 4 {(1 = Not in place), (2 = Currently being established), (3 = In place

but needs improving), (4 = In place and effective)}. The questionnaire, thus, intotal could throw up a score anywhere between 32 (the minimum possible:

32x1) and 128 (the maximum possible: 32x4). Similarly, in its five different

PAs, the scoring ranges would be between their respective maxima and minima

i.e. between 03 and 12 for PA1; between 09 and 36 for PA2; between 04 and

16 for PA3; between 07 and 28 for PA4; and, finally, for PA5 it would be

between 09-36.

The respondents were instructed to presume question was,

specifically, addressed to them and respond, accordingly, as best as they can. Incase the respondents would find a question only partly relevant to them, they

were advised to respond to the question to the extent it pertained to them. And,

in case any question appeared to be completely irrelevant, the respondents wereadvised to leave it blank.

For the purpose of analysis, the various ranges of scores (between 0%

and 100%) were sub-divided into four quartiles: the lowest quartile, Q1,

extending between 0% and 25%; second quartile, Q2, extending between 25%

and 50%; third quartile, Q3, between 50% and 75% and the highest quartile,Q4, between 75% and 100%.


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The quartile-wise break up, overall and across the five performance

areas, is tabulated hereunder:-

Quartile Range PA-1 PA-2 PA-3 PA-4 PA-5 Overall

1st

Quartile


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The overall average score of NCC in this survey was found to be

62.10% (79.5/128): a score that is indicative of its being an Achieving

Authority.

Details of the Scores:

The details of the scores across the five different

performance areas are as under:

Performance Area Score Level

Knowing your communities and equality

mapping

64.78% (7.8/12) Achieving

Place shaping, leadership, partnership

and organisational commitment

60.65 (21.8/36) Achieving

Community engagement and satisfaction 68.92% (11/16) Achieving

Responsive services and customer care 60.05% (16.8/28) Achieving

A modern and diverse workforce 61.38% (22.1/36) Achieving

Overall 62.10% (79.5/128) Achieving


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PA 1:

For the 03 actions in the 1st performance area, Knowing yourcommunities and equality mapping, NCC, on average, scores 2.95; 2.57 & 2.23

respectively.


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PA 2:

For the 09 actions in 2nd performance area, place shaping, leadership,

partnership and organisational commitment, NCC, on average, scores 2.17;

2.15; 2.05; 2.61; 2.28; 2.38; 2.82; 2.55 & 2.76 respectively.

PA 3:

For the 04 actions in 3rd performance area, Community engagement andsatisfaction, NCC, on average, scores 2.90; 2.60; 2.79 & 2.73 respectively.

PA 4:

For the 07 questions/actions in 4th performance area, Responsiveservices and customer care, NCC, on average, scores 1.95; 2.35; 2.38; 2.27;

3.10; 2.29 & 2.43 respectively.


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PA 5:

For the 09 questions/actions in 5th performance area, A modern and

diverse workforce, NCC, on average, scores 2.31; 1.71; 2.50; 2.33; 2.25; 2.66;2.86; 2.27 & 2.32 respectively.

Actions in Descending Order:

If the actions, overall, are arranged in descending

order of their scores, the following picture emerges (scores in brackets):-

2.32 (3.17) > 2.21 (3.10) > 2.1 (2.95) > 2.13 (2.90) >

2.30 (2.86) > 2.10 (2.82) > 2.15 (2.79) > 2.12 (2.76) > 2.16 (2.73) > 2.29

(2.66) > 2.7 (2.61) > 2.14 (2.60) > 2.2 (2.57) > 2.11 (2.55) > 2.26 (2.50)> 2.23 (2.43) >2.19 (2.38) > 2.9 (2.38) > 2.18 (2.35) > 2.27 (2.33) >

2.24 (2.31) > 2.22 (2.29) > 2.8 (2.28) > 2.20 (2.27) > 2.31 (2.27) > 2.28


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(2.25) > 2.3 (2.23) > 2.4 (2.17) > 2.5 (2.15) > 2.6 (2.05) > 2.17 (1.95) >

2.25 (1.71)

And, when the actions in the five performance areas are arranged in the

descending order, following picture emerges:-

PA-1 PA-2 PA-3 PA-4 PA-5

Action Score Action Score Action Score Action Score Action Score

2.1 2.9 2.10 2.82 2.13 2.90 2.21 3.10 2.32 3.17

2.2 2.6 2.12 2.76 2.15 2.79 2.23 2.43 2.30 2.86

2.3 2.1 2.7 2.61 2.16 2.73 2.19 2.38 2.29 2.66

2.11 2.55 2.14 2.60 2.18 2.35 2.26 2.50

2.9 2.38 2.22 2.29 2.27 2.33

2.8 2.28 2.20 2.27 2.24 2.31

2.4 2.17 2.17 1.95 2.31 2.27

2.5 2.15 2.28 2.25

2.6 2.05 2.25 1.71

The Way Forward.

A perusal of the Equality Framework for Local Government, 2009,

reveals that an overwhelming majority (about 50%) of the thirty-two (32)

actions (listed in the annexure attached herewith) prescribed for Achieving

authorities relate, directly or indirectly, to information: either in way ofcollecting it or in way of synthesizing it or in way of communicating it. A

majority of the other half of the actions are, primarily, related to having

equality outcomes / objectives/ goals in place, at the service/ unit levels. Inother words, all these actions, in a nutshell, drive LAs towards having a clearer

information/understanding of the ground realities vis-a-vis the equality in the

county; and using it to inform and set a bunch of requisite equalityoutcomes/objectives/goals at the service/unit levels.

In operational terms, at corporate level, the whole Framework boils

down to three things: a provident statutory equality scheme(s); an efficientSORP and a smart EqIA toolkit. The statutory equality scheme(s) needs to be

well informed of the ground realities such that it clearly spells out the equality

agenda in shape of tangible equality outcomes/ objectives/ goals; the SORP

needs to be effective in ensuring that the equality scheme(s) are implemented in

letter and spirit; and, to top it all, an EqIA toolkit should obviate any negative

equality impact and augment any positive equality impact of the overall


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business of NCC. These three instruments of equality, in the first instance,

need to be based/informed of the ground realities and then shall, in the courseof their operation, reflect/throw up information about the state of

affairs/direction the things are moving in.

This overarching policy umbrella shall provide a bespoke system to

implement equality work; a system that will not only ensure our legal

compliance but shall also ensure the delivery of equality outcomes.

Therefore, to begin with, it shall be prudent if NCC revisits its equality

scheme(s) and puts in place a dynamic and more relevant scheme. It shall behighly desirable, in view of NCCs goal to be an excellent authority by 2011, if

this is a one-year-scheme rather the usual three year scheme. The one year

tenure shall give it the flexibility required to address the immediate equality

needs of NCC, as well as the ability to respond swiftly to the potential

widespread changes that the implementation of the Equality Bill by Parliament

in Spring 2010 would bring.

However, as a first step towards the new scheme, tangible equality

outcomes/ objectives/ goals need to set at service/ unit level. There are two

ways to do it. One is the bottom up, i.e., these equality outcomes/

objectives/targets/goals etc are actually set at the unit/service level and are then

fed into the equality scheme. Or, conversely, these equality outcomes/

objectives/targets/goals etc are done top-down: the outcomes/ goals/ objectives/

targets etc are set at corporate level by incorporating/ prescribing them into the

equality scheme(s) and then left to service/unit levels to be implemented. The

latter option, however, may not be very pragmatic/practical: it may be better to

leave it to the services that can do it more realistically within the resources

available.

With this in mind we are trying to secure a 99 event in March for some

interactive work to be undertaken in relation to the scheme.

Farooq Ahmed KirmaniJanuary 4, 2009

Documents

Self Assessment Report: Equality Framework for Local Government