The public's expectations for local services are rising all the time. And although local government generally is delivering better quality service than ever before, people's satisfaction with councils' performance has not increased. In some cases it's even fallen. There are three key reasons l The public want joined up services at community level. However most services, housing, roads, planning, schools and so on are still delivered separately l The pace of change is accelerating: people expect ever more accessible services at better value l People want more say: many services don't offer ways for people to get involved Councils are facing rising expectations while pressures on their budgets are becoming intense. To tackle these challenges councils are increasingly working in partnership with their stakeholders - Local Strategic Partnerships are defining their locality needs alongside local communities and stakeholders. They're looking for better outcomes, healthier communities physically and economically, better, healthier environments. On the delivery side councils are increasingly setting up partnerships with providers whether public, private and voluntary sectors to deliver these broad community outcomes. Delivering joined up services must involve front line services as much as ‘back office' functions such as finance and human resources. But arguably it's even more important to bring front line services together so that communities and public see and experience a unified service on the ground. Amey has been in the forefront of the move to front line service integration. Working in partnership with a number of councils and with local communities in environmental services Amey has shown how providers can make a critical contribution to improved community perceptions of service. The key to success has been good three way working relationships between community, council and provider in tackling service design, performance monitoring and day to day operations. For example in Bedfordshire the highways service improvements we delivered alongside the council saw levels of customer satisfaction increase from 30% to 70%. These cooperative relationships can only work if councils and providers move away from a contractual mentality. The starting point is to establish a dialogue from the start between council service commissioners and key strategic providers. This means establishing new relationships of trust, overcoming traditional professional and organisational boundaries. Only then will anything like true transparency really be achieved. Traditional boundaries between council and providers should take second place in building up a single organisation committed to improving public service and sharing risk. The most important boundary should be between the public and the council and its providers. n Join the online debate as to whether joined up delivery is the best solution, at www.localgov.co.uk/amey
