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Councils must be ready to deliver 30% more for 30% less, says leader Iain Malcolm, who describes his own authority's strategy for dealing with the new era of austerity. In these challenging times, it is vital that leaders across local government stay positive, and seize the opportunity to lead a ‘paradigm shift' in how we deliver services for our communities. To continue delivering excellent services, we will, simply, have to do things differently. Rising demand and reducing resources mean that, in effect, we must deliver ‘30% more with 30% less'. South Tyneside's Iain Malcolm South Tyneside already has a great track record in innovation. My new chief executive, Martin Wales, and myself, are working on an efficiency programme to provide ‘new models of service delivery'. This is a root-and-branch review of everything we do, from strategic commissioning and the impact of our services, to the use of new technologies, and the criteria we use to assess social care needs. There is no one, silver bullet that can increase productivity while saving us money, but with nothing ‘off the table', we are creating the right conditions for innovation. Having already embarked on innovative strategic partnerships with blue chip partners such as BT, Balfour Beatty and Carillion, we understand the potential that exists to work even more closely with the private sector, while bringing new jobs to South Tyneside. In housing, for example, we're exploring opportunities to share the risk – and rewards – of new ventures with private house-builders by supporting them to procure land in our borough. Indeed, ‘insourcing' expertise from different sectors is one way in which we can build our capacity to deal with a range of major challenges. In doing this, we're keen to share our expertise with our neighbours. And, as new headquarters are being built for BT's local government operation on our riverfront, I want to explore with colleagues across the country how BT South Tyneside can help other councils deliver better business support services. In the North East, I firmly believe that we have a great opportunity to exploit our natural strengths. Compared with other parts of the country, the North East is a cohesive, well-defined region, and all 12 of its authorities are now unitary councils. This gives us a great opportunity to forge new strategic alliances, new shared services, and to speak with one voice. Where we all agree is that the new government needs to deliver on its pledge to rebalance the UK economy – away from a reliance on financial services in the London ‘super region' – with a real commitment to stimulating growth in the North East. As ever, manufacturing will have a key role to play in leading the economic resurgence in the region, and we must capitalise on the encouraging growth of offshore and renewable industries on the Tyne. Therefore, I will be calling on the Government to back the region's designation as the nation's low carbon economic area, and honour the commitment to support the manufacture of electric cars at Washington. But, it is not just in manufacturing where we excel. We're already home to some major government business support services – from pensions to child benefits – and we have fantastic public sector expertise that we can promote to the rest of the country. Specifically we need to foster a new enabling language between public and private sector to reflect the shared risk era we're entering. The Government's commitment to localism and the ‘Big society' also provide us with an opportunity to capitalise on our natural strengths – bonding social capital is still very strong in the North East, and we have a thriving community sector which is already helping us to deliver excellent services. But, to exploit these resources, we must be given the flexibilities from central government to innovate – as we simply no longer have the time and resources to spend on the old model of central control and compliance. Indeed, with the abolition of CAA, we now have the chance to ensure that inspections promote innovation, instead of encouraging us to play it safe and tick boxes. This freedom is a fundamental building block of effective localism – alongside greater horizontal integration of local services. In this new climate, we are determined to thrive, and not just survive. We know we need to make some hard decisions but, by staying positive and encouraging innovation, I'm confident we have the political win on South Tyneside and across the region to meet the challenges. Cllr Iain Malcolm is leader of South Tyneside MBC

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WHITEHALL

How to cope with the new era

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