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Congratulations to local government. There is no doubt that you are the most efficient part of the public sector, and we know this because central government just keeps on cutting more and more cash from your budgets – yet you are still standing. That, of course, is your reward for efficiency – you get even less – and despite your best efforts at pleading, Mr Pickles will forever play Mr Bumble to your Oliver Twist. The Local Government Association calculates that the 10% cuts – which were already enough to make your eyes water – are actually more likely to be 15% when it comes down to the real brass tacks. You could try to make ends meet by finding new charges to spread the load from your squeezed taxpayers. But don't start putting in charges for students' waste – DEFRA will start to raise its legislation stick at you. As Sheffield's Cllr Jack Scott says: ‘So much for localism.' Despite years of rhetoric on the need to move away from salami slicing and start a wholesale reform of local government, very few authorities have actually achieved anything near ‘transformation'. It is not an easy task. Doing more for less will no longer cut it. Doing less for less is only getting halfway there. Doing something different is the only option – the trouble is what? It is, of course, different for every council, but does it need to be? We currently have 400-plus councils each trying to decide what they will be in the future – why? Stop re-inventing the wheel and start stealing the best ideas from those who are ahead of the game. You don't need to relinquish localism to have the same basic structure as a dozen other councils across the country, it just needs to be tailored to local circumstances. Lambeth and Oldham have both opted for the co-op council – but they're hundreds of miles apart. So bite the bullet, take a solution off the shelf, and concentrate the real efforts on boosting your local economy and making your council as self-sufficient as you can.

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Great work - but there's more to do

By Heather Jameson | 01 August 2013

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