Scrap the CAA and save billions
Author: Public Service |
Scrapping the Comprehensive Area Assessment (CAA) will improve local performance and could save billions, according to a report by the think tank Localis.
The report said that councils should be given greater control of their performance with increased local accountability because the CAA has “induced a culture of compliance”. If councils left the CAA local government performance would improve and the 2bn cost of compliance would be removed. Overall savings, however, could be much higher.
Localis recommended that the CAA should be optional and councils should be “actively encouraged” to opt out and then choose their own measures to drive up performance. Councils should also be made to release more data to residents, with all spending over 500 put in the public domain, alongside information on councillors such as attendance, declared interests and voting records.
The report also said that the 25 indicators from the National Indicator Set should be scrapped immediately and replaced by a Local Indicator Set. National indicators weren’t chosen by any council in their local area agreements, Localis said, and all remaining indicators and targets should undergo a “rigorous” check based on such factors as public interest. Finally, there must be more power devolved from central to local government or performance will be affected and the case for localism completely undermined.
Localis chief executive James Morris said: “[At the moment] local authorities are more accountable to central government than to their residents. Without doubt this has been a contributing factor in the disengagement of local people. The new system we propose can turn this underwhelming system of performance and assessment on its head.”
And the report’s author Tom Shakespeare said: “The need for local government to be freed from central targets has never been greater. Now is the perfect time to re-think how to radically improve the public sector, improving performance and saving significant sums of money in the process.”