Putting the Customer First

Modernising Policy Making in Local Government

Author: Barry Maginn   |   10/09/2010

In 2000 the government set out a vision for more customer-focused, inclusive, and evidence-based policy in central government in the ‘Modernising Government’ white paper.

But at the same time Whitehall imposed on local government a system of governance which concentrated power and disincentivised public decisionmaking in local government, through the Local Government Act 2000.

In this report, we discuss the intricacies and virtues of customer-focused policymaking, and how it applies to local government. We based our findings on an innovative council, Cheshire West and Chester, who have developed a system of decision-making that disperses power from the executive to the full council, using policy-development boards.

With a forward by Simon Baddeley, this report explores the shortcomings councils face in their approaches to communications, partnerships, and accountability, and offers practical solutions that all councils can learn from to fine tune their policy-making processes.