12 September 2003
The Treasury is likely to use the next Spending Review to unveil a new targets regime and reforms to councils' public service agreements.
Nick MacPherson, managing director of the Treasury's Public Services Directorate, said the 2004 review would focus more on 'local accountability for local delivery'.
He told a Local Government Association conference on September 8 that the Treasury and Delivery Unit's 'Devolved decision-making review' would make clear to other Whitehall departments the value of allowing local authorities more autonomy.
Speaking in place of Chief Secretary to the Treasury Paul Boateng, MacPherson said this review, which will influence the Spending Review, is to find ways of combining the targets regime with greater devolution for councils.
He said ministers were considering how to create a new system of performance indicators that would maintain high targets while being responsive to 'customer and citizen pressure'.
Tied in with these reforms will be significant changes to local PSAs. MacPherson said the next round would focus on 'stretching', but voluntary, targets for councils in return for more freedoms.
'Instead of having a split between national and local targets, we want to use the local PSA process to build a shared view of what the real priorities for the area are,' he said.
MacPherson refused to be drawn on whether the business rate would return to local control.
Also speaking at the conference was Professor Julian Le Grand, the newly appointed policy and strategy adviser to the prime minister. He told a sceptical audience that Choice, where money follows the customer, was a 'mechanism to prompt the efficiency, quality and equity of public services'.
PFsep2003
