Survey says its services with a smile for the people of Wales

6 Mar 08
People in Wales are largely satisfied with their public services, a survey by the Welsh Assembly Government has found.

07 March 2008

People in Wales are largely satisfied with their public services, a survey by the Welsh Assembly Government has found.

The face-to-face talks with 7,500 households found satisfaction ratings of between 70% and 90% for a range of services, including education, the NHS, social services, buses, recycling and sports facilities.

But Living in Wales, published on March 5, also highlighted areas where there was less satisfaction, with fewest people happy with access to information on local bus services, early years' education, housing advice and carers' services.

The survey also revealed that in cases where service users were not satisfied, they were sometimes reluctant to complain. For example, 12% of those asked about hospital services said they had wanted to complain in the past year, but only around one in ten of these had complained formally and a third had raised concerns informally. Of those who did not complain, 31% said this was because it 'wouldn't do any good'.

Across all service areas, most people were using telephone or face-to-face contact to get access, with far smaller numbers using electronic services, the survey found.

Andrew Davies, minister for finance and public service delivery, said: 'The Living in Wales survey is important in finding out what really matters to people and is vital to designing, reforming and delivering efficient public services.'

He added: 'However, the results indicate a number of issues that need further study, particularly around the accessibility of information about services and complaint handling.'

Welsh Local Government Association chief executive Steve Thomas said: 'Today's survey shows that our efforts and approaches are paying off. We have always accepted that as public service deliverers we will ultimately be judged on the quality of our performance. Today, local government can hold its head high in the knowledge that we are getting it right when it comes to delivering for the people of Wales.'

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