Sir Jeremy Beecham

Writing for ePolitix.com the chairman of the Local Government Association, Sir Jeremy Beecham, says that if joined up government is to be effective there must be a more imaginative approach to the role of local councils.

The call for a move beyond the modest progress towards joined-up government achieved during the late 1990s, voiced last week by the director of the prime minister's Strategy Unit, Geoff Mulgan, is one we should all support.

It is good to see that this issue is being taken seriously at the centre of government. But the debate must be extended to embrace the way Westminster and Whitehall relate to local councils.

Mulgan must be correct in his conclusion that "government's that can think and operate in 360 degrees will over time prove better at solving problems and meeting needs than governments that remain trapped in the vertical hierarchies they have inherited" .

We must recognise, however, that the inheritance to which he refers includes an arcane approach to central-local relations which hinders the ability of government, both central and local, to respond to the challenges facing local communities.

Nothing illustrates the need to make joined up government work more starkly than the shared priorities for public services which the Local Government Association recently agreed with government.

The priorities are:

• Raising standards across our schools.

• Improving the quality of life of older people and of children, young people and families at risk.

• Promoting healthier communities and narrowing health inequalities.

• Creating safer and stronger communities.

• Transforming our local environment.

• Meeting local transport needs more effectively.

• Promoting the economic vitality of localities.

We are not saying that these priorities should be the priorities of every council. But what we are saying is that they cover the seven areas in which central and local government agree that it is most important, nationally, to deliver tangible improvements in service. They cover some of the most pressing and challenging public policy issues we face today.

Significantly, each of the priorities involves more than one traditional government or council department. Each requires action by more than one sector or agency. And each requires action by the individual and/or the local community as well as by the state.

For example, regardless of how efficient street cleaning becomes, litter will be a problem for as long as people drop it. And continued progress in driving up literacy standards hinges as much on helping parents to support their children as it does on what happens in the class room.

Also, the areas covered by the priorities cannot be addressed in isolation from each other. There are, for example, important interconnections between child poverty, health inequalities and education standards. The critical point is that they way in which they interlink varies from place to place.

The importance of the relationship between the centre and the locality is reflected in the government's principles for public service reform, one of which is about devolution to the front line. And the relationship between the centre, departments and the wider public sector features strongly in the agenda for the modernisation of the civil service set by the new cabinet secretary Andrew Turnbull.

Yet it is still possible for a cabinet office minister to give a 30 minute speech on improving public services without mentioning local councils once. And when ministers do talk about devolution the language they use is often managerialist - with overtones of head quarters and branch offices - rather than political, acknowledging the relationship between one political institution and another.

Calls for government to trust councils more, and to give them more freedom to tackle issues such as those addressed by the shared priorities, are frequently met with concerns about the quality and capacity of local government.

The publication on December 12 of the results of the comprehensive performance assessment (CPA) of all single tier and county council will fundamentally change the nature of that debate.

The Audit Commission has already published its review of the early lessons from the CPA and its conclusions about what is good in local government chime in very closely with Mulgan's approach.

"The majority of councils", concludes the commission, "have set themselves demanding targets for improving the quality of life of their citizens.They make use of additional resources from outside their own organisations, by linking up in partnership with other public, private and voluntary organisations, and by encouraging local people to participate in improving their own quality of life."

A distinctive feature of excellent councils, according to the commission, is that "they are often better at achieving more for their communities through the delivery of cross-cutting projects, often in partnership with others".

The commission's conclusions should give ministers the confidence to enter into a new more productive relationship with councils which complements the move towards a more joined up approach in Whitehall.

Mulgan is right to point out that whatever organisation structures are put in place, there will always be boundary problems. Simply replacing one set with another is unlikely to achieve a great deal.

He is also convincing in his conclusion that the future shape of central government will involve both vertical hierarchies for long-standing tasks with clear lines of accountability and horizontal structures for determining strategy and carrying out shorter term tasks.

Mulgan acknowledges "a steadily growing role for local partnerships in integrating the work of both national and local agencies on the ground".

But he has understated the importance of localities, in terms of people's needs and experience of public service, and of the integration of strategy and delivery at a local level. In short there needs to be a more imaginative approach to the contribution of local councils and their local partners if we are to make real progress in addressing the issues Mulgan has identified.

If Mulgan is right in his assertion that boundaries will always be an issue and that there will always be a strong vertical driver to the structure of government, then perhaps we should see local councils as the lead player in securing integration.

If his view that radical whole systems approaches are needed in areas such as children's services is correct - and I am convinced it is - then isn't it at the local level that we are most likely to be able to be pull off the challenging task of integrating what are in many cases a diverse set of agencies with different lines of financial and political accountability?

We do, as Mulgan argues, need some "more fundamental systems redesign".

We should exploit the willingness of the government to give ambitious freedoms and flexibilities to the best performing councils to push the boundaries of integration at a local level.

That is the best chance we have of escaping from our silo-based inheritance.