Scottish councils join forces in mass tweet

Next week councils throughout Scotland will use twitter to give local residents a better understanding of what they do.

From 12noon on Tuesday 27 September until 12noon on Wednesday 28 staff in 29 of Scotland’s 32 councils will tweet updates on local services.

The initiative is being organised by the National Communications Group, which brings together communications professionals working in Scottish councils.

Kate Bond who is chair of the group and head of communications at Aberdeenshire Council said it waas an opportunity for local government in Scotland to work together to improve awareness of what they do.

“It’s a good way of introducing councils who are new to social networking.

“We have set up a buddy system, matching councils who have been using social networking for a long time with those who are less experienced.

“Social networking offers a new way of promoting dialogue with residents and getting them to engage with us,” she said. 

Walsall Council undertook a similar exercise in March and its chief executive Paul Sheehan, writing about the experience in the LGC said:

 “The most popular tweet of the day was that we were moving a woodpecker roost from a rotten tree.

“It all painted a picture of a vibrant authority filled with dedicated people doing good work. A series of small things that add up to so much more,” he said

Survey records high trust in councils

This article was published on the LGC Plus website on September 23, 2011.

The last-ever government survey of public attitudes towards citizenship has found trust in local government at a record high.

The 2010-11 citizenship survey found that 64% of respondents trusted their council – a higher percentage than in all previous years.

In addition, 86% of adults in England were satisfied with their local area as a place to live, showing a continued increase from 82% in 2008-09 and 83% in 2009-10.

However, in a blow to the government’s Big Society agenda, the survey showed levels of volunteering and civic participation stubbornly refusing to rise.

Twenty five percent of respondents said they had volunteered formally at least once a month in 2010-11 – a rate unchanged on 2008-09 and 2009-10 levels but still lower than at any point between 2001 and 2007-08.

Similarly, 34% of people said they had engaged in civic participation at least once in the 12 months prior to the survey, a figure unchanged on 2009-10 but lower than in any year before then.

Junior local government minister Bob Neill (Con) said the results showed that councils were still able to improve services, despite funding cuts.

“Despite the need to pay off the deficit inherited from the last administration many councils are showing they can reduce costs, while at the same time improving services for their residents,” he said.

“Central government is setting councils free, shifting power away from Whitehall and putting it back in the hands of councillors and councils giving them greater control their finances and putting them at the centre of driving local growth.”

The annual citizenship survey has been testing public attitudes to influencing decisions, volunteering, community cohesion, fear of crime and racial and religious prejudice since 2001.

But this year’s survey will be the last, as the Department for Communities & Local Government has decided to cancel it in a bid to save the estimated £4m annual cost.  

A Cabinet Office spokesman said it would still need robust statistics on volunteering and would be announcing plans for collecting them shortly.

However, Ellie Brodie, a researcher at the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO), said the end of the survey was bad news for those interested in monitoring the progress of the Big Society.

“We had some grave concerns about DCLG cutting the survey, as there isn’t any other source that provides data on that range of subjects,” she said. “It provides data over time that allows us to say whether volunteering has changed year on year and in the context of a big push to get people involved.

“There is not going to be any other way of the government measuring the impact of those policies,” she added.

Nick Hurd, minister for civil society, said the figures were in fact positive in difficult economic times.

“It’s very encouraging that the decline in volunteering and civic participation has stopped,” he said.

“And community spirit is on the rise, more people feel like they belong strongly to their neighbourhood than recorded at any time in the last decade.”

Council carbon data published

This story was published on the LGC Plus website on September 19, 2011.

Carbon emissions fell in almost all local authority areas in recent years, according to government figures.

Figures released last week by the Department for Energy and Climate Change showed an overall fall of 14% across all local authority areas between 2005 and 2009.

Total emissions increased in only ten local authority areas, most notably in Highland Council where they were up by 11%.

The council believes this may be due to increased tourist traffic and the widespread use of oil as a domestic fuel.

The biggest fall was seen in Gravesham BC, down 66% since 2005, and is attributed to the closure of a large cement works.

The report found that domestic emissions had fallen in all local authority areas but there were rises in industrial, commercial and road emissions.

King’s Lynn & West Norfolk BC’s total emissions rose by 7%, driven by a 25.3% increase in industrial and commercial emissions.

Deputy leader Brian Long (Con) defended the increase: “King’s Lynn has seen major industrial and commercial growth.

“One of Europe’s largest paper processing plants has just opened in the area, it will increase carbon emissions but it is recycling more newspaper than anywhere else in the country.”

“Kings Lynn is on the up and the council has done a lot to promote that.”

With emissions increases and decreases so closely linked to industrial activity, a spokesman for DECC said the government was not relying on the economic downturn to keep emissions in check.

“When the economy picks up again we want to make sure we don’t see a sudden peak in emissions which is why we have policies in place to help reduce our reliance on fossil fuels,” he said.

Although industry is the biggest producer of emissions - 43% compared to 30% from the domestic sector and 27% from road transport - the Carbon Trust has been encouraging councils to look at their own emissions.

Richard Rugg, director of programmes at the trust, said local authorities should aim to reduce their own emissions by up to 25% in five years, a figure already achieved by Oxford City Council.

Schools were important places to start as emissions from their buildings can add 84% to the total, Mr Rugg said, and the trust is working with Cambridge schools on quick ways to save energy and money.

“We start with heating and lighting controls, insulation and IT, a big consumer of energy,” said Mr Rugg.

Case study: Sheffield City Council – 20% drop in emissions

The council has increased the numbers of bus lanes, joined up cycle lanes and introduced free parking for low emissions vehicles.

Bio-methane vehicles form part of the councils’ fleet, fuelled from green matter, supplied by local businesses.

The Care4Air partnership encourages local residents, schools and businesses to ‘do their bit’ to improve air quality and runs an award scheme to recognise excellence.

The council is part of the East End Quality of Life Initiative, which works in some of the most deprived parts of the city, where local volunteers carry out pollution monitoring and free air quality alerts are available to those with respiratory problems.

Andy Nolan, Director of Sustainable Development at Sheffield City Council said: “We are still digesting the data but there has been a bigger push around renewable energy over the last few years which have enabled us to create energy distribution.”

Three large wood burning installations produce two MW of power to heat 550 dwellings and the city is one of the top generators of solar power. Heat from the city’s waste incinerator fuels 140 buildings.

Mr Nolan believes that clear planning policies are essential.

“Sheffield was the first of the core cities to have a Local Development Framework in place with very clear and supportive planning initiatives that have encouraged the adoption of sustainable fuels.

“We also have businesses in the city who have responded to opportunities such as Feed in Tariffs,” he said.

Mr Nolan believed that national initiatives such as CRC and emissions trading were driving reductions in the business sector, especially in manufacturing.

The first CRC league tables, rating the energy efficiency performance of large businesses and public organisations, will be published later this autumn.

Social housing fraud much worse than thought

Story published on LGC Plus, September 12, 2011.

The threat of social housing tenancy fraud in the UK could be three times higher than previously thought, new research has warned.

The research by data company Experian Public Sector reveals that the fraudulent occupancy of social housing such as subletting could exist in at least 157,000 properties or around 3.1% of all social rented housing. This is three times the number estimated by the Audit Commission in 2009.

The figures are based on an initial analysis of 125,000 social housing tenancies in ten UK local authorities and housing associations in rural and urban areas.

Experian said it hoped to analyse data in more areas over the coming months.

Researchers matched data from a variety of sources to identify tenants living at other addresses.

Experian believes that £2bn a year could be saved if these properties were made available to those in temporary accommodation.

Nick Mothershaw, Experian’s director of fraud & identity, said: “Our initial research suggests that the level of social housing tenancy fraud in Britain could be much higher than previously estimated.

“It also demonstrates how more effective data matching can quickly provide a reliable indication of what could be illegal occupancy and subletting.

“This means investigators can prioritise and deal swiftly with fraudulent cases. Reducing social housing tenancy fraud will significantly reduce the cost of temporary accommodation which we estimate at over £2 billion a year.”

Gwyneth Taylor, policy director at the National Federation of Arms Length Management Organisations, who manage council housing said illegal sub-letting was hard to track.

“ALMO’s do a lot of work to try and estimate the level of illegal sub-letting, It’s quite difficult if people pay their rent. We don’t come knocking on peoples doors asking for rent any more,” she said.

Tower Hamlets votes against broadcasting investment

This story was published on the LGC Plus website on September 12, 2011.

Tower Hamlets LBC has agreed to continue not recording and broadcasting council meetings, despite an earlier decision to ban members of the public from taping, filming or photographing meetings.

The council’s cabinet decided last week to take no action on a report outlining a range of options for webcasting meetings, thus continuing the current practice of not recording council meetings.

This was one of four options considered by the cabinet last week, one of which would have involved upgrading the council’s existing recording systems, at an estimated cost of up to £75,000.

Conservative opposition leader Peter Golds last year criticised the council leadership for not making meetings available to the public over the internet.

In February, the authority amended its constitution preventing members of the public and guests from recording meetings but vowed to webcast all public council meetings within 48 hours, but it has yet to implemented the pledge.

The cabinet had considered three options:

Using existing CCTV equipment to implement a “basic, low quality service” that could be delivered within existing budgets;

Upgrading the existing system, employing “pan-tilt cameras” and “ambient microphones” to improve sound and picture quality at a one-off cost of up to £75,000; and

Contracting out the webcasting at a cost of £25,000 a year, which would allow meetings to be streamed live and would typically offer sub-titles and links to explanatory materials such as presentations and reports.

The cabinet report described the system of fixed video cameras and microphones in the council chamber as “old and unreliable”.