Issue - meetings

Purpose of report

To inform Cabinet of the government's draft Local Government Outcomes Framework (LGOF) and ask them to approve Council's proposed response to the consultation.

Decision

That Cabinet approve the LGOF consultation response for submission to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG).

Alternative options considered and rejected

The Council were not required to respond to the LGOF consultation. However, in not doing so, the Council would miss an opportunity to influence the development of a key MHCLG workstream.

Reasons for the decision

The LGOF was a key part of MHCLG’s programme to rewire the relationship between central and local government. The consultation was an opportunity for the Council to influence the development of this workstream.

On 3 July 2025 the MCHLG announced a LGOF, a new approach to outcome based accountability. It included 15 outcomes that government expected to work on with local authorities, underpinned by outcome measures drawing from existing data sources. 86 draft metrics were published for sector feedback.

The consultation response welcomed the positioning of the LGOF as a steering mechanism. Assruances had been given from government that the LGOF would not set targets or create league tables.

It had been highlighted that SKDC’s current Corporate Plan already demonstrated high alignment with policy areas. Service planning would be adjusted to encourage service leaders to approach policy management in a holistic manner.

Post Local Government Reorganisation (LGR), it was suggested that MHCLG the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and other bodies continue to capture data on old district footprints.

Sector feedback will be reviewed and the final LGOF would be published alongside the Local Government Funding Settlement in December 2025. LGOF would go live in April 2026.

The Appendix to the report contained metrics where we SKDC had disagreed with MHCLG on measures used for local government activity. These areas of disagreement included:

-       Percentage of planning application decided on time (dwellings – priority outcome 2)

-       whether people feel that they can influence local decisions (priority outcome 11)

-       fly tipping enforcement actions (priority outcome 11)

The following points were highlighted during debate:

·         Disagreement arose on the fly tipping metric as enforcement of fly tipping depended on evidence. If the Council did not have evidence, it could not take action; it was a difficult area to take action on as gaining evidence was tough. However, where there was the opportunity to go to court, it was taken by SKDC.

·         A completely new ministerial team had very recently been appointed at MHCLG. It would be interesting to see what their views on the LGOF were.

·         The NHS had very recently published its oversight framework for 2025/2026 in the form of league tables. The government does not intend to use LGOF statistics to compile league tables.