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Implementation of the National Cultural Strategy:
Draft Guidance for Scottish Local Authorities

Part 5. Best Value and performance management (including consultation, planning, budget-setting and performance management)

5.1 Best Value

5.1.1 Effective performance management is of course of increasing importance for local authority services in general, not solely cultural provision. The main current development in local authorities' performance management is Best Value. Its importance is certain to increase as the Local Government in Scotland Bill, introduced to the Scottish Parliament in May 2002, will introduce a new statutory requirement to secure Best Value.

5.1.2 The importance of performance management links to a range of initiatives and requirements, including:

• local authorities' own initiatives to improve the different dimensions of performance and to secure continuous improvement (including economy, efficiency, effectiveness and quality)

• the role of external audit and Audit Scotland (working on behalf of the Accounts Commission for Scotland)

• the statutory duty on local authorities to manage their services so as to achieve value for money, as required by the Local Government Act 1994 (to be repealed by the Local Government in Scotland Bill and replaced by the duty of Best Value)

• Scottish local authorities' voluntary commitment, since 2000, to have in place a public performance reporting framework to ensure stakeholders are fully informed about performance issues

• a growing focus on outcomes, associated with three-year budgeting.

5.1.3 The policy objective of Best Value is to modernise local government management and business practice so that local authorities can deliver better, more responsive public services. Best Value is about:

• pursuing continuous improvement

• achieving a balance between quality and cost

• improving accountability by being more responsive to stakeholders

5.1.4 The main activity under Best Value is the service review. Ideally, local authorities should be in a position to learn from each other's experiences arising from these reviews. However, exchange of information to improve understanding has been limited by several factors, which restrict the information available to permit inter-authority comparisons:

• the focus and scope of reviews tend to differ from authority to authority (as local authorities have discretion in relation to these matters)

• local authorities tend to hold information relating to service delivery in different ways.

5.1.5 Nevertheless, when planning service reviews, local authorities should:

• use existing guidance (e.g. the toolkit for benchmarking library services published by the Scottish Library Association)

• devise their own measures of performance - and recognise that this may necessitate going beyond information currently reported to Audit Scotland and the Scottish Executive

• aim to have available an appropriate and wide range of measures (a 'balanced scorecard')

• consider the value of joining or forming 'benchmarking families' with other local authorities, in order to inform reviews.

5.1.6 Finally, it is of course essential, having carried out a review, to arrange to make changes which the review suggest are necessary - that is, to act on the review. Possible changes which a review may prompt include one or more of the following:

• re-design of policy

• amendment of an existing plan or strategy

• re-allocation of resources

• changed operational practice

• a change in partnership arrangements

• a new focus in monitoring.

The Scottish Executive has published guidance to local authorities on certain aspects of Best Value - " Best Value: Making Choices - a Guide to Best Value, Procurement and Competitiveness". This document sets out some of the choices that local authorities can make in response to a review process.

5.1.7 The Local Government in Scotland Bill proposes to place Scottish local authorities under a duty to report publicly on both their financial and general performance. Regulations issued under powers taken in the Bill will set out minimum requirements on authorities in relation to what information they need to make available. This provision is intended to stress the importance of citizen involvement and consultation in service delivery.

5.2 Consultation

5.2.1 Consultation is widely accepted as an important element in any public service. There is little inherent in cultural provision which suggests that local authorities must take a different approach to consultation. However, it is worth re-stating the key principles. The consultation process brings value by:

• providing information

• involving and informing stakeholders

• inviting participation (e.g. through creating opportunities for 'design' proposals from consultees)

• seeking evaluative comment (includes 'before' and 'after' comment on provision and initiatives).

5.2.2 It is important to recognise the different stakeholders who have a claim to be consulted; for example:

• users (actual or possible future users, non-users)

• citizens (not the same as users)

• the local authority's partner and non-partner organisations

• the authority's own staff.

Some quality improvement systems (see section 5.8 below) rely on such consultation and require evidence of this having taken place.

5.2.3 Within these broad categories of 'stakeholder' there are groups whose interests are being increasingly recognised - for example, people with disabilities, young people, and people from ethnic minorities. Others may be excluded from participation and service delivery by virtue of their geographical isolation. Special effort is required to reach less 'accessible' consultees (including non-users), whose views may otherwise be under-represented.

5.2.4 For this reason, local authorities should select consultation and participation mechanisms with a view to widening opportunities for involvement. Options include:

• analysis of existing research and/or commissioning of new research

• surveys

• focus groups

• citizens panels

• freesheets

• websites (which may have particular advantages in consulting young people).

5.2.5 Some activities associated with cultural, and other, provision should always be the focus of consultation:

• strategies and plans

• existing service delivery

• major capital projects.

Illustration of the 'loop' of consultation'loop' of consultation -

5.2.6 It is also good practice to provide feedback on what has been concluded after consultation - and then, subsequently, feedback on how the strategy or initiative is being implemented.

5.3 Market research

5.3.1 Cultural provision - like other provision by local authorities - should be based on an assessment of the needs and preferences of service users, to ensure as far as possible that the provision arranged matches these - and takes account of the likely needs of future users.

5.3.2 As discussed, consultation involves informing citizens and service users about e.g. the local authority's policies and service proposals, and gathering information on their preferences etc. However, market research is an activity which seeks other information - e.g. on services arranged by other providers/other local authorities; or more detailed information (e.g. in-depth user satisfaction information). Market research has a key use in terms of the delivery process, in assessing user reaction to the actual service provision, including issues of quality and delivery methods.

5.3.3 Market research should draw on local authorities' existing information and that collected routinely. However, market research often involves gathering information which is not routinely available. Cost may prevent local authorities carrying out large-scale surveys, but it is possible to gather information using methods which are relatively inexpensive (e.g. surveys which are carried out at the point of service delivery, rather than as a separate exercise) and use published results from relevant research in other localities.

5.3.4 It is good practice for local authorities to make use of market research at the stages of:

• planning cultural provision

• monitoring delivery

and to use this information in a systematic way to inform future planning and delivery.

5.3.5 The approaches described above help local authorities respond better to users. Authorities may also wish to develop audience tastes through the use of 'user/audience development' approaches. Here the purpose is to encourage users to experience and/or participate in activities across the diversity of cultural provision (promoting social inclusion).

5.4 Planning for cultural provision

5.4.1 It is good practice that each local authority has a single over-arching plan or strategy for cultural provision (*), which, on an authority-wide basis, draws together all the authority's cultural goals and how it proposes they should be achieved. (The terms 'plan' and 'strategy' are used interchangeably within and between local authorities. This guidance does not propose any standardisation of terminology.)

(*) In England, the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has advised local authorities that they should prepare a single cultural strategy or plan. DCMS's guidance concerns each local authority's cultural goals. It distinguishes

• "guidance", part of which local authorities are expected to follow (comprising "scope, benefits, principles, and policy context"), and

• "general advice" which local authorities are not required to follow (e.g. management issues such as the form and content of the strategy, and arrangements for monitoring and review).

While preparation of a strategy is not a statutory duty, the DCMS expects all authorities to develop one by late 2002

5.4.2 It is a matter for each local authority to decide whether it is desirable to have separate plans/strategies for some or most of the activities listed in Table A. Similarly, if the local authority has external partnerships relating to cultural matters, these may require additional plans or strategies. Whether they are set out in separate documents is also a matter for each local authority to decide.

5.4.3 In preparing its over-arching plan/strategy for cultural provision, it is good practice for the local authority to consider each of the following 'building blocks' at (a) - (l), and to reflect in the text of the plan/strategy that each has been taken into account:

(a) a statement of the local authority's own strategic goals and targets (including key issues such as access)

(b) a statement of how these goals relate to the Scottish Executive's National Cultural Strategy

(c) (where these exist) a statement of the strategic goals it has agreed with its partner organisations, including how these can be actioned through community planning

(d) the conclusions the local authority has reached following an analysis of needs (including, for example, how demographic change has been taken into account)

(e) the conclusions arising from both consultation and market research carried out by the local authority

(f) (possibly using the listing of activities in Table A) a description of the intended provision, which quantifies key issues (including the volume of provision and number/categories of users who will benefit - and how these compare in relation to present arrangements; the cost etc)

(g) a statement of how far the local authority feel this achieves 'adequacy'

(h) a description of service provision arrangements (i.e. where direct provision, externally commissioning, and partnerships will be used)

(i) a statement of the resources intended to be committed, in each year covered by the plan, to achieve (f)

(j) the performance measures the local authority will use to assess successful achievement of its plan/strategy

(k) the review mechanisms the local authority proposes to employ

(l) a statement that sources of guidance have been taken into account - for example, relevant advice by the Scottish Arts Council/CoSLA and by sportscotland on how plans/strategies should be prepared and what they should contain.

5.4.4 At the time of writing, some - but not all - Scottish local authorities have plans or strategies which achieve good practices set out in the previous paragraph. Working towards achieving good practice may require a number of related steps, including:

• taking a wider view of 'culture', as proposed in the National Cultural Strategy (and in this guidance)

• checking that the local authority's policies on cultural provision and other related authority policies (e.g. for tourism, economic development, creative industries, etc) are mutually supportive

• considering whether policy, planning and service provision relating to culture are narrowly focused within departments, or whether they adopt the local authority-wide focus envisaged in the previous paragraph

• ensuring planning and budget-setting are directly related to each other

• addressing any problems in assessing the availability of good routine statistical information to support planning, budget-setting and assessing success

• confirming the role of cultural provision in community planning - reflecting the authority's goals and the community's aspirations.

5.5 Service provision (*)

(*) See also para 3.6 above.

5.5.1 One of the major decisions to be made by each local authority in pursuit of Best Value (**) is the extent to which it is active across the 9 activities listed in Table A. In turn, the local authority must then decide whether the service provision will be made:

• directly by the local authority itself,

• externally by another provider, or

• jointly, through a partnership arrangement (in this context, 'partnership' means joint commissioning or joint provision) between the local authority and one or more other bodies, including other local authorities or non-local authority bodies.

(**) These issues are discussed in detail in guidance issued by the Scottish Executive - "Best Value: Making Choices - a Guide to Best Value, Procurement and Competitiveness".

5.5.2 Direct provision is the option local authorities know best. For that reason it is not discussed here in detail. However, it is good practice for a local authority to consider, for each service currently delivered by in-house provision, whether this is in fact the best arrangement. The criteria for this assessment are those involved in a Best Value review - including effectiveness, quality and cost.

5.5.3 The second major option, external commissioning, offers a large number of variations, including the use of voluntary and private sector organisations, 'arms length' local authority trusts, and individuals (e.g. creative artists).

5.5.4 Similarly the mechanisms for 'commissioning' may also be varied. They include:

• direct payments for specified services based on a contract, and

• service provision agreements (where a local authority concludes an agreement with a provider to take over specified services - often where these would otherwise be provided directly by the local authority itself).

5.5.5 Grant aid (e.g. where the 'core' costs of a voluntary organisation are supported, perhaps to achieve the local authority's 'capacity-building' goals) is perhaps best regarded as a separate mechanism, not necessarily related to the delivery of a specified service.

5.6 Budget-setting

5.6.1 A major reason for planning is to make commitments involving resources. It is not meaningful to prepare a plan or strategy which does not create commitments. The plan or strategy should detail the resources required.

5.6.2 As is the case for other local authority service provision, a variety of resources are relevant - including revenue and capital funding, human resources, land, buildings, and equipment. In practice, it is funding which is the major resource, and budget-setting the major planning activity.

Planning revenue spending

5.6.3 In recent years, there have been several budget-setting developments which have been noticeable. While none of these developments is specific to cultural provision, each development is nevertheless important for this area.

Three-year budget setting

5.6.4 The first of these developments has been the introduction of three-year budget setting (as contrasted with the more traditional model of annual budget-setting). Planning resource allocation over a longer period of time brings several benefits, including creating more year-to-year stability. This stability has benefits both for the local authority's directly-provided services and potentially also for external organisations which the authority funds or commissions externally or with which it has a partnership involving resource commitments.

Community budgeting

5.6.5 A more recent development is 'community budgeting'. This is an approach to assist the development of community planning in local service delivery and community engagement (as confirmed in the Scottish Executive paper "Community Budgeting: A consultation document on local services and community engagement", issued in 2002). More detailed knowledge of mainstream spend in localities or across communities of interest is a potential tool for more integrated delivery of service priorities by community planning partners. For some activities local authorities already give grants and devolve financial control to community organisations (e.g. local sport and arts bodies), and this is one potential component of community budgeting.

Outcome-focused budget-setting

5.6.6 Another trend is for budget-setting to be increasingly related to what is achieved by the allocation of such resources. This means the focus of attention is moving from inputs (the resources being invested through the budget) to outputs (e.g. the volume of service delivered) and, where possible, outcomes (the benefits realised by users; the extent to which the local authority's own goals are being achieved).

5.6.7 This trend is the context in which to see the recent creation of outcome agreements - joint agreements between central and local government (individual local authorities in Scotland) where the 'outcomes' for specified services are related to the resources invested. At the time of writing, there are no outcome agreements in Scotland relating to cultural provision.

Best Value

5.6.8 The third major development in resource management across local government services (not only cultural provision) has been Best Value itself. With the move away from a cost-focused culture to one that balances quality and cost, local authorities now have a mechanism to examine systematically their cultural provision in terms of the impacts or outcomes achieved by resource allocation. The specific importance of Best Value here is that budget-setting should reflect the conclusions reached following the analysis undertaken as part of each local authority's Best Value programmes (i.e. its review work relating to cultural provision).

Planning capital spending

5.6.9 The Scottish Arts Council (SAC) has published guidance to local authorities on capital spending. The SAC advises that it is good practice for:

• local authorities to develop priorities and capital plans for their area, developed in consultation with their communities

• local authorities to have an authority-wide (rather than departmental or service-based) approach to capital planning, based on structures and an ethos which encourages joint working, and

• capital developments to be led by the specific kind of arts activity that will take place in the building and the demand for the activity (and for the planning not to be 'building-led').

5.6.10 Overall, it is therefore good practice for each local authority to:

• set three year budgets for cultural provision

• ensure that resource allocation is focused on intended outcomes, and

• be informed by the local authority's own Best Value work.

5.6.11 It is also good practice for local authorities to:

• ensure there are adequate resources to implement their strategies and cover the key features of the cultural activities set out in Table A

• have appropriate decision making and staff structures (this could expand on some of the points discussed on the roles of officers, councillors etc)

• consider different models for service delivery to ensure best value in the use of resources (this could expand on issues about trusts and other forms of externalisation)

• consider how to address the issue of upgrading facilities

• provide support for the voluntary sector and work in partnership with it and other appropriate agencies.

5.7 Access

5.7.1 As discussed in Part 2, there is a key role for local authorities to facilitate and widen access to cultural provision and experiences. This is not simply a matter of increasing attendances - important as that goal often is. Participation is another 'access' goal. It is therefore good practice that local authorities are explicit about whether they are referring to attendance, participation or both, when using the term 'audience development'.

5.7.2 Since widening access must necessarily be carried out on a planned basis, it is necessary for local authorities' plans and strategies to be explicit - that is, not simply to express the aspiration that access will be widened but to bring forward proposals to achieve this, including:

• identifying the groups the local authority intends to attract (e.g. young people, older people, people which disabilities, people of minority ethnic origin)

• making proposals about how service provision will be designed so as to attract interest from these groups (including the use of neighbourhood resources such as schools and sport facilities)

• clarifying whether people are to be attracted as 'observers' or 'participants'

• confirming arrangements for marketing services, and how specific tools (e.g. education and outreach work) are to be used.

5.8 Quality

Why quality of provision is important

5.8.1 In cultural provision - as in public service provision as a whole - quality is of growing importance. This is recognised in the proposed statutory duty of Best Value which asks local authorities to secure continuous improvement with an appropriate balance between quality and cost. It matters how good service provision is, because poor services do not meet the needs of their users, fail to meet the intentions of those who arrange them, and are not a good use of public resources. In the particular area of culture, poor services undermine cultural provision as having value in its own right and as a means to achieving policy goals. An example of the latter is where poor services alienate those who already experience exclusion.

The responsibility of local authorities

5.8.2 Where local authority services are inspected by central government, this provides a means of independent and rigorous evaluation. However, the local authorities' role in cultural provision is generally not inspected (*). Therefore, in the absence of external inspection, the onus is on local authorities to be rigorous in managing cultural activities so as to achieve quality in service delivery. External audit has a role to play in terms of quality control.

(*) One exception to this is community learning, where local authorities are required to submit a community learning strategy to the Scottish Executive, and annual targets for improvement. HM Inspectorate for Education also carries out regular inspections of community learning and development, and has a 'quality indicators framework' which provides illustrations of what success looks like.

User views

5.8.3 The guidance has already discussed the need for taking user views into account. It is good practice to test service quality by inviting user feedback, and local authorities should consider how adequate their current arrangements are for seeking opinion in relation to cultural provision.

Quality improvement schemes

5.8.4 In addition, as managers of service provision (whether this is direct, external or based on partnership), local authorities need to form a view on quality which provides a managerial perspective (and may reflect but differ from the user's perspective). There are different quality improvement models available to local authorities, each of which is compatible with Best Value:

• some are 'generic', for example standards relating to processes (e.g. those created by the British Standards Institution, such as ISO 9000) and to training and support for staff (e.g. Investors in People) and pursuing quality-related awards for public sector bodies (e.g. the Chartermark scheme)

• others are particularly relevant to cultural provision, for example -

  • the 'How Good Is Our School' approach, developed by HM Inspectorate for Education, which addresses matters relevant to cultural provision

  • the 'QUEST' quality improvement scheme, which was developed by UK Sports Council and based on the 'business excellence model' developed by the European Foundation for Quality Management, and relates to both facilities and sports development

  • museums registration standards, and

  • VisitScotland's facilities-specific registration scheme

• a further option is adapting schemes which exist in one cultural area for use in another.

5.8.5 Overall, therefore, there are several mechanisms available to local authorities. It is good practice to:

• select the quality improvement schemes which best fit the local authority's circumstances

• consider arrangements where services are commissioned externally (rather than delivered directly) or in partnership, with a view to promoting quality

• use the resulting information to evaluate and review progress

• arrange to take user views into account on a systematic basis.

5.9 Information and research for managing performance

The need for information and research information

5.9.1 Traditionally, routine statistical and research information on cultural provision has been incomplete. As the National Cultural Strategy commented:

"There was little comprehensive data collection or analysis of spending on cultural activities and its effects."

(Creating Our Future . . . Minding Our Past, p 57)

5.9.2 The routine data available for local authorities' arts services are among the stronger of local authorities' cultural data - but even here there are known difficulties. For example, the main source of detailed information on spending is the annual survey commissioned jointly by the Scottish Arts Council and the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. While its value is considerable, there are problems with the consistency of reporting from one local authority to another. Meanwhile when more detailed data (relating not only to spending but also to service provision) were sought by the Scottish Executive, in the period before publication of the National Cultural Strategy, there were limitations to the data reported - at least partly because of the accessibility and quality of data held by local authorities.

5.9.3 It is acknowledged by both the Scottish Executive and Scottish local authorities that better routine information to improve the national dataset is desirable - in particular, to assess the outcomes and impacts of spending, across the entire of range of local authorities' cultural activities (see Table A).

Service planing

5.9.4 Effective planning of cultural provision needs to be based upon good management information. Routinely-available information on service provision is essential, including data on:

• the volume of services provided

• the number/categories of service users

• the cost of provision, and

• gaps and needs.

This information is needed by local authorities whether they provide the services directly, commission them externally or provide them partnership.

5.9.5 In addition, local authorities also require research and survey information - that is, information which is not necessarily routinely available, such as information on service users' views of the service (e.g. quality, access, availability).

Performance management

5.9.6 Finally, local authorities need good routine information in order to have measures of success. Performance information which is always available, comprehensive and robust is essential if a local authority is to:

• assess the extent to which it is actually achieving its own policy goals (and those of the Scottish Executive, and the local authority's own partner organisations), and

• understand what Best Value it is achieving in relation to its cultural activities.

5.9.7 An associated use of performance (and other) information is benchmarking - that is, where a local authority makes comparisons between one service and one or more other services (either within the same local authority, or, more commonly, in other local authorities) with a view to identifying where there is scope for improvement. The improvement may be in relation to issues such as quality, cost, effectiveness. Benchmarking in cultural provision is currently under-developed, and holds much scope for local authorities to identify improvements. However, to achieve this, good quality information is necessary.

5.9.8 CoSLA may wish to consider seeking the agreement of local authorities to collect data on finance and possibly also on usage, in a consistent format, to allow trends to be investigated and comparisons to be made between local authorities.

5.9.9 In summary, therefore, it is good practice for local authorities to:

• recognise the fundamental importance of good routine and research information for

• planning cultural provision

• performance management

• review the adequacy of current information, and

• (where necessary) arrange to improve the quality and range of at least key information.

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