| Title | Public perceptions of public services delivered |
Associated Targets | None |
Brief Description | The indicator is intended to demonstrate one dimension of the quality of public services, namely satisfaction (not necessarily same as quality) and provide an overview rather than detail on specific sectors. Satisfaction will be measured in relation to 3 specific types of public services where Scottish Government have a policy interest and where they have a high public importance. They are health services; public transport; schools. |
Strategic Objective(s) to Which Indicator Relates | This indicator is intended to demonstrate improvement in public services in Scotland (as defined by users). It fits with the wealthier and fairer objective in terms of ensuring public services are available/accessible to all and of an acceptable standard to the citizen. |
More Detailed Definitions | |
Definitions of Keywords | Users of services are defined as those who had an opinion on the quality of a particular service. |
Evidence Source | Scottish Household Survey In the absence of a single readily available indicator to measure satisfaction with public services a composite measure of the perceptions of the above 3 groups of service user will be developed. Information on perceptions of each of the three service areas is available from SHS quarterly, although we are reporting annually on Scotland Performs. Results at local authority level are available annually for the larger local authorities and every two years for the smaller local authorities. There is no requirement for new data collection but whether to build into pre-existing data collections an over-arching assessment of quality of public services will be reviewed. For more information on the Scottish Household Survey, see www.scotland.gov.uk/shs |
Baseline and Past Trends | Baseline year 2007 = 58% (full year's data). This was the first year these questions were included in the survey. |
Methodology for Data Source | The indicator on satisfaction with public services is derived using the question RF10F from the Scottish Household Survey ( SHS). This question was introduced into the survey in 2007, and is asked of three-quarters of the sample (approx 12,000 households a year). It asks: "Overall, how satisfied or dissatisfied are you with each of these council services?" Then lists 8 public services to give opinions on. The three that were used for this indicator were Local health services, Local schools and public transport. The respondent could say: Very satisfied
Fairly satisfied
Neither Satisfied nor Dissatisfied
Fairly Dissatisfied
Very Dissatisfied
No Opinion The indicator is on the basis of the percentage of adults who said that they were very or fairly satisfied with all three services, excluding "no opinion". So, if a respondent said they were satisfied with local health services and public transport, but had no opinion about local schools (perhaps because they were not users of that service) they are counted as being satisfied with the services in their area. The same applies for other combinations of satisfaction and no opinion, except for the small percentage of respondents who answered "no opinion" to all three and therefore were excluded from the denominator. |
Data Ownership and Quality Assurance | Scottish Government provide the data as managers of the SHS - which is a National Statistics Output. |
Publication of Data | The data are published in the Scottish Household Survey Annual Report, which is published annually in August/September. |
Methodology for Recent Change Arrow on Scotland | Methodology will be proposed in September 2009 when the 2008 result is published. |
Future issues or reviews | We are currently looking at the indicator as it is a composite. We are checking that we have the right components in the indicator to cover public services. We are also considering other options. This will report in 2009, though we do not anticipate any changes in the short term. |