Public Service Agreement - Introduction
This summary gives an overview of the Public Service Agreement, breaking it into the following sections:
Leicester City Council - Public Service Agreement
- Performance Targets
- National Targets
- Local Targets
- Freedoms and Flexibilities
- Pump Priming
- Performance Reward
Leicester City Council - Public Service Agreement
Leicester signed its Local Public Service Agreement with central government on 4th July 2002. It covers the period up to March 2005. The PSA will help to achieve the city's ambition to be a:
"premier city in Europe with a thriving and diverse society in which everyone is involved and in which everyone can have a decent, happy and fulfilling life. A city with a strong economy, a healthy, caring and educated society, a safe and attractive environment and an improving quality of life - a sustainable city".
The selection of PSA targets was designed to drive the city's Community Plan themes in particular areas of weakness in performance and to reflect the council's priorities and overall approach to delivering local governance and services to its residents. The LPSA has been in shaped in conjunction with the Leicester Partnership, the city's local strategic partnership
Headline Outcomes
- Raising educational standards in the city by increasing educational attainment at GCSE;
- Improving life chances and quality of life for young people and children in care by icreasing educational attainment at GCSE;
- Improving life chances and quality of life for young people and children in care by achieving an overall reduction in the number of looked after children;
- Enabling more older people to live as independently as possible by providing high quality pre-admission and rehabilitation care;
- Addressing fuel poverty by improving the condition of housing stock in the private sector;
- Reducing health inequalities by reducing the number of adult smokers in Leicester;
- Making Leicester a safer place by reducing domestic burglary in the city;
- Making Leicester's roads safer by reducing road accident casualties;
- Making Leicester a cleaner and better place by improving the cleanliness of the city centre;
- Improving social and personal well-being and enhancing social cohesion by increasing cultural participation;
- Improving employment opportunities for refugees within the city;
- Increasing the efficiency, economy and effectiveness of council services.
What flexibilities have been given?
Leicester City Council and the government have agreed 7 freedoms and flexibilities which will help achieve the LPSA targets:
What will the pump priming money be used for?
- Virement of Standards Fund between categories;
- Minimum resource allocation through the Standards Fund of 95% of the 2001/2002 allocation for the duration of the period covered by the LPSA;
- Consideration of priority roll out of any revised planning system dependant upon the criteria for any potential new system being met;
- Meeting by the end of July 2002 with DfES to discuss the issue of funding reflecting the additional costs more rapidly of influxes of pupils such as the Dutch Somalis in Leicester. This dialogue will continue until the introduction of the new Revenue Grant System in 2003/04;
- Participation in the Department of Health Information Sharing Group, as part of the department's information for social care work programme;
- To retain receipts arising from Fixed Penalty Notices for littering to use in relation to initiatives to further improve street cleanliness in Leicester;
- Additional powers to combat fly posting
What will the pump priming money be used for?
Leicester will receive just over £1 million in pump priming grant. This will focus on:-
- raising standards in schools (learning mentors, specialist teaching programme for Somali students,IQEA programme);
- improving life chances of looked after children and reducing the overall number of looked after children (adoption support, corporate parenting officer);
- enabling older people to live more independently (review of current care, development of training strategy, additional capacity within independent care packages);
- identifying vulnerable households in terms of fuel poverty measures;
- smoking cessation programmes;
- reducing domestic burglary in the city;
- research into road safety schemes and development of casualty reduction strategy;
- making Leicester a cleaner city (Litter Warden, Education Officer);
- increase levels of participation in cultural events in the city (research to identify excluded groups and education, marketing and promotion);
- increase employment opportunities for refugees (tailored training packages, English language training)
Unsupported Credit Approvals
Leicester will receive £2.5 million in Unsupported Credit Approval. This will be used to:
Performance Reward Grant
If Leicester City Council meets or exceeds all the performance targets it will receive a performance reward grant of £7.5 million.
Schedule 1 target summary, targets
Schedule 2 freedoms and flexibilities
Target 1: changes 1-5
Target 4: change 6
Target 9: changes 7-8
Schedule 3 pump priming grant
Schedule 4 performance reward grant
For further information, please contact Liz Reid-Jones, Policy Officer, Chief Executive's Office, tel. 0116 252 6097
Leicester will receive £2.5 million in Unsupported Credit Approval. This will be used to:
- provide credit cover to enable the council to enter into the necessary property leases as required to participate in the NHS Lift Initiative;
- implement a new local tax computer system to improve collection of council tax and the cost effectiveness of the service;
- implement a new payroll system in order to improve the overall cost effectiveness of the service.
Performance Reward Grant
If Leicester City Council meets or exceeds all the performance targets it will receive a performance reward grant of £7.5 million.
Schedule 1 target summary, targets
Schedule 2 freedoms and flexibilities
Target 1: changes 1-5
Target 4: change 6
Target 9: changes 7-8
Schedule 3 pump priming grant
Schedule 4 performance reward grant
For further information, please contact Liz Reid-Jones, Policy Officer, Chief Executive's Office, tel. 0116 252 6097
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