This week in the Full Council meeting at Warwickshire County Council, Tories voted against a motion proposed by Cllrs O’Rourke and seconded by Cllr Adkins to save front line services in Warwickshire. The motion called for Tory controlled Warwickshire County Council to explore all opportunities to maximise savings through shared services initiatives in order to avoid cutting vital front-line services. The motion called for a cross party working group to be established to lead a review to identify which current back office and corporate services
could be potentially delivered more efficiently through a shared service approach, and that results of that review be brought back to a Cabinet meeting within the current financial year outlining any opportunities to make savings.

In her speech to the Council, Councillor Maggie O’Rourke argued: ‘Shared services initiatives can cover many different models of working. It’s often thought of as back office arrangements-which may be transactional, operational or professional. Councils and other public sector services across the country are now actively looking at shared services initiatives that can deliver efficiencies, continuity, sustainability, as well as the opportunity to deliver seamless services across sectors and beyond county boundaries. Better delivering for the many not just the few. So, we believe that WCC should be leading the way on shared services initiatives. We need to be demonstrating to people of Warwickshire that we have considered every possible option to protect vital frontline services whilst ensuring we are delivering the best possible value for money during this period of Austerity.’

Cllr Helen Adkins, who seconded the motion argued that: ‘[w]hilst the LGA says that councils are already saving half a billion a year from shared service arrangements, there is still more to be done. It is a tiresome claim that agreeing shared service arrangements is something we are “already doing” – and that further efficiency savings are impossible. I am sure if we were to look in detail we have only touched on a tiny fraction of what we could be doing, if we are serious about achieving value for money and saving front line services.  Innovation and efficiency are not only about saving money but improving services and it is perhaps apt to add that shared services of course can, involve a number of players including the NHS, the fire brigade or the police. There is a constant claim to increase council tax and this is seen as a “no alternative!” But is this true and honest? If the efforts to implement more shared services have not been 100% can we really be honest with residents about our willingness to put them and their needs first? Even if it means we have to take the time to think hard about where such shared services could be implemented further, surely it is worth it, if it benefits the needs of the residents we represent?

There are many benefits shared services can bring such as increased investment, for example, in more advanced IT systems, as partners’ resources are pooled, adoption of best practices across service delivery partnerships, opportunities to redesign services to better meet the
needs of users and improvements in service performance, for example, improved response times. And furthermore, there are many examples where shared services have made a big impact in other local authorities. For example, Somerset County Council, Taunton Deane
Borough Council, and Avon and Somerset Police, offer a range of shared back office services including finance, ICT, procurement, property facilities management, human resources, design and print. With no clear sign austerity is really over a question mark still faces public- facing services and whether they can be maintained at all in the current climate. Therefore, collaborating to share a range of transactional services which vary little across authority boundaries, such as HR, payroll and revenues and benefits makes good business sense. There are currently over 500 individual shared services arrangements in the UK, generating savings worth in excess of £643m a year, according to the LGA.

The Labour Group at WCC back the recent Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) report that revealed that 63% of senior local government executives now strongly agree the front-line will suffer if authorities don’t radically change how they structure and deliver their core functions. Whilst the Tories offered an amended motion which asked the senior management to consider shared services at WCC, the Labour Group appealed for this to be done in a transparent, urgent and productive fashion.