Rother District
Council
Peer Challenge of the CPA Corporate
Self-Assessment
Max Wide, SOLACE Enterprises Facilitator
Elaine Peters, Managing Director, South Somerset
District Council
Councillor Kevin Reynolds, Chair of Overview and
Scrutiny, Huntingdonshire District Council
2
Contents
Contents ................................................................................................ 2
Background ............................................................................................ 3
The Rother District Peer Challenge Process ................................................. 4
What is the Council seeking to achieve? ..................................................... 8
Theme One: Ambition .............................................................................. 8
Theme Two: Prioritisation......................................................................... 8
Theme Three: Focus ................................................................................ 9
How has the Council set about delivering its priorities? ...............................11
Theme Four: Capacity.............................................................................11
Theme Five: Performance management ....................................................11
What has the Council achieved/not achieved to date? .................................12
Theme Six: Achievement (service quality) .................................................12
Theme Seven: Achievement (improvement) ..............................................12
Theme Eight: Investment ........................................................................13
What does the Council plan to do next? ....................................................14
Theme Nine: Learning ............................................................................14
Theme Ten: Future plans ........................................................................14
Process, content and deliverability of the Self-Assessment ..........................15
Process .................................................................................................15
Content ................................................................................................15
Deliverability .........................................................................................15
The Council’s response to the Peer Challenge ............................................15
Conclusion ............................................................................................15
Rother District CPA Peer Challenge
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Background
1.
In October 2002 the Audit Commission published its proposals on the
methodology to be adopted for carrying out Comprehensive
Performance Assessments (CPA) for District Councils, which was
piloted in ten “pathfinder” authorities. It was subsequently decided to
carry out a second piloting stage, this time for the District Councils in
one county. A number of amendments were made to the draft
methodology in the light of this piloting, but now that it has been
finalised one of the central elements remains a self-assessment to be
challenged by peers.
2.
The Audit Commission’s intended aims of Peer Challenge are to:

Provide an objective, robust and managed external challenge to the
self assessment;

Encourage thinking about strengths and areas for improvement;

Contribute to producing a strong and forward-looking improvement
plan.
3.
A number of different approaches and organisations have been
accredited by the Audit Commission to provide the requisite Peer
Challenge including the model that has been developed by SOLACE
Enterprises.
4.
The SOLACE model involves a chief executive and leader working with
a facilitator for three days plus a follow up “Challenge Event”. This
model has been specifically designed for providing Peer Challenge
rather than being an adaptation of an existing model and meets the
Audit Commission’s requirements for Peer Challenge:
5.

Using credible peers who understand the working of a District
Council;

Peers must be independent from the council;

The peer team must be communicated to and acceptable to the
council; The Peer Challenge must cover the four top level corporate
assessment questions;

The peer team must provide written and verbal feedback to the
council.
The SOLACE model sets out to test the robustness of three different
aspects of the self-assessment carried out by the local authority,
namely:

The scope and rigour of the process adopted by the authority for
producing its self-assessment (e.g. the extent of stakeholder
involvement, the breadth and depth of information gathered, etc.);
Rother District CPA Peer Challenge
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
The range and honesty of the content of the self-assessment (e.g.
is it comprehensive and does it appear a balanced document,
addressing areas for improvement as well as successes?);

The council’s capacity to deliver on the conclusions and address
the areas of risk set out in the self assessment (e.g. looking at
what progress has already been achieved in the areas where the
need for action has been identified, the likelihood of progress being
maintained, ownership of the assessment by the council’s
leadership, the resources likely to be available, etc.).
6.
The purpose of the SOLACE Enterprises’ model of Peer Challenge is to
help the local authority to ensure that the final version of its selfassessment is as accurate a reflection of its current performance,
achievements and future capacity as it possibly can be.
7.
As well as being designed specifically to provide Peer Challenge for
CPA self assessment there are some other distinctive features of the
SOLACE model including:

The emphasis placed on establishing a dialogue with the council;

The understanding that Peer Challenge is not part of the inspection

The emphasis placed on the flexibility of the challenge process and
focusing on the specific circumstances of and issues facing a
council.
The Rother District Peer Challenge Process
8.
The Peer Challenge of the Rother District self-assessment began
during the week commencing 30th June when a provisional timetable
of activities was drawn up and background documentation circulated
to the challenge team.
9.
The challenge team was also briefed for the process. The team was:
10.

Max Wide, SOLACE Enterprises Facilitator

Elaine Peters, Managing Director, South Somerset District Council

Councillor Kevin Reynolds, Chair of Overview and Scrutiny,
Huntingdonshire District Council
On the evening prior to the three-day visit the team met to prepare
for the challenge process. In that preparatory meeting the team:

Reviewed the Audit Commission’s proposed methodology for CPA
for District Councils and the SOLACE model for challenging the selfassessment element of that process.

Reviewed the background information provided by the authority,
including the self-assessment, the related evidence and the
additional documentation requested by the SOLACE Facilitator
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
Agreed lines of enquiry to be pursued during the visit and
additional activities and documentation that was needed to gather
information on these

In the light of that agreement, reviewed and agreed adjustments
to the provisional timetable of activities.

Agreed a modus operandi for the process (e.g. team roles and
responsibilities)
11.
The team examined the top-level questions and the ten key themes
for CPA, but gave particular attention to the issues that appeared
from the documentation to warrant particular focus. It was recognised
by the team that three people working on site for three days could
not look at absolutely everything in the same level of detail and that
the process needed to be bounded in some way.
12.
The various methods that the team used to gather information
included:

Face to face and telephone interviews with a cross section of
stakeholders from inside and outside the Authority. These included
o Council Leader
o Chief Executive
o Corporate directors/ Heads of Service
o External partners
o Cabinet members
o Overview and Scrutiny Chair and members
o County Council Chief Executive
o Chair of the LSP
o District Auditor
o A “table dialogue” session involving group discussions with a
diagonal slice of staff from the authority including frontline
staff.
o A tour of the area to familiarise the team with Rother District
and the surrounding area.
13.
Throughout the process the team reflected back to the Council what
they thought they were seeing and learning which provided the
authority with an opportunity to steer the team to look at additional
information if they thought that they had not been given quite the
right message. It was also intended that this dialogue would help to
generate an ownership of our feedback because nothing would come
as a surprise.
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14.
After the three-day visit the team returned to the authority to
feedback the results of the information gathering process in a more
structured way at a “challenge event”. This event was attended by:

Members of the Senior Management Team

Members of the Cabinet and scrutiny members

Staff who had participated in the interviews

External partners
15.
Although the presentation made by the team was robust and
evidenced, the aim was to make this Challenge Event as informal and
as non-adversarial as possible. The Challenge Event was an important
additional means of evidence gathering.
16.
The results of the process outlined above, including the challenge
event, are set out in the remainder of this report which is structured
as follows:





Section Three: Feedback on the top-level question What is the
Council seeking to achieve? and the three themes that fall
under this question namely:

Ambition

Prioritisation

Focus
Section Four: Feedback on the top-level question How has the
Council set about delivering its priorities? and the two themes
that fall under this question namely:

Capacity

Performance management
Section Five: Feedback on the top-level question What has the
Council achieved/not achieved to date? and the two themes
that fall under this question, namely:

Achievement (service quality)

Achievement (service improvement)

Investment
Section Six: Feedback on the top-level question What does the
Council plan to do next? and the two themes that fall under this
question, namely:

Learning

Future plans
Section Seven: feedback on the three different elements for self
assessment i.e.:
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17.

The process by which it was produced

Its overall content

Its deliverability

Section Eight: The Council’s response

Conclusion
In making its comments the team sought to add value by
concentrating on those areas where, as peers, they were able to
identify issues that had not been fed back to the authority by other
commentators, or where it came to a different view on an issue that
had already been discussed. While the team took care to note areas
of strengths as well as areas for improvement, since the main aim of
the challenge process was to stimulate improvement, comparatively
more attention has been given in this report to explaining and
evidencing the areas on which the team believes the Council should
focus its attention.
Rother District CPA Peer Challenge
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What is the Council seeking to achieve?
Theme One: Ambition
Strengths:
18. We found that the aims of the Council are clearly stated and visible
throughout the self-assessment document and the BVPP. They were
well publicised and communicated in writing and through training and
briefing which ensures that staff are aware of the aims.
19.
There is a recognition in the Council that the issues introduced in the
scene setting document required action by to be taken jointly with
partners and hence the Council is developing a community vision
through LSP Action Groups.
20.
We found in talking to staff, members and partners a clear direction
for the Council culturally. The Council is on a journey from an insular
organisation to one that is turning outward to engage the community
and work more closely with partners.
21.
We were particularly struck by the palpable sense of ambition and
enthusiasm within the Council. Staff were ‘on a mission’ and full of
purpose and energy.
22.
The Council has taken its role as a community leader very seriously
and has played the lead role in establishing the Local Strategic
Partnership having commissioned a major piece of research by
Brighton University into the demographic, social and economic issues
facing the District.
Issues
23.
Whilst we found that the ambitions were stated and well known we
think that could benefit from a shaper focus. They seem to be all
embracing covering all aspects of the Councils work but not
particularly differentiated in relation to the themes introduced in the
scene setting document.
24.
Whilst we could find short-term priorities related to the aims we could
not find any long-term aims that had any ‘hard’ targets attached.
Consequently the aims lost their impact and came to resemble
headings under which work is organised.
25.
The manner in which the LSP had been established was the focus for
some debate amongst the Peer Team. The Council played a leading
role, commissioning the research and hosting the Community Forum
that led to the membership of the action groups being identified. It
acted from the point of view of wishing to avoid a ‘talking shop’ and
from a desire to ensure that the right people are there that can get
Rother District CPA Peer Challenge
9
things done. Whilst the approach had generated some initial
resentment and misunderstanding amongst some partners, this have
been overcome and many believe the partnership is stronger as a
result.
26.
In reviewing the early work of the Community Strategy action groups
we found a mixed picture in terms of definable aims with some
groups, notably Health, identifying short term targets. Others
however describe their objectives in very global terms.
27.
We would encourage the Council and the LSP to review their aims and
ensure that clear short, medium and long-term objectives are set
against their aims.
Theme Two: Prioritisation
Strengths:
28. There is a clear set of short-term priorities within the aims stated in
the self-assessment. Three of them (affordable housing recycling and
planning) are measurable.
29.
We found good evidence of the Councils ability to identify priority
areas and to shift resources to match their intentions and achieve
stated targets. The clearest example of this has been in planning
where the service was prioritised as a result of poor performance and
the Council has achieved significant improvements as a result.
30.
Following the challenge event the Council provided additional
information relating to similar shifts in resources in favour of work on
crime and disorder and recycling.
Issues:
31.
Many of the priorities arranged under the aims read as a restatement
of the aims themselves, rather that a sharper set of priorities that
would give a better focus to staff and members.
32.
We were not clear about the overall approach to determining priorities
and the role that consultation, national priorities and community
‘intelligence’ plays.
33.
We were concerned also that there is no prioritisation between the
aims which, because of their all-embracing nature led us to conclude
that the Council has a difficulty with determining what is not a
priority.
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Theme Three: Focus
Strengths:
34.
The Council has clearly taken significant steps to ensure that the
organisation is much more focussed on achieving aims than hitherto.
Portfolio holders are allocated to aims and act to ensure that the
Council remains focussed on them.
35.
We found that service plans has clear links to the Council’s aims.
36.
In addition the Revenue budget is also organised to show the amount
of spend on each aim.
37.
The Council has also demonstrated a capacity to see things through
and has therefore completed some major projects;
a. De la Warr Pavilion
b. Rye swimming pool
38.
Moreover the recent reorganisation was based on the need to make to
SMT more strategically focused.
39.
Scrutiny committee does receive and review performance information
and could show examples of where it had acted to improve poor
performance.
Issues:
40.
Whilst the portfolio holders being responsible for specific aims is
welcome, there was little evidence of their using performance
information to track progress. They seemed reliant on officer opinion
rather than an objective analysis of progress based on a set of agreed
measures.
41.
In examining the past years Management Team agenda we were
concerned that there does not seem to have been a sufficient focus
on strategic issues, we accept however that the restructured team is
fairly new and the Council is working on this.
42.
In relation to the tools that the Council uses to remain focussed we
were unsure about the extent to which risk management is embedded
in the Councils culture. Much of the housing strategy was dependent
on a decision by the Secretary of State to approve the development of
a By-pass. This decision, in risk management terms was a ‘pivotal
uncertainty’, but there did not seem to be a contingency plan. The bypass was not approved
Rother District CPA Peer Challenge
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How has the Council set about delivering its priorities?
Theme Four: Capacity
Strengths:
43. We found that there was much in the Councils favour in relation to
capacity. Staff morale and stability seemed particularly good.
44.
The LSP action groups are making steady progress.
45.
We found that the relationships between officers and between officers
and members were good.
46.
The Council has externalised and transferred services in the past. The
establishment of the Trust to run the De La Warr Pavilion shows that
they are willing to use alternative methods of delivery and have
become skilled at managing contracts.
47.
We found that HR policies are improving and that there had recently
been additional Investment in training for staff and members
Issues:
48.
The Council is embarked upon a journey to turn itself outwards,
embrace a wider public sector agenda and engage positively with
partners. Those that we spoke to had no doubts about the sincerity of
members and staff but they did express doubts as to the capacity of
Rother to back up stated intentions with adequate skilled staff. Many
of the experiences they reported belonged more to the ‘old culture’
than the new.
49.
As peers we considered that the new leadership team had over the
last 2 years released a substantial amount of enthusiasm and
commitment that was hitherto suppressed. In embedding a
permanent and sustainable change however we felt that there was
substantial investment still required in convincing and skilling the
whole of the organisation to embrace the new way of working.
50.
Part of the new culture, that of internal challenge and the use of
objective performance information to inform organisational progress is
still developing.
Theme Five: Performance management
Strengths:
51. The Council has received an unqualified BVPP which reflects the
integrity of the data it supplies.
52.
It has recently committed resources to the development of
computerised performance management system.
Rother District CPA Peer Challenge
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53.
We found that service plan actions and targets are linked to Council
aims
54.
The Council presents performance information in relation to its aims.
55.
We also saw good evidence of the use of PI information to turn
around performance
a. Benefits
b. Planning
Issues:
56.
Overall however the Indicator suites do not capture the aims. We
found that the items listed under the aims represented a mixed
collection of actions, strategies and targets. What is missing is the
refinement of the items presented so that the leaders can genuinely
track progress towards aims being achieved. We are assured that the
new Performance Management system will address this.
What has the Council achieved/not achieved to date?
Theme Six: Achievement (service quality)
Strengths:
57. The Council is a strong service provider. It has a substantial
proportion of top quartile PI's with Particular strengths in some
service areas
a. Benefits,
b. Finance and Audit,
c. Council Tax Collection
Issues
58.
59.
We felt that given their importance in the local context that the
Council needs to develop more measures in relation to leisure and
economic development.
We also felt that a more challenging target is needed for planning,
substantial improvements had been made in this area but we would
encourage the Council to go further still.
Theme Seven: Achievement (improvement)
Strengths:
60. The Council has achieved improvements in planning, access, levels of
crime, rural services, participation and staff communication.
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61.
Partners were very enthusiastic about the change in approach over
the last two years and the improvements in an organisation described
without dissent as “previously dire” in relation to the way in which it
engaged with partners and stakeholders.
62.
The team saw evidence of increased participation in sport through the
development of sports grounds and facilities. Partnership with people
in the community had led to the development of a new pavilion which
enabled greater usage of sports fields.
Issues:
63.
The lack of clear outcome targets makes it difficult to assess whether
the scale of improvement is in line with the Councils intentions or the
level of need in the community.
64.
For example the vision for E-Government was not clear to us. As a
result of this it was difficult to evaluate, on our visit to Battle, whether
what had been achieved there was in line with intentions.
65.
Moreover in relation to Sports we can see the improved facilities in
Bexhill and Rye and the consequent increase in participation, but what
we don’t know is whether, in a population that has substantial
numbers of older people, participation of target groups is increasing.
We would encourage the Council to develop and track targets in this
way so that it knows the outcomes of the investments it is making.
Theme Eight: Investment
Strengths:
66. The Council is taking some positive steps to invest in the future. In
the last Council tax round it increased the level of taxation in order to
invest in the Authority.
67.
We were concerned about the historic delays in addressing the issue
of. The Council has taken substantial steps to invest in waste
reduction and recycling and learn from others.
68.
It is developing in a measured way its performance management
system and utilising ICT in order to do this.
69.
It is resourcing the development of the LSP action groups and building
more positive relationships with partners generally.
70.
It is aware of the need to develop the scrutiny function and it is
investing in training.
71.
It is taking steps to learn from others through participation in
benchmarking and through visits to other authorities engaged in the
same kinds of project.
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Issues:
72. There were signs that in response to a more engaged and listening
council the public were increasing their expectations. Our belief is that
the Council needs to invest in the consultation and community
development skills in order to sustain this new approach rather than
fall victim to it.
What does the Council plan to do next?
Theme Nine: Learning
Strengths:
73. We saw evidence of substantial self-awareness and openness amongst
interviewees.
74.
Staff reported that more involved and putting forward ideas and that
the ‘ask the Leader’ and ask the Chief initiatives had helped in this
regard.
75.
We also saw evidence of increased involvement of external
consultants for example in the preparation of CPA and the Connecting
with Communities initiative.
Issues:
76.
77.
Whilst much of the Council is involved in looking outside and learning
from others we would encourage the Council to do this systematically
so that there is a deliberate policy, to sustain the changes it is trying
to make, of learning from the best.
We wanted to see more evidence of learning from complaints and
customer feedback.
Theme Ten: Future plans
Strengths:
78. We found that the Councils high level action plan was usefully linked
to the Council aims and that the plans had long-term SMART targets
Issues:
79.
80.
We felt that the Council needs to develop a longer term vision with
specific outcome targets in relation to its aims.
We felt that the Council needed to develop a plan to ensure that it
completes the cultural transition in relation to which it has made good
progress.
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81.
We would recommend that the Council invests to enhance community
engagement, consultation and community development skills.
Process, content and deliverability of the Self-Assessment
82.
This section of the challenge report sets out the team’s findings on the
three aspects of the authority’s CPA self-assessment which the team
was charged with assessing namely:

The process by which it was produced

Its content

Its deliverability
Process
83.
The self-assessment was developed with substantial involvement of
staff and members with external facilitation and challenge. All the emails we received stated that staff had participated in the process.
Content
84.
Our impression was of an organisation in transition, the selfassessment did not capture this sufficiently. The Authority is aiming
high but we felt that in its enthusiasm it had painted a picture that
suggested the cultural transition was complete. Greater clarity in
painting the past present and future story give a stronger and more
compelling story.
Deliverability
85.
We feel that the authority has learnt substantially from this process
and that with the addition of the actions we propose under future
plans, it will be able to deliver improvements to the quality of life for
people in Rother.
The Council’s response to the Peer Challenge
86.
The discussions at the challenge event and in subsequent
correspondence have been extremely constructive and the Council
has taken on board much of our feedback as well as challenging us
and providing further evidence where necessary.
Conclusion
87.
Rother District Council has climbed a considerable mountain in the
past two years. Partners in particular reflected this progress,
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describing the Council as substantially different to their past
experiences. It is an ambitious Council that has taken steps to
reconnect with the community and its partners. It is now redefining
its ambitions within the LSP and is aware of the changes it needs to
make in organisational and cultural terms. The direction of travel is
very positive. It now needs to consolidate its position and invest in
completing and sustaining its transformation.
Acknowledgements
88.
We would like to thank the Members, staff and partners of Rother
District Council for their warmth and hospitality and for making out
stay so comfortable and enjoyable.
Max Wide
Senior Associate
SOLACE Enterprises
Rother District CPA Peer Challenge