Paper that comes in two parts. First Lesley Sutton shares her experience in looking at (some) data on local authority spend and performance in a few sectors. This is undertaken on the basis of published data, and the annex describes the key data sets that are available and touches upon the significant gaps. Her work does point to a major variation in performance but also emphasises that this is a data and policy minefield; great care should be taken before drawing any conclusions as to relative efficiencies, etc.
Then KPMG provide their perspective on local government transformation and a case study related to delivering change at one Scottish local authority. Their conclusions from the case study are set out clearly, with much food for thought for those across the public sector.