Rosalind Turner, Kent county council
We have to be realistic: We are working within huge budget constraints. However, I have an example of innovative thinking and working, based on an organisation working with another local authority to provide support for carers. They are being offered a strategic partnership with a guaranteed minimum income for three years, but with a significant reduction on previous grant. There will be a per capita reduction of about 30% for each carer.
However, there will be greater freedom for the organisation to determine what those services should be. There will be a reckoning after three years of how services have been delivered. However this will be on a broader basis than over recent years, where the organisation received several specific grants – all of which had separate accounting requirements.
To receive respite care and a personalised budget carers still have to go through the local authority, and there is currently a nine month wait. So there needs to be some discussion on whether this function can be transferred to the voluntary organisation, which is already in contact with four times as many carers as the local authority. We need to consider a whole pathway change of identification of need, assessment and delivery.
Sharing costs and benefits across the public sector: Something we have been trying to achieve for years with section 57 agreements between health and adult care, and of course through children's trusts, plus all the hopes and aspirations of "place-based budgeting".
Children's centres are probably a good example of joined-up services, even though the budgets come in separately from health and local authorities and others.
We haven't yet spoken about staff or management groups taking on service delivery, and I would anticipate children's centres would be ripe for this, particularly with their strong connection to parents and communities. I would have thought they would be in a good place to argue for combined budgets.
Also some hope from the SEN green paper and the idea of joined-up assessments between education, health and social care, delivered by voluntary organisations, and hopefully through direct payments to the families. If we keep testing the ground and pushing the boundaries, we might yet get something really worthwhile. Even though we can't shy away from budget reductions, wouldn't it be nice to see a commensurate process reduction between need and access to services?
Louise Wilson, Mybnk
We need to be aware of the risks: There needs to some wariness around the introduction of new businesses and how successful they can be. We work with young people through micro-finance schemes to develop new enterprises and encourage them to think about how they can come up with innovative solutions to social problems, perhaps even becoming agents for social change. In my opinion, a micro finance approach can reduce the financial risks involved and ensure that people have the skills and drive to be an entrepreneur. There have also been some successful programmes of note – one being Beyond the Barn. Of the 33 social enterprises they have incubated in the last five years, 25 are still running and have created 200 jobs in the local area. There will always be risk with new business but it is worth ensuring that there is good support there as well.
You need to subscribe to the social change you wish to see: MyBnk's mission will always be about providing young people with the education they need in the finance and enterprise arena – we appreciate it will not always be us who provides this.
I think that the worry especially of some smaller enterprises is that they won't be able to be effective in the running to access some local government commissioning, even though they may be best placed to deliver parts of it.
Jenni Inglis, Consultant
We need to work together: There are a wide range of people involved in any commissioning process. Those professionals need to work as a team and there must be enough emphasis on investigating needs and considering what to buy before anyone puts pen to paper on a specification. Engaging with potential providers to understand options prior to deciding what to buy is something that has generally been flagged up as requiring more work. Once any supplier has to bid on a scope and spec that's already been set, the opportunity to have their bid favoured on "added value" is limited.
Procurement is only one part of commissioning processes. See the NAO successful commissioning guide and eight principles of good commissioning. These highlight the importance of the earlier stages of deciding what to buy.
Predicting the future is hard: One of the problems with unintended consequences is that, obviously, they're hard to foresee. However, getting better at systematic identification of stakeholders and talking to them about change – how change could be measured and importance of change – does help us to foresee some and to put in place systems to measure them. Then, during delivery, again asking stakeholders open questions about what changes can help to ensure there isn't anything that's fallen through the net.
Nick Johnson, chief executive Social Care Association
It's all about the money: I think money is the bottom line and this is demonstrated by the number of (often small) voluntary organisations who have lost work at the first competitive tender. Some councils believe more in these types of organisations than straight private companies, which may help – although some social enterprises are more about enterprise and less about social, to quote Sue Bott of NCIL. Local authorities seem to warm to private consultancies when it comes to money management and proposed (detrimental) change.
An organisation can go bust trying to get work: If this is to work, the process should be shortened and made more accessible for everyone. When I was in local government, we often specified what we wanted and then produced a short service agreement on which we based our relationship. I am not sure we could demonstrate that the very business-oriented model we now have produces better outcomes or engenders greater community engagement – in fact I suspect the opposite.
Garath Symonds, Surrey county council
Think about the desired outcome: Something that we have been looking at is outcomes-based commissioning where as commissioner we prescribe the social outcome that we want, but not the method of achieving it. Where outcomes are shared between the commissioner and a voluntary sector provider that is great, however when we are spending public money it is better to focus on specific outcomes.
Another answer could be co-production, where services are delivered in a reciprocal nature between young people, professionals and their communities. We are aiming to make this a commissioning standard across Services for Young People.
Martin Buckland, ADAS
We can't only focus on price: There is undoubtedly too much focus within the public sector procurement process on price and process and not outcomes that deliver value and quality. But there is also an assumption that lower price means less value or quality – I believe the private sector can deliver both lower prices and improved value and quality. But allowing contracts with very little reference to quality and only focusing on price is a disaster.
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