Hackney's getting better

The Audit Commission have just published their latest Corporate Assessment of Hackney Council: http://www.hackney.gov.uk/xp-lbh-carep.pdf

Key findings:

• “Hackney Council has put in place many of the foundations for achieving excellence, but recognises that it is on a long-term journey of improvement. It has established effective leadership at the senior level but this has not yet translated into consistent performance lower down the organisation. It has a good understanding of where it needs to improve but many of the resulting changes are recent and have yet to have an impact on outcomes. Service performance is improving in many areas but remains low in comparison to other local authorities.”
• “Community leadership by the Mayor is strong and his commitment is an important driver of the continuing improvement in Hackney. He now has a high profile in the community and his three priorities are familiar to staff and stakeholders.”
• “Managerial leadership is also strong and effective. A 2005 Mori survey showed that residents are significantly more satisfied with Council services than in 2002, though they are still more negative than those in other London boroughs.”
• “The Council shows a strong understanding of diversity which it celebrates as a strength of the local community.”
• “Internally the Council has focused on race equality and eradicating discrimination”
• "Financial planning and control is now very strong in contrast to the situation five years ago. This provides a robust basis for resourcing the Council's priorities over the medium term and delivering continuing improvement. Improvements in income collection and more efficient procurement have helped the Council to deliver efficiency savings while maintaining service quality.”
• “The Council is clear what it needs to do to become high performing. It knows what it needs to improve, has developed strategies to do this in a sustainable way over the medium term and has already begun to deliver some improvements.”