The Rt Hon Eric Pickles, Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, has announced the abolition of the 152 Local Area Agreements (LAAs) that currently exist.
LAAs were initialised in 2004 by the Labour Government and permitted councils and their local partners to define their own priorities and select 35 of the most appropriate targets from a set of national performance indicators.
Speaking to council leaders and local government professionals at Hammersmith & Fulham Town Hall, London, Mr. Pickles criticised the bureaucracy surrounding the LAA system saying:
“Time and time again, I hear complaints from councils about how much of a burden the national indicator set is.
There are 66 pages of guidance telling councils how to report on national indicators. So today, I’m scrapping the existing local area agreements… and instead of the national indicator set, and instead of every single department’s endless demands that you measure this, that or the other, I’m promising today that there’s just going to be one list of every bit of data that government needs from you.
So instead of red tape and regulation, instead of instructions and inspections, we’re giving councils what they’ve wanted for decades: Freedom, Power and Responsibility!”
He also said that next week’s Comprehensive Spending Review would streamline the sources of funding given to councils.
Click here to read the full speech (http://www.communities.gov.uk/speeches/corporate/townhallwaste)
