Rachel Litherland
Much of the attention and coverage given to Total Place thus far has focused on the official 13 pilots chosen to lead on the project, which is understandable.
But the pilots do not, by any means, represent the only places where councils are working in partnership with local partner agencies to drive efficiencies and improve services.
A fundamental part of Total Place is both the recognition and encouragement of this sort of work elsewhere.
It was work done in Suffolk, Norfolk and Cumbria respectively – the 'pre-pilots' – that preceded the Total Place project, and work continues in all three areas. Although Total Place is ostensibly a project running until the Budget, the fundamental changes in service redesign that it is trying to bring about are very much for the long-term.
The number of these areas – now known as "parallel places" – continues to rise, as more and more local authorities tell us about the work they have done, are doing, or plan to do around the Total Place agenda. To name but a few examples: The 'Making Cambridgeshire Count' initiative designed to transform partnership working and public services; council and NHS partnership work in Herefordshire; Tower Hamlets piloting strategic commissioning; and there are many more.
The Regional Improvement and Efficiency Partnerships (RIEPs) have given strong backing to the parallel places, helping to link them with pilots in their area, and some have provided funding to undertake similar work. Both the South West RIEP and Improvement East have funded almost all of their councils to do so. Local authorities have been building effective partnership working for some time as a response to the economic downturn and other pressures they face and have grabbed this agenda with both hands.
Parallel places have the arguable advantage of not having to report back to Whitehall with findings from their work, as the pilots had to do within quite a tight timescale – although evidence from parallel places was used alongside that of the pilots for the submission to Whitehall to inform the pre-Budget report.
It is also up to the parallel places to decide on the scale of the work going on, the themes they want to look at in more depth, and the way they go about it. In Suffolk, for example, work began by concentrating on building trust between the leaders of local agencies, rather than with the counting of local public spend as in the pilots.
The result is that an increasingly rich and varied tapestry of work is developing and the IDeA, alongside the rest of the LGA Group, is working hard to try to link up the diverse work going on all over the country.
By informing places which other areas are covering a similar theme, offering thematic support from our national advisors on issues such as adult social care, children and young people, and community safety, we aim to spread the learning and stop others reinventing the wheel. The first of a series of thematic seminars specifically aimed at parallel places will be held soon, offering opportunities for people from areas working on similar themes to meet and share learning.
Local authorities do not have to "apply" to become parallel places – if they are doing this sort of work, they already come under that definition. If there are places which would like to explore the idea, we are happy to provide any support we can.
People are welcome to join the conversation around the work at the dedicated Total Place Community of Practice, which provides a private forum for people to learn and share information.
To join the CoP and for further information and case studies, visit Total Place or the the IDeA or contact and www.idea.gov.uk, or contact Rachel.litherland@idea.gov.uk
Rachel Litherland is the national advisor on partnerships at the (IDeA)
