Adapting to change
Recommendations from the Williams Commission were about far more than just cutting the number of local authorities in Wales, although that is the proposal that made all the headlines. The report published in January covered public service governance and delivery and will have major implications for housing and its relationship the relationship with other public services. WHQ asked Kellie Beirne and Shayne Hembrow for their views on what Williams will mean for housing
Williams: ‘Radical change is needed for public services to survive’
The commission chaired by Sir Paul williams, the former chief executive of NHS Wales, was asked to examine all aspects of public services in wales and make recommendations about their future direction.
After eight months of work, the final report was published in January and makes over 60 recommendations that are designed to:
• Reduce the complexity of the public sector by removing duplication and making sure organisations work together effectively.
• Increase the capacity of local authorities by reducing their number to combat the serious problems of small scale and create significant long-term savings. This will help protect front-line jobs and services.
• Strengthen governance and scrutiny so that services are responsive and the mechanisms for holding the public sector to account are better informed and more effective.
• Ensure that citizens and communities are at the heart of service design and delivery.
• Create new and more coherent approaches to leadership to ensure the best people as leaders are appointed and developed.
• Encourage a new culture of one public service for Wales with organisations united around a shared, collaborative and citizen centred set of public service values.
• Simplify and streamlining performance management by introducing a single and concise set of national outcomes, with local partnerships and organisations feeding in to them, to increase clarity and accountability.
Sir Paul Williams said: ‘Radical change is needed for public services to survive in a viable and sustainable form. We cannot deny or ignore current and future challenges; instead, we need a public sector which can rise to meet them. We need a radical shift, which will mean fundamental changes to structures, roles and programmes across the Welsh public sector. We all need to embrace the need for change, and make it happen as quickly and effectively as possible. It is far better to invest in reform now, before it is too late, and to create world-class public services and a public sector of which we can all be proud.’
For a copy of the report go to http://wales.gov.uk/topics/improvingservices/public-service-governance-and-delivery/?lang=en