PR 817

COUNTY COUNCIL RETAINS TOP RANKING

Hampshire County Council has retained its `excellent' rating from the Audit Commission for the second year running.

As part of an annual refresh of the Comprehensive Performance Assessment (CPA), the authority had its ranking re-confirmed, maintaining its position among a select 26-strong group of top-performing councils nationwide.

The CPA was introduced last year to measure the performance of councils across the country into five categories: excellent, good, fair, weak or poor.

In its assessment, the Audit Commission said the County Council had made improvements to services over the last year. It added: "Based on current plans, the council is well placed to further improve the way it works and the services provided to local people."

Leader of the County Council, Councillor Ken Thornber, said: "This is great news, and a just reward for the hard work carried out by everyone in the authority, every day of the week. It would have been easy to become complacent after receiving our excellent status last year, but we were determined to work every bit as hard on our services for the people of Hampshire as we did in 2002.

"Improvements to Social Services this year included additional money to enable more elderly people to be discharged from hospital and to provide more intensive home care - and the Audit Commission said prospects for further improvement were excellent.

"Other successes have been improving the educational achievement of children at risk of social exclusion and working innovatively with local partners. The Audit Commission also recognised the investments being made to reduce traffic congestion and improve transport and road safety.

"Last year's excellent rating opened up exciting opportunities for us to take a real lead in dialogue with Government on key issues, particularly through the Innovations Forum - a group of excellent authorities working to develop new ways of improving public service. Maintaining our rating means we'll continue to have a strong voice at national level.

"I would, however, like to see more of the `freedoms and flexibilities' we were promised when we gained our initial ranking. These have been unimaginative so far, and I hope our second year as an excellent authority will see our relationship with Government develop into one where we are enabled to deliver in a way which fits local priorities rather than through central prescription.

"That said, I'm delighted that our efforts have proved so worthwhile. Having such strong third party endorsement that we're still doing an excellent job is a well-deserved feather in our cap."

ENDS

For further information please contact: Sarette Martin on 01962 847367 sarette.martin@hants.gov.uk

17/12/2003