Sharing services – an introduction

Because without sharing neither of us would be able to cross the chasm

Eric Pickles and Grant Shapps are fond of responding to Local Government leaders complaining about Local Government cuts with three responses:

1. Local Authorities should not complain when they pay their Chief Executive more than the amount paid to the Prime Minister
2. Local Government would be fine if it simply abolished non-jobs (Grant Shapps claimed Manchester Council should not cut 2,000 jobs but instead get rid of their ‘twitter tsar’)
3. Local Government could make substantial savings if it did a better job of sharing ‘back office services’

We’ve addressed the first issue before and the second issue is obvious baloney so does not bear discussion (well, maybe if you’re lucky we’ll give it a run in a few weeks).

The third issue, that of shared services, is of real interest to local government and to those of us who work within it.