The quality of public services across Tendring will improve with reduced costs to customers if partners can work much closer together.

That was the clear message from a special workshop staged in Weeley today (January 27).

Representatives from Government, Essex County Council (ECC), Tendring District Council (TDC), Essex Police, Fire, Ambulance, NHS North East Essex Primary Care Trust, and many others got round the table to thrash out how services can be delivered better.

And an initial step towards achieving that goal was to explore the potential of developing a "single front door" multi-service hub for residents.

The purpose-built civic centre would provide high quality, joined up efficient services which are what people want - and expect. It could involve the Councils sharing the building with a number of functions including a library, health, voluntary and other providers under one roof.

Other lesser used buildings could then be sold to reduce overall costs across the District.

Peter Martin, Leader of ECC, said that the people his Council represented are the same people that TDC represents.

"Residents are not interested in who provides the service, they just want their bins emptied," he said. "It does not matter who does it, as long as it happens."

Cllr Martin added that due to the current financial climate it is important to make assets work harder than in the past.

"We simply cannot afford to have property around which is not properly used and by coming together in a hub we can make savings," he said. "This is a great opportunity that we need to explore."

In October last year TDC and ECC signed a Memorandum of Understanding to commit to work proactively together, using built assets to improve efficiency and effectiveness, drive down costs and improve customer experience.

Peter Halliday, TDC Deputy Leader, said that many of the key issues each partner deals with are very similar.

"Working closer together in this way we can help to solve them and provide affordable excellence for our residents," he said.

"It is very much about us looking very hard and differently at how we work and make the very most of all the resources available to us.
"It is vital that public services stamp out duplication, talk to each other more and exchange information wherever possible to improve customer experience."

Cllr Halliday said he was delighted that TDC and ECC have got on board together to do this - and the initiative has the backing of Westminster.

John Connell, from the Department for Communities and Local Government, told the workshop that the Department is very keen to support what is happening in Tendring.

"It is being driven by the local authority and we firmly believe it is about local areas doing it for themselves and finding out what the customer really wants," he said.

"Local is truly best and what we like about Tendring is that TDC is taking the lead with the support of ECC. Whitehall is committed to help make it happen because bringing partners together is a really good thing."

The project is also being supported and partly-funded by Improvement East.

One of the other aims of the workshop was to find out who, other than ECC and TDC, is interested in getting involved.

27/1/12