Members of local councils should play a greater role in the procurement processes that deliver local services. This will allow them to meet the ‘political priorities’ on which they have been elected. The call comes from Procurement & Partnership: Making it work, Doing it Right – a new collection of essays by key experts and professionals from across the local government procurement field. The document is published by the New Local Government Network, an independent think tank.The argument for councillor involvement is put by Bryony Rudkin, Leader of Suffolk County Council: ” The idea that councillors should be kept away from procurement is frankly quite baffling because we have the skills between us that represent the community. For members, it means full involvement in the development of the procurement strategy, and in larger procurement projects as well. It’s an ability to allocate saving corporately.”

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There needs to be a cultural change in the skills, behaviours, knowledge and training of more than 100 occupations involved in delivering sustainable communities. This is the key message from the Egan Skills Review which was set up to look at skills needed by built environment professionals to deliver the Sustainable Communities Plan. The Task Group, headed by Sir John Egan, included people with backgrounds in housing and commercial development, retail, planning, regional and local government, social housing, environment and process re-engineering,The Task Group found that the current approach was, in many cases, failing to deliver the priorities in the Government’s Sustainable Communities Plan and that systems are falling to provide what people want. In order to turn the situation around a new approach is needed with new skills, and new ways of working. This will involve changing the attitude, behaviour and knowledge of everyone involved. The Group recommends cultural change in professional skills and training. This would involve such innovations as planners interacting with highways engineers, environmental officers teaming up urban designers, and developers engaging with community groups.

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