This paper from the Local Government Association and Improvement and Development Agency sets out proposals for a new performance management framework. The paper argues that the current framework hinders the drive for improved public services, because it focuses on assessment rather than improvement, encourages compliance rather than innovation and it has become too burdensome.The new framework needs to be consistent with the changes that are taking place in the way localities are governed. It needs to engage people as citizens, customers and taxpayers and to reward innovation. The objective is to bring about better life chances for local people and local communities, to meet and raise their aspirations by ensuring that local public services continue to improve, to strive for excellence, and to provide value for money with accountability to local people.

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Bristol has become the first major city in the UK to launch a comprehensive weekly collection service to recycle food, cardboard and garden waste. The city council says this not only puts it at the forefront of moves to protect the environment but will save council tax payers from significant future rises in household bills.In the first stage of changes, which come into effect this week, around 30,000 Bristol residents will start using the new services with all the remaining 120,000 homes in the city that have doorstep rubbish collections benefiting by early August. The new system means that households will no longer throw away the majority of their waste. Instead food waste, including peelings, bones, tea bags and eggshells will go into a new kitchen waste bin ready for weekly collection.

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A new Civil Service Code has been published and for the first time it will form part of the terms and conditions for Civil Servants. The code was introduced by the Head of the service Sir Gus O’Donnell at yesterday’s major public service reform conference in London. He said it set out the fundamental account of what was expected of all Civil Servants in the 21st Century.As well as reaffirming historic values, the new Code makes clear that the Civil Service must be outward-facing and meet the needs of the public who fund and use its services. For the first time the Code allows the Independent Civil Service Commissioners to consider a complaint direct from a civil servant and it will form part of the contractual relationship between civil servants and their employers.

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