Service First - The New Charter Programme
Service First - "The Panel has been established by the Government to seek people's views on improving public services. It is a unique development and will play an important part in shaping the Modernising Government White Paper which I plan to publish at Easter". This is what Dr. Jack Cunningham said when he published the results of the second wave of research using the People's Panel.
Research was carried out by MORI, working under contract to the Cabinet Office, which interviewed 3,003 Panel Members across the UK by phone between August and November last year. The data collected are weighted to the known profile of the population.
The findings of the research are:
There is significant support for local services becoming more directly responsive, through referenda, local Mayors, etc.;
The balance of criticism is critical of care in the community. It is credited with integrating people into local communities, but seen as then not giving them the level of care they need;
Public services are better at listening to complaints than they were a few years ago, but there is more work to do as 75% of people think that a lot of determination is needed to get something done about a complaint;
Reliability and frequency of services are the improvements seen as most important for bus services, while reliability is the most important area for improvement in train services. Cost and frequency are also important.
Several means of raising revenue for transport services were put to Panel Members but none received majority support. There was some interest in a range of options. The greatest support for releasing funds for investment was for cutting spending on new roads.
The results from each wave of research will inform decisions on the delivery of public services. In the case of the first wave the Government was already tackling a number of the issues raised by the research:
Public services underfunded - The Chancellor announced in September that £40 billion of new money will be made available for schools and hospitals;
Lack of openness in public services - the new Freedom of Information Bill will make access to information held by Government and agencies much simpler and easier to obtain;
Train companies and London Transport very bad at keeping people informed about their services - The Cabinet Office and the Central
Rail Users' Consultative Committee have worked with the Office of Passenger Rail Franchising on new guidance to train operators on drawing up passengers' charters;
London Transport is addressing the need to improve information about its services through a comprehensive campaign - "Tube 2000".
Future planned uses of the People's Panel are:
Experience of using public services to inform the Modernising Government White Paper (Cabinet Office);
Identifying issues that are important to women (Cabinet Office);
Testing the added value of school league tables (DfEE);
Attitudes to biosciences (Office of Science and Technology);
A third wave of quantitative research in the spring (Government-wide).
Any Government Department, Next Steps Agency, non-departmental public body, or any other publicly funded body, local authority or association representing these bodies may use the Panel to obtain public views of service delivery - on a repayment basis.
It is interesting to compare the findings of this research with that carried out by NfCG last year. There are similarities.
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