Tower Hamlets hails progress made against best value action plan

The London Borough of Tower Hamlets has insisted this week that it has made significant progress against the action plan drawn up to secure its compliance with the Best Value duty.

The council was required – under a direction issued by the then Communities Secretary Eric Pickles on 17 December 2014 – to agree the plan with Government-appointed commissioners. It tackles issues over the allocation of grants, disposal of council assets and use of publicity.

In a six-month update submitted to Pickles’ successor, Greg Clark, Tower Hamlets said 91% of the items identified in the Best Value Action Plan had been completed or were due to be completed in line with the targets set.

The council noted the appointments of Will Tuckley, chief executive at the London Borough of Bexley, as its new chief executive, along with a new Director of Law, Probity and Governance, Melanie Clay from Central Bedfordshire, and a new Corporate Director of Resources.

It also cited the following as key achievements:

• Improvements to procurement practices, “with tightened controls and spend analysis to reduce costs”;
• A completely new Mainstream Grants Programme, “which has been developed through an open, transparent commissioning process with a clear focus on third-sector delivery of outcomes which progress the council’s Community Plan priorities”;
• The establishment of a clear decision-making process in respect of property disposals. This had been used to sign-off a number of transactions;
• A revised Communications Protocol had been established and considerable work undertaken to develop online approaches to communicating with residents. A review of communications will be carried out and the council’s weekly publication, East End Life, will be moving to a fortnightly frequency in the short term, with a commitment from the mayor to ensure the council is compliant with the Code of Recommended Practice on Local Authority Publicity by March 2016.

John Biggs, Mayor of Tower Hamlets, said: “During this six-month period, and particularly in the last three months since I took over as mayor, considerable progress has been made and the foundations set for further improvement over the next few months.

“My ambition is to ensure that we satisfy the requirements set down in the directions, but I am keen to go beyond a ‘tick box’ exercise of simply satisfying those conditions, and completing the individual actions in the Best Value Plan. I want to ensure these improvements help us achieve our ambition to provide the best possible service for residents, visitors and businesses in Tower Hamlets.”

The next report is due in March 2016.