Strategic partnerships grew from the ashes of compulsory competitive tendering (CCT) and growing pressure on local authorities to perform. They have responded to regular assessments of their services by teaming up with the private sector in strategic partnerships – effectively outsourcing a number of services and entering into a long-term relationship with the service provider.
Best value and the duty to achieve ‘economy, efficiency and effectiveness’ under Section 3 of the Local Government Act 1999 has been with local authorities since January 2001, replacing the CCT regime. This has now been supplemented by Comprehensive Performance Assessments (CPA) which categorises local authorities as ‘excellent’, ‘good’, ‘fair’, ‘weak’ or ‘poor’.
