Data shows improvements in MCC’s performance

Data released this month shows that Monmouthshire County Council (MCC) is performing well compared to other councils in Wales.

MCC excels in areas such as: helping older people to live in the community; key stage 3 school results; library use; and composting of garden waste.

All Welsh local authorities use the National Performance Measurement Framework to assess their overall performance. Statistics showing how MCC did in 2008/09 were released by the Welsh Assembly Government this week. Overall performance was improved or maintained against more than two thirds in indicators in the set.

The data shows areas where MCC excels:

• Monmouthshire composts the highest proportion of municipal waste of any authority in Wales at 21.8%. This is a three point increase on last year’s figure of 18.7%.The Welsh average is 12.8%.
• Key stage 3 results are the best in Wales with 66.7% of pupils achieving the Core Subject Indicator compared to a Welsh average of 59.7%.
• Pupil attendance in primary schools is the second best in Wales at 94.36%.
• 100% of reviews for children who are looked after by the local authority were completed on time. Across Wales the average was 91.4%.
• Monmouthshire has increased the proportion of older social services users who are supported to live in their own home from 85.5% to 89.3%. This makes us the second best performer in Wales. We also have the lowest rate of older people placed into residential or nursing care.
• The rate of Monmouthshire residents making use of their local library is the highest in Wales with 8,874 visits per thousand people against a Welsh average of 5,913 visits.
• For the third year running, MCC has the lowest sickness absence amongst its staff of any authority in Wales with 8.9 days lost against a Welsh average of 11.5. MCC also has below average staff turnover, 8.3% against a Welsh average of 9.1%.

Officers have said they are aware that there are always areas that need improvement. Some of the areas they are working to improve include:

• Over the past year MCC have made significant improvements in the percentage of householder planning applications that are determined within eight weeks. This has increased from 63.6% to 78.4%. This is just below the Welsh average
• The percentage of undisputed creditor invoices paid within 30 days has been improved from 39.9% to 70.6%. This is still amongst the lowest in Wales although the rate of improvement is one of the highest. Concerns over the validity of the reporting mechanism are being addressed to provide a clearer picture of actual performance and with those changes and other improvements in place a much improved performance will be achieved in 2009/10.
• MCC takes an average of 18.6 days to process benefit claims compared to a Welsh average of 11.1 days. This makes the authority one of the lowest performing authorities in Wales. Work is already underway to improve performance and ensure our claimants receive a significant improvement in the service they receive.
• Although there has been an increase in the percentage of non compostable waste that is reused or recycled, MCC’s present performance of 17.03% is the lowest of any authority in Wales. MCC is planning changes to the service to address this.

More information on what MCC did in 2008/09 is contained in their improvement plan which will be published on their website http://www.monmouthshire.gov.uk/improvement at the end of October.

The complete dataset is available on the Data Unit website: http://www.dataunitwales.gov.uk.