Are you being served?

Denbighshire County Council (DCC) have just published their Resident's Survey Report. And an interesting read it is too. But before scrutinising the content of that Report, it is interesting to note that the Local Government Data Unit has just announced that DCC was one of the top 5 performing Councils in Wales during 2015/16. But sadly, the Resident's Survey Report was not used to come to this conclusion. If it had been used, it would be difficult to believe that DCC is one of the best performing councils in Wales - unless the others are even worse.

Although I'm not sure if DCC are legally required to conduct a Resident's Survey, I would have thought it to be an obvious thing to do. To quote the Local Government Authority, "Understanding the resident's views is a key element of assessing the effectiveness of an authority, alongside cost and performance information. Furthermore, understanding resident satisfaction and being able to make informed comparisons can strengthen local accountability and be a key part of the sector's approach to managing its own performance". Ergo, if this or any other Council was serious about being accountable, why do so few people engage with them? At the very least, it will give DCC a resident's view of how they are doing. Throughout industry, it is now fairly commonplace to see employees at all levels carrying out 360 feedback surveys. This often entails seeking the views of everyone with whom you work to gain a more broad idea of how your performance and behaviour is perceived from your peers - be they senior or junior.

When DCC were faced with a budget reduction of £17 million in 2014, they commenced a public consultation exercise and chose to name it "Cutting our Cloth". At the time of the 2011 census, Denbighshire had an adult population of 57,091 (over the age of 16). So what would constitute a reasonable response? Given that DCC were faced with a budget cut of approximately 10% and given that they were proposing some really serious cuts to frontline services, it would be reasonable to expect a massive public response to the "Cutting our Cloth" consultation. They received 822 responses. 822 out of 57,091 is not a response of which to be proud. As this was all happening, a lead officer of DCC warned the Council that the views of individual protest groups were not necessarily representative of the wider community. As Mandy Rice-Davies famously said, "Well, he would say that wouldn't he?". But it was an insult to the hundreds of people who were up in arms over the proposals for cuts. Perhaps it was more convenient to have so few responses at a time when lead officers seemed hell bent on executing devastating cuts on the most vulnerable people in our society?

So why exactly was it that DCC were only able to garner 822 responses from such a large eligible population? It might be argued that most people are just content to "let the Council get on with it". It may also be true that thousands of people didn't even know the consultation was taking place at all. I fell in to the second category and I know that the same was true of most of my friends. But it was also true that those who do not have access to the internet were effectively precluded. Although this was pointed out to DCC at the time, they have employed the same tactic with the Resident's Survey. Denbighshire has one of the largest retired populations in Wales - the very group to whom internet access remains more of a concept than a reality.

But back to the Resident's Survey Report. Having received just 822 responses for the "Cutting our Cloth" consultation, DCC were now aiming for 1000 responses in order to achieve a decent sample size. Although quite how such a tiny percentage constitutes a decent sample size is a mystery to me. Having made the decision to confine their survey to digital media, DCC received just 711 responses. That is 13.5% less responses than the 822 for "Cutting our Cloth"!

Digressing briefly, I noted this week that Wrexham Council were faced with another £5 million in cuts to their budget. One of the Cabinet members was so concerned about this that he suggested that they might even have to go to Queen's Square to seek people's views face to face. Why is that not being done anyway! Give or take, 711 amounts to just over 1% of eligible residents. DCC expressed their disappointment with this figure. Might I suggest they take up the words of the Wrexham Cabinet member? With 4,500 employees, how hard can it be to deploy some of them to ask people face to face in town centres? It would also serve to break down the existing "ivory towers" impression of DCC. Such an approach would definitely yield a far more worthwhile response. During the Tour of Britain bike race in Denbigh, I've never seen so many DCC employees festooned in high viz jackets so it would appear they can be called upon if needed.

As already pointed out, DCC currently employs around 4,500 people. If just half of DCC's own employees had completed this survey, DCC would have received three times as many responses. As it is, the 711 responses received was truly pathetic. But, whatever the deficiencies in the way they sought responses, the data received are worth repeating.

But as ever with these documents, when the figures are poor, it is tempting to represent them in a misleading way. Let me illustrate my point. In their Report, DCC announce the 711 responses received and then give a table detailing what percentage came from each area:-

Respondents nearest town	Percentage of total responses (711)
Denbigh	23%
Rhyl	21%
Ruthin	17%
Prestatyn	14%
Llangollen	13%
St. Asaph	4%
Rhuddlan	4%
Corwen	3%
Grand Total	100%

 But I think the data might look a little more informative like this:-

Nearest Town	2011 Census Population	Number of responses received	% of town residents who responded
Denbigh	9876	164	1.7%
Rhyl	25149	149	0.6%
Ruthin	5461	121	2.2%
Prestatyn	18849	100	0.5%
Llangollen	4079	92	2.3%
St. Asaph	3355	28	0.8%
Rhuddlan	3709	28	0.8%
Corwen	2325	21	0.9%

But my version is obviously a little less kind in the way it is presented. But it is a lot more informative. Figures can be very misleading. We could deduce that 99.4% of Rhyl residents did not respond. But we could equally say that 25,000 Rhyl residents did not respond. See what I mean? Whichever way you may prefer to look at it, the level of public response is incredibly poor. And Rhyl is the town with the largest population and the highest levels of social deprivation. It would have been nice to know the views of those 25,000 people if only to gain a more representative picture.

Of the 711 who did reply:- 

• Roughly 75% felt their lives were happy and fulfilled (By definition 25% are not).
• 81% were happy with their local area as a place to live (So, 19% are not happy).
• 34% felt their local area had got worse in the last 12 months (That is over a third!).
• 68% were satisfied with the overall cleanliness of their local streets (Nearly a third are unhappy!).
• 46% were satisfied with dog fouling in their local area (This figure is highly misleading!).
• 57% were satisfied with road maintenance (So 43% are not happy with our roads!).
• 54% satisfied with streets in towns and villages (Or, 46% are not satisfied with town streets).
• 39% were satisfied with rural roads (But, 61% are not satisfied with our rural roads).
• 2/3 of respondents visited the town centre more then once per week (So, a third only visit weekly).
• 59% were happy with their town centres in general (In general, 41% were not happy!).
• 79% were happy with the range of services (Great but a fifth were not).
• 50% were happy with the range of shops in their local town centre (Half were unhappy with this!).
• 48% were happy with availability of car parking (Over half were unhappy).
• 44% were happy with the cost of car parking (survey prior to recent increases).
• 42% were satisfied with levels of traffic congestion (58% not satisfied with traffic congestion).
• 12% are satisfied with job opportunities (88% are not satisfied with job opportunities!!!!).
• 16% are happy with entertainment for young people in town centres (84% are unhappy!).
• 24% feel unsafe after dark (This is a really worrying figure).
• 4% felt unsafe during the day.
• 8% felt unsafe on public transport (For a county with poor public transport, this is a big worry).       

But as bad as some of those responses reflect on DCC, the really damning responses are to be found at the end of the Report. This is the part of the Report which deals with customer service:-

• 39% felt DCC was performing well (compare that to the Local Government Data Unit Report which puts DCC as one of the best performing Councils in Wales).
• 33% felt DCC spends its money well - obviously 67% don't! That is utterly appalling.
• 36% felt they were getting the standards of service they were expecting.
• 27% felt they knew how to get involved with local decision making.
• 53% were satisfied with the information they received.
• 57% were satisfied with the time taken to resolve their issue.
• 60% were happy with customer service and that they were able to speak to the right person.

Since this Report, DCC have appointed a new Head of Service. This person (and I can only assume it is one of the existing Heads of Service who was in post while the 711 responses were received) will lead the new "Customers, Communication and Marketing Service". Among their strategies to improve the customer experience are:-

• A new telephone system to reduce delays (I wonder what is wrong with the existing system?).
• Use the website to accomodate a new customer feedback tool - once again precluding many people.
• Use the website to increase the amount of available information - once again precluding many people.
• Revise our approach to reviewing customer feedback to ensure it informs decisions about changes to services - this strongly infers that customer feedback up to now has not informed decisions about changes to services! So what has happened to the information provided by customers in the past?
• Expand our use of social media for engagement with residents - residents have been very active with their views on social media on several forums but there is little evidence that DCC have ever taken any notice! 

But am I being unfair to DCC? Perhaps a 1% response rate is actually really good? So I have done some research. Newcastle City Council achieved a response rate of 21% from their Survey last year. Such was their desire to get a good number of responses, they even offered a prize draw as part of the campaign. Great idea! In Cardiff, the council garnered responses from 4,500 residents out of 70,000. That is 6.4% of their residents. As scrutinise the performances elsewhere, I see much greater evidence of public engagement and much greater evidence of councils actively seeking it.

Under the updated version of the constitution of Denbighshire County Council, it is currently stated that county councillors are expected to:-

• represent their communities and bring their views in to the Council's decision making process; ie. become the advocate of and for their communities,
• deal with individual casework and act as an advocate for constituents in resolving particular concerns or grievances,
• be available to represent the Council on other bodies; and maintain the highest standards of conduct and ethics.   

During the last few years, there has been too little evidence of county councillors representing their communities and particularly in instances where large numbers of people are expressing dissatisfaction over a given issue. There are too few examples of county councillors acting as true advocates for constituents. And when it comes to conduct and ethics? I'll leave that for you to decide.

Finally, if DCC really are serious about being "an excellent council, close to the community" they will need to do much better than this to convince anyone. Talking the talk is easy. But even though they met with just 711 responses, the message delivered could hardly have been more damning. The majority of people are not happy with how DCC are performing, not happy with how DCC is spending its money, not happy with the standards of service they are expecting and did not know how to get involved in local decision making.

So are the people of Denbighshire being served by DCC? The evidence says no. An excellent council, close to the community? I don't think so. One of the top 5 councils in Wales? A delusion, by definition, is a belief that is held with strong conviction despite superior evidence to the contrary. I rest my case.