Barnet - Does the One Barnet Commissioning Council work?

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This isn't going to be a long blog. It doesn't need to be. You only really need to look at the two extracts from council reports below to know everyting you need to about how the One Barnet Commissioning Council is going.

 These are from the report pack for  tonights  PERFORMANCE AND CONTRACT MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE of Barnet Council meeting. The committees job is to ensure that the council is efficiently managing its suppliers and ensuring that their contracts are being adhered to.

The following extract tells you everything you need to know. Of the 'themed committee indicators in the report pack', just under 40% have worsened in Q1 of 2017/18. In an act of unrivalled Chutzpah, a ridiculous spin is put on these results. The council have the audacity to claim "the majority have improved". Whilst this is technically correct, the fact that 37% have worsened is absolutely appalling. 

Barnet Eye readers will also be interested to see just how much of the 'savings' we were promised as a results of the One Barne are actually materialising and how much us Barnet Taxpayers are giving back to suppliers in cash in what is known as "gainshare payments".

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In other words, by the councils own figures over £90 million of savings have failed to materialise and £6 million has been paid to suppliers in the savings that have occurred. These are from the councils own report.

Does One Barnet work? Is the commissioning council a success? Well I daresay that our local council leadership will say "we've achived savings of £35 million that we wouldn't have got otherwise. But these savings were taken against a "do nothing" model. There was never a comparator done to work out what savings could have been made without outsourcing.

These savings have come at a cost. Hundreds of jobs have moved out of Barnet. This has affected the local economy. Do councillors read these reports? One can only wonder. I must say I was surprised that all of this was tucked away with little commentary to actually highlight the dire nature of what was being reported. This is no surprise to me. By my rather dodgy maths, that means every man, woman and child in the Borough will not be getting £250 of promised savings from this contract. Of course Capita have done rather well out of the deal, with payments of £265 million according to the report.

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Value for money? Draw your own conclusions