Is Cornwall on the brink of change?
Cornwall is working on unitarisation of the County Council and a possibly new and radical approach to developing and celebrating culture is being sought. A new head of cultural services is likely to have brought in fresh eyes. There will be many challenges but undue emphasis on the structures for delivery should not outweigh the benefits of creative problem solving. Cornwall needs to standout by delivering short-term impact through a number of ‘quick wins’. Local opinion on the best cultural ‘horizons’ will no doubt vary, but any new programme that does not show improvements and more significantly, also a better return on investment within three years may need to be reviewed. Cornwall, like other large county councils with widely dispersed populations cannot afford to adopt a slow and ‘sleepy’ programme of change aimed at producing results within the next 7 to 10 years as is usually the case with unusually slow and sleepy councils.
Cornwall’s challenge for managing culture as ‘a driver for economic development’ is phenomenal and customers are likely to be highly demanding. Would any slippage in running culture as a serious business mean that other councils could even emerge as possible local competitors? Are competitors more likely to benefit especially if Cornwall continues to offer ‘more of the same’ cultural provision as it perhaps offers at present? How would this be possible? There has been an argument that accommodation in London during the 2012 Games is going to be relatively expensive. Have the adjoining London boroughs on the outer fringes and even towns in the South East carried out any competitor analysis to see if they can offer more affordable accommodation to visitors who will save money by living outside London? Similarly, could access to the Cornish seafront also be provided by cheaper accommodation in the neighbouring counties? People are willing to travel if they can save money.
It would appear that for Cornwall, some of the previous Best Value inspection reports produced by the Audit Commission may not be very supportive. A comprehensive performance assessment (CPA) outcome for 2008 offers a weighted average score of 2 for Cornwall’s culture service assessment suggesting adequate performance but only at minimum requirements. Further details on the score and its interpretation is available at http://cpa.audit-commission.gov.uk Whilst some observers may harbour doubts about the Commission’s methodology, that is, its rationale for weighting of outcomes and the reliance on previous judgements to extrapolate new final scores, there seems to be sufficient robustness in the CPA judgements to make the results useful at this stage of analysis. Further changes in the outcome of CAA, the Comprehensive Area Assessment should offer ongoing and possibly more reliable judgements on Cornwall’s future performance.
