Council Tax reduction

[rov1200]

Will this new scheme help to cut the council tax?

http://www.telegraph....y-Council-Tories.html

[buildersmate]

No.
It isn't new and it is most unlikely to work because Councils aren't smart enough to know how to set up appropriate performance measures. These contracts need to be set up such that the outsourcing provider only gets paid when it delivers at the required performance quality and timeliness.
Here's one expensive previous failure.
http://www.theregiste...hbs_outsourcing_deal/

[Coobeastie]

Highly unlikely.

What it will more than likely mean is that if the council saves money, any subsidies that it gets from government will be trimmed back accordingly.

[rov1200]

Obviously hasn't worked in your part of the woods. Maybe the plan was not thought out properly from the start. You would think Essex were now aware of the pitfalls not to repeat the same mistakes again.

But in a general sense we know privatisation works as the success of BT, Electric, Water etc have shown. It just needs working on. Although if the head of the project is still a council official it is probably doomed from the start.

Labour have never ever been any good at financial management as proved by most local councils are now being run by Tories.

[Gromit]

My local council signed a contract with a Private Company, Serco to run its Swimming Pools with the aim of cutting the Council Tax bill.

Halfway through the contract Serco was operating at a loss and had run up bill of a quarter of a million pounds. They threatened pull out of the contract (don't know how) unless they could re-negociate the contract.

The end result was that the council now pays more than it did before, and the service is rubbish. If this is the shape of things to come, god help us.

[Jumbuck]

shhhhh... don't mention the privatisation of the railways.