Wigan council has achieved a remarkable feat. Despite cuts of £140m, it has maintained, even improved, its services, and transformed its relationship with residents. But there has been a cost: more than 1,000 of its staff have lost their jobs – roughly a fifth of the workforce.
Under relentless pressure to do more with less, all councils have had to make cuts. Many also bandy the word transformation around, but few achieve it. A study of Wigan by the King’s Fund makes clear this council is an exception.
The bedrock of Wigan’s approach is a new relationship with both its staff and local people. It has rejected the paternalism that bedevils many public services in favour of working with individuals, families and communities to nurture their strengths and build independence and self-reliance. This is known locally as the Wigan Deal.
Key to its success has been farsighted financial planning. While many councils in the early years of austerity became fixated on what they had to cut, Wigan looked at evidence from across the country to decide what it could do differently.
A number of councils exacerbated their precarious financial position by setting impossible cuts targets, forcing them to gouge out even greater amounts of spending in subsequent years and deplete their reserves to prop up day-to-day costs. Wigan set realistic cuts targets, which allowed for some inevitable slippage, and used reserves to fund change programmes such as hiring temporary social workers to reassess care packages so they were better suited to individual needs.
This financial smart thinking allowed the council to focus on the primary goal of the Wigan Deal: improving the lives of local people. Brilliantly, it invested in training its workforce to think differently. An anthropologist worked with staff on techniques to understand the lives and needs of local people better, setting aside their preconceptions and exploring the world through residents’ eyes.
This evolved into a new approach to social work, based around having “different conversations” about what clients valued in life and what they could do, rather than what they couldn’t. Families with complex needs were encouraged to take control over their lives by building relationships, living healthier lives and feeling part of the community, supported rather than led by council staff.
The council showed courage by taking this approach into difficult areas such as child protection. Family group conferences were introduced, which might involve eight members of the child’s extended family and only two social workers, trying to find a way forward by drawing on the family’s own resources.
Across local government and the NHS there is endless talk about investing in prevention to reduce future demand. Wigan’s huge focus on public health – such as training thousands of health champions to bring campaigns to schools, homes and workplaces – means the town is outstripping the national average in cutting premature mortality from cardiovascular disease and cancer, probably through more physical activity and less smoking. Healthy life expectancy has improved by 31 months for women and 19 for men – a strong performance.
Delayed transfers of care between the NHS and social services are less than half the national average and re-enablement services for older people are keeping impressive numbers in their own homes.
Aspects of what Wigan has done – sound financial planning, investing to save and liberating the resourcefulness of staff and local people – are seen across the country. But Wigan stands out for the way its financial approach has underpinned a new philosophy about what it is trying to achieve and the relationship with the people it is there to serve.
Other councils could learn from Wigan’s success in mobilising community resources around everything from public health to supporting individual families in crisis. It has improved outcomes, promoted self-reliance and strengthened the sense of people pulling together. It has achieved this through the tremendous energy and commitment of its staff and by tapping into the sense of local pride – the slogan is “Believe in Wigan”.
The Wigan Deal can never be a national blueprint. Endless public sector cultural change programmes have tested to destruction the idea that success can simply be transplanted from one place to another. But many councils should reflect on the way Wigan has put the wisdom and creativity of staff and the community at the heart of its thinking. Procedures and transactions are giving a way to listening and understanding. The town achieved this by spending money on changing the way staff think. As one social worker put it: “It doesn’t feel like a job, it feels like a movement.”