Case Study: Local Government Reorganisation - Strategic Case Development for Norfolk County Council

Client: Norfolk County Council

Date: July 2025

Challenges faced by the client:

Norfolk County Council (NCC) is actively exploring Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) options to improve efficiency, strengthen place-based service delivery and enhance strategic capacity across Norfolk. This work sits within a politically sensitive and complex operating environment, where functions currently delivered by seven district and borough councils vary considerably in scope, scale and performance.

Key challenges included:

• Data and insight limitations due to inconsistent or unavailable information across districts.

• Assessing potential disruption risks to service delivery, workforce stability and local identity during reorganisation.

• Complex contractual, financial, and ICT landscapes that would require rationalisation and integration.

• High potential for legal, reputational, and cultural risks if transition planning was not robust and timely.

• A need to strike a balance between operational efficiency and community connection in any future model.

Our support:

Mutual Ventures was commissioned by NCC to provide a high-level Risk - Benefit Assessment to support early strategic thinking around LGR. The purpose of our work was to help the Council and its partners understand the potential benefits, transition risks, and statutory implications of reconfiguring local government in Norfolk.

We undertook a structured desktop review of publicly available information, recent guidance (including PwC’s 2025 updated LGR: financial implications report) and learning from comparator areas such as North Yorkshire, Dorset, Buckinghamshire, and Cumbria.

Our support included:

• Strategic mapping of district-level service functions and responsibilities.

• Thematic analysis across three domains: strategic benefits, transition risks and statutory/legal considerations.

• Identification of eight key transition risk areas (governance, legal, workforce, finance, service delivery, organisational culture, community cohesion, and ICT integration).

• Development of assessment frameworks and mitigation strategies for each risk.

• Detailed exploration of TUPE, asset management and contract rationalisation challenges.

• Highlighting lessons from other LGR transitions, with a focus on workforce engagement, digital integration and protecting local identity.

We provided clear and actionable next steps to support NCC’s internal business case development and forward planning.

Outcome achieved:

Our work provided Norfolk County Council with:

• A credible and structured evidence base to support strategic conversations about the future of local government in the county.

• A clear articulation of what reorganisation could enable, what it might disrupt and what it must comply with, grounded in legal, financial and practical realities.

• A comprehensive risk and mitigation framework that can inform business case development, programme design and political engagement.

• A focused set of recommendations for further action, including detailed data analysis, stakeholder engagement, service mapping and transition planning.

• Drawing on national learning, we identified twelve core considerations that must be addressed to deliver meaningful and sustainable reorganisation.

• A values-led framing that recognises the importance of cultural alignment, place identity and democratic legitimacy as core ingredients for sustainable reform.

The case study is now being used as a key strategic input into NCC’s options appraisal, business case and final LGR submission to MHCLG.

Quote from the client:

“Mutual Ventures provided us with a highly professional, insightful and practical overview of the risks and opportunities involved in reorganisation. Their understanding of the Norfolk context, coupled with experience from across the sector, has enabled us to move forward with greater clarity, confidence and credibility.”