The fork in the road: Will councils take the chance to transform?

As resources tighten, councils are at risk of diminishing to simply being a provider of last resort, statutory public services. In this blog, Kate Copeland and Ross Murray argue that this can’t be allowed to happen. 

They reflect on their recent work with Norfolk County Council (NCC) to develop a new Community Engagement Model focused on creating a practical path for councils to become true partners with the communities they serve as well as other parts of the public sector. 

The NCC Community Engagement Model has now been published as part of NCC’s Local

Government Re-organisation (LGR) business case. Mutual Ventures’ full report is referenced extensively within the main text and included in full as Appendix B. 

Local government across England is at a defining moment. 

Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) is redrawing the map and challenging the future role and purpose of local authorities. This is driven by the Government’s 2024 Devolution White Paper, which announced a priority programme for areas interested in devolution and reform.  

There are a lot of reasons why reform is needed. However, it is clear that the current system is not working effectively. Councils are grappling with rising demand for complex services, unprecedented financial pressures, and a decline in public trust. The relentless pursuit of savings within siloed services - which our colleague Andrew Laird has called the ‘efficiency fallacy’ - has been a flawed strategy. It has created a system that is complex, costly, and fails to address the root causes of residents’ needs. 

Within this challenging landscape lies a compelling opportunity for change. Major shifts like LGR offer a rare chance to develop new partnerships across public services and with residents. 

For many councils, this is a ‘fork in the road’ moment. The government's national mandate for LGR seeks to replace the current two-tier system of county and district councils with more streamlined, single tier unitary authorities. This process presents an opportunity to reset the relationship between public services and the residents they serve. 

The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) sets the explicit criteria against which all proposals will be assessed. While criteria related to financial viability, efficiency, and the capacity to deliver high-quality, sustainable services are prominent, a sixth criterion places community engagement at the heart of the reorganisation process. The guidance states that "new unitary structures should enable stronger community engagement and deliver genuine opportunity for neighbourhood empowerment". This changes community engagement from a desirable policy goal to a mandatory design feature of any successful proposal submitted to the government. The Government also intends for “Neighbourhood Area Committees” to act as the conduits between the community and local government, ensuring residents have greater involvement in decisions affecting their daily lives. 

Recently, we had the opportunity to work with Norfolk County Council to develop a scalable model for community engagement and wider public service reform that aligns with the government's approach to LGR. This model is grounded in the principles of Radical Place Leadership (RPL) and provides a practical path to help shift councils from being service providers to genuine partners with their communities. 

Radical Place Leadership in practice 

At its core, Radical Place Leadership (RPL) is about changing the culture and mindset within public services. Despite its name, it’s quite straightforward. It is not about scrapping existing systems and starting over but instead identifying what is already working well and building on this to help services work better together. What makes this 'radical' is the commitment to break down silos while maintaining the services and support that communities depend on. RPL empowers public sector services to create lasting change with, not for, residents and communities.  

RPL provides the ‘how’ for achieving the public service reform goals of reorganisation. Instead of just changing organisational charts, RPL is about fundamentally rethinking the council’s role, challenging traditional, siloed models and moving from a partner and enabler.  

For a council looking to make this shift, we have broken this down into three areas that need be embedded into a council's ways of working: 

• A ‘one team, one council’ leadership: For too long, leadership has operated in departmental silos, creating confusing and frustrating experiences for residents. A ‘One Team’ approach fosters shared accountability for outcomes, with leadership meetings centred on neighbourhood challenges, rather than departmental performance reports. This way of working creates space for shared objectives and innovations such as pooled budgets for prevention, where services invest collectively to improve wellbeing and reduce future demand. 

• Empowered frontline staff: Frontline workers remain the greatest asset for public services, yet their potential is often stifled by rigid rules and risk-averse cultures. Empowering them to work autonomously, using their experience and professional judgement, reduces red tape, improves the speed of decisions, and allows on-the-ground knowledge to play into critical decisions and service design.  

• A new social contract with residents: This cultural change must be underpinned by a new agreement with residents. Utilising agreements such as public-facing ‘People Pledges’ can make this tangible and redefine the relationship from 'doing to' communities to 'doing with' them. A pledge like, "we will work with you to build on your community's strengths" signals a decisive move away from a paternalistic model that asks "what's wrong here?" to an asset-based approach that asks "what's strong here?".  

A blueprint for neighbourhood action in Norfolk 

What could a new approach look like on the ground? After speaking with stakeholders from across Norfolk, we developed a practical model designed to bring the council and residents closer together. The model is based on two interconnected components:  

1. Neighbourhood Area Committees: These forums are the heart of local democracy in our model. They bring together key stakeholders in a place (e.g., elected councillors, VCSE representatives, local business owners, faith leaders, and partners from statutory services like health and the police) with a shared purpose to set local priorities and make meaningful decisions. Their job is to set local priorities and make real decisions. This isn’t just another talking shop. NACs will be given devolved power and, crucially, dedicated budgets to get things done. This means they'll have genuine influence over local services, whether that's commissioning new youth activities, tackling anti-social behaviour, or co-designing solutions to local traffic problems. 

2. Integrated Neighbourhood Teams (INTs): These are the ‘operational engines’ of the model, acting as the council's on-the-ground problem-solvers. To be effective, they should be multi-agency, often co-located, teams of frontline staff from council services, health, police, and other partners.  No more passing issues from department to department. The strength of this model is its flexibility to enable the INTs to pivot to respond to a variety of local challenges. Over time, we expect the focus will shift to more proactive and preventative work, such as identifying and supporting isolated older residents, and working with families on the edge of crisis before they ever need a statutory service. 

For this model to work, there needs to be a powerful feedback loop between these two structures. For example, an INT in Norfolk might identify a persistent problem with fly-tipping. The team can provide an immediate operational response and share insights with the NAC, such as the alley being poorly lit and lacking adequate bins for nearby shops. This enables the NAC to use its devolved budget for a long-term solution, like funding new lighting and a proper waste disposal scheme. The immediate need is met, while a long-term solution builds community resilience. 

“Done badly, Local Government Reorganisation could mean some services become more remote from citizens. We didn't want that to happen. This new neighbourhood model will allow us to shift power and resources closer to the people, enabling the council to work together more effectively with partners, communities and businesses on solutions that truly reflect local needs and priorities.” 

Sarah Rhoden, Director of Communities, Information and Learning for Norfolk County Council 

A new chapter for local government 

For many this model will feel very radical, for others it will feel more like common sense. It is about creating simple structures, reshaping and transforming culture, and implementing the well-known conditions for council (and wider) services to work closely and more effectively together at a neighbourhood level.  

We also recognise that the model needs to be bespoke be design. Rigid structures are likely to fail across Norfolk’s diverse geography and would probably do so elsewhere. The consistent principles can be flexed to fit unique local contexts. 

The challenges facing local government are immense, but they also provide the impetus for a radical and positive transformation. This is about more than just delivering services more efficiently; it is about strengthening the very fabric of our communities. It is about rebuilding social capital, fostering civic pride, and creating a form of local democracy that feels relevant, empowering, and real to residents.  

For councils in the midst of LGR, it's easy to focus on the immediate structural changes. But the real opportunity lies in designing your new Neighbourhood Area Committees to be more than just new groups. Our model provides a blueprint for making them the engine of public service reform, ensuring you don't just reorganise, but genuinely transform. LGR is your chance to get neighbourhood governance right from day one 

By making the bold shift from provider to partner, councils can utilise this model to write a new, more hopeful chapter for themselves and the people they serve. 

Ready to explore what this could mean for your area? We understand transformation is underway - the question is whether you'll lead it or be left behind. Local Government Reorganisation is your chance to get neighbourhood governance right from day one. We're helping councils across England to unlock the full potential of neighbourhood-level delivery, supporting them to design NACs that transform how services work for residents.  

Ready to make the most of Local Government Reorganisation? Let's talk. 

Get in touch with our Chief Exec Andrew Laird at andrew@mutualventures.co.uk