Joining up is hard to do

So three London boroughs have studied how they can merge entire departments, including the ones delivering or commissioning highways, transport and parking services.

The report from Westminster, Kensington & Chelsea and Hammersmith & Fulham on ‘Tri-borough Working’ has concluded that the savings to be had from fully amalgamating two highways and transport departments could be as low as £350,000 a year, or, in the best case scenario, £500,000. The biggest savings are to be had elsewhere.

Potentially frontline parking services could also be joined up, to reap further savings, on top of £300,000 that could be saved by merging two councils' back-office parking departments. Again, worth having, but still small beer when you consider that the three councils face a collective £100m blackhole from 2012/13 until 2014/15.

Part of the difficulty is that due to the contracts Westminster holds, that authority could not join any highways, transport or parking merger with the other two authorities until 2014, and even then only if either Westminster, or the other two authorities, were to decide to change their delivery model.

Unlike the other two councils, Westminster has a slimmed down, commissioning department, with few staff to either provide services or to micro-manage those provided externally. Hammersmith & Fulham and Kensington & Chelsea will need to decide whether or not this model suits them.

This will require “much more detailed work to full understand how the range of highways functions are undertaken in all three boroughs and the extent and cost of policy work, service commissioning and operational management and delivery. Only then can a properly informed decision be made”, the report says.

So it's not only about merging council departments, which will of course make it easier to reduce staff overheads. It's about a more fundamental reappraisal of what a council highways and transport department is for. That's where there could be far bigger savings.