"Local Priorities" Website

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am writing to make a Freedom of Information request in connection
with the DCLG's website "Local Priorities"
(http://www.localpriorities.communities.g...).

In summary, I would like to know what specific purpose the website
was intended to serve, what improvements are planned for the
future, how much it cost to establish, and how much it is budgeted
to cost for ongoing maintenance.

To that end, please would you send me:

Any internal documents produced by the department that would
explain the intended purpose of the website (e.g. briefings or
specifications for third party contractors bidding to establish and
maintain the website).

Any internal documents produced by the department that describe
future improvements to the website (e.g. a high level plan or
specification describing any new features intended for the website
in future).

The department's high level budget for the establishment of the
website, including internal and third party resources.

The department's high level budget for the ongoing maintenance of
the website, including internal and third party resources.

Thanks for your assistance with this request.

Yours faithfully,

Etienne Pollard

Dear Jane Todorovic,

Thank you for your helpful reply regarding the specification and
purpose of the local priorities website. The data that you sent
through was exactly what I had hoped you would be able to provide,
which is greatly appreciated.

Reading through the website spec, I noticed that there was a
specific intention to name the LAAs for a given LA, but not to
provide the values. There was also an intention to provide links to
the LAA contract documents (where available) and to the FTI
analytical website. I have looked through several of Camden's LAAs
on the local priorities website, but have found no link to either
the contracts or the FTI site. Did these links not make into the
final version, or is data for Camden not available?

While it is certainly helpful for people to know the names of the
LAAs that are being targeted in their area, I don't quite
understand why you don't publish the actual targets (and maybe even
the achievements in due course)? Many of the LAAs are quantitative
targets against known baselines, and for most of these the
description on its own isn't very helpful without the accompanying
data. Some additional data would make it quite a lot more useful -
for example, the current/baseline and target performance for each
LAA, and eventually the performance data for each LAA.

I would suggest that the lack of hard data makes it less likely
that it would "make LAAs real to people in communities and for them
to be able to access information in a way that’s meaningful to
them". I would also argue that it doesn't fulfil the requirement
that "the website/microsite should provide statistics and data".

At the moment, the only way to find out the hard numbers for an LAA
target seems to be by carefully and laboriously search the website
of the relevant LA for their LAA performance reports. I know from
personal experience (Camden) that this takes a long time, and I
suspect that it's going to be too much hassle for many (perhaps
most) of the people who visit the local priorities website. The
absence of any data certainly takes away any possibility of being
able to scan through the LAAs and understand which are challenging
targets, which are likely to be achieved, and so on.

Despite the above, I still think that it's a useful starting point,
and I hope that it will be expanded with some hard data in due
course. Finally, I would like to thank you again for your helpful
reply to my FOI request, which helped me to understand the thinking
behind the website.

Yours sincerely,

Etienne Pollard