How Falkirk Council works with its partners has been praised in a report published this week into the local community planning partnership.
Audit Scotland praised the local authority in a number of areas for how it works with other agencies such as Police Scotland, NHS Forth Valley community organisations and others.
In particular, they praised:
- the strong culture of collaboration in Falkirk;
- many examples of innovative and effective partnerships across the area;
- the ability for Falkirk to respond quickly to local problems;
- the success at securing funding for major local initiatives.
More than £1bn is spent locally each year by community planning partners as they deliver services designed to improve the lives of Falkirk’s 156,000 population.
Councillor Craig Martin, Leader of Falkirk Council said: “Community planning is at the heart of what we do as an organisation and our primary goal is to improve the lives of people in the area and the area itself by providing quality services that meet the needs of local people working in partnership with others.
“There are great examples of where we are working with partners to improve our area across our priority areas such as children and young people, poverty and welfare reform and safer communities.
“We recognise that auditors have highlighted areas for improvement and it's encouraging that prior to the audit we had in place an improvement agenda that addressed those areas.
“I am very confident that we can go on to make our partnerships even more successful leading to an improvement in the quality of life for everyone who lives in the area.”
