North East Lincolnshire Council: Consultancy Support

We were commissioned by North East Lincolnshire Council (NELC) in February 2008 to support them in establishing the evidence base for Level 3 of the Equality Standards for Local Government to meet their target of external assessment in October/November.

The Council had established Corporate and Directorate equality groups and had identified the need for further one to one support for Directorates to ensure that they were confident in the requirements for evidence at Level 3.

We facilitated a workshop with the Corporate Equality Group which allowed us to identify:

• Existing good practice in relation to Levels 2 and 3;
• Areas for development;
• Organisational support needed to achieve Level 3; and
• Directorate needs for individual support.

We then worked with Directorates individually to:

• Review equality impact assessments and action plans;
• Identify existing equality objectives and targets;
• Identify areas in business plans where equalities issues could be further explored and developed; and
• Identify types of evidence which the council could use for Level 3 assessment.

This involved working with larger groups, such as the Corporate Services Executive Management Team, and in smaller groups or one-to-one (for example with the Children’s’ Services equalities manager).

We were able to support Directorates to:

• Carry out Equality Impact Assessments of areas where there had been significant changes or developments, or where functions had not previously been assessed;
• Plan actions for further equalities monitoring of functions and services – for example, in relation to customer satisfaction surveys or mapping areas of low benefit take-up;
• Identify equality objectives and targets within mainstream business plans and identify areas for further setting of targets; and
• Identify and action plan for further involvement and consultation of equality groups – for example, in liaison with the local Age Concern in relation to voting rights.

Feedback from Directorates has been very positive, with Directorates reporting that they feel more confident about identifying and gathering evidence and that they are clearer about the equality issues in their mainstream practice.