The new landscape for health and wellbeingLiam Hughes, National AdviserFor Healthy Communities8th April 2008 SSRG Annual Workshop

Data, information and priorities• The new policy framework• Assessment of need and

performance• Local area agreements• Some challenges and concerns

(Back to the future (1) - 1975!)

The IDeA and the Healthy Communities Programme• IDeA – improving local government• The Healthy Communities Programme• Local government and public health• Beacons for health:

- Coventry -Derwentside -Greenwich -Merseyside Fire and

-Sheffield Rescue -Sunderland

Excellent councils:

• Leadership and partnership• Community engagement• Creativity and innovation• Comprehensive and systematic

approach• Information in depth• Performance development• Good outcomes

The new policy landscape

• People and places• Productivity and results• Horizontal and vertical (partnerships and pathways)

“Totally engaged”

The story of this place

• Sustainable Communities Strategy

• PCT Prospectus and Local Development Plan

• Joint Strategic Needs Assessments: - information, evidence, analysis - 3 to15yr perspectives

Triangulation of inputs

• information and evidence• professional opinion• patient and public views• political perspectives

The core data set

• Public health observatories• Demography• Social and environmental context• Lifestyle• Burden of ill-health and disability• Services and gaps

Outputs

• Agreed priorities• Feed-in to LAA and other plans• Common appreciation of problems

and dilemmas• Materials for political debate

Setting JSNA priorities

• The governance framework• Inter-organisational politics• Intra-organisational politics• Limiting the agenda?• Pre-selecting the options (Example: COPD)

Local area agreements

• 35 plus 16 from198 ( which ones and why?)• Sea-change for health• Risk and ambition?• Negotiations within the LSP and with government office

Comprehensive Area Assessments• Evaluation of partnership performance• “Improvement notices”?• Annual joint inspectorate risk

assessments• “Place Surveys” and public expectations• Prospects for the area and the quality of

life for local people

Some concerns

• “Central government will be more ”hands off”, except when it won`t !”

• “Play safe and avoid hard targets”• “We concentrated on those in

greatest need, and other people felt neglected”

• “My assessment depends on your performance?!”

Regional improvement and efficiency partnerships

• “We are here to help – all of us, honestly!”

• “Of course, it is your responsibility to do that better!”

• “We share the same objectives, really!”• “When budgets are tight, we will hit our targets”

Health improvement and inequalities• National health improvement –

shifting the mean!• Inequalities – removing the tail!• Changing the local geography• Spearheads and local inequalities• Gender, class, ethnicity, social

exclusion

New challenges

• Poor emotional health• Obesity and alcohol• Active ageing and integrated long-

term care• Housing • The efficiency dividend

IDeA Healthy Communities Programme

• Knowledge• Peer reviews and leadership

development• Regional and sub-regional• Thematic work-streams : mining and

industrial, coastal, deep rural• New work on planning and housing

liam.hughes@idea.gov.uk