CPA - 2007
Introduction
Each year the Audit Commission publishes a Comprehensive Performance Assessment (CPA) for every council in the England and Wales. The Audit Commission is the government body that is responsible for checking that public money is spent efficiently and effectively.
The CPA gets its name because it draws together information from a range of different sources to make an overall judgement of councils’ performance. The intention behind this is that people can more easily compare the performance of one council against another.
The CPA makes two judgements on councils’ performance which are each council’s overall CPA category and the ‘direction of travel’. The latest judgement for Bradford Council was in February 2007 when we were judged to be a ‘three star’ authority which is improving adequately.
Please click on the link for more information on the Council’s latest CPA judgement
For more information on the different elements of the Comprehensive Performance Assessment go to Structure of the CPA
Corporate Assessment
One of the key judgements that make up the CPA is the Corporate Assessment which is an inspection that measures how well the council and its partners are working to improve services to people in the District. The last Corporate Assessment took place in 2002 and we have recently had another Corporate Assessment inspection between 28 January and 8 February 2008. For more information on the next Corporate Assessment in 2008 click on Corporate Assessment
Looking ahead
Councils have had CPA judgements since 2002 although the rules were made harder in 2005 when the Audit Commission published 'CPA - the Harder Test' (see 'Related links' below). The Government has now announced that the CPA regime will be replaced by a new system for assessing Councils and their partners which will be called the Comprehensive Area Assessment.
