Outstanding Peer Review praises Chippenham Town Council on doing a great job for the town

Outstanding Peer Review praises Chippenham Town Council on doing a great job for the town.

In January 2025, Chippenham Town Council hosted an independent peer review delivered by the Local Government Association’s, Corporate Peer Challenge (CPC).

CPC is a tried and trusted method of improvement; it provides councils with a robust and effective improvement tool which is owned and delivered by the sector, for the sector. CPC also contributes to local authorities’ assurance of their own performance and is part of the wider work the LGA is undertaking to develop an improvement and assurance framework for local government.

Following their initial research and planning supported by the Corporate Management Team, the peer team spent 2.5 days onsite, during which they:

• Gathered evidence, information, and views from more than 15 meetings, in addition to further research and reading.
• Talked to almost 50 people including a range of council staff together with councillors and external stakeholders.

Following this visit, a Feedback Report has been produced, the Executive Summary includes;

“Chippenham Town Council (CTC) should be confident in what it achieves for Chippenham, in the view of an independent peer team it is doing a great job for the town and external stakeholders that the peer team met with spoke positively about the council. CTC is described by some partners as impressive, approachable, effective and honest with a great sense of community spirit. CTC has recruited well to the officers it employs. Many of these staff that the peer team spoke to were passionate about what they do and clearly care about the town of Chippenham – that is the view of the Local Government Association Corporate Peer Challenge Team that visited Chippenham Town Council in January of this year.”

You can read the Feedback Report in full HERE.

Mark Smith (Chief Executive) said;

“This report is an excellent outcome for the Town Council and is evidence of the fantastic work the town council achieves in its commitment in delivering services for Chippenham. I am pleased to see it noted how well we work with our partners and stakeholders across the town, it is also reassuring the report acknowledges that the council’s finances are well managed. We welcome the observations on improvements which can be made, and we are committed to producing an action plan which will identify how these will be made”

The Peer Team considered the following five themes which form the core components of all Corporate Peer Challenges. These areas are critical to councils’ performance and improvement.

• Local priorities and outcomes
• Organisational and place leadership
• Governance and culture
• Financial planning and management
• Does the council have a grip on its current financial position?

At the end of the challenge, the peer team presented a summary of their findings:

• The Council should be commended on its openness, the welcome extended to the team and the drive for improvement demonstrated by inviting this peer challenge.
• Chippenham Town Council is fortunate to have the staff it does – they are passionate about what they do and speak of caring about the town.
• There is a shared sense of pride amongst councillors and staff in the quality of services that the town council provides for the town.
• Strategic partners speak highly of the town council and how it works effectively as a partner for the benefit of the town. The Town Council demonstrates sector-leading performance in this area.
• Community partners also recognise the work that the council does and would welcome coordination of a cross-organisational approach to help build capacity at a community level.
• The council benefits from a large number of volunteers who are a valuable resource in providing services to the town.
• The council has introduced Key Performance Indicators which will evidence service delivery performance. Monitoring and developing these KPIs will allow intervention and mitigation if performance goes off target.
• The council has sound financial management in place and the external auditors have raised no issues.
• A strong financial planning and financial management framework is in evidence.
• The external auditor has confirmed no matters giving cause for concern at CTC.

Chippenham Town Council was the first ever town council to take part in a CPC in 2019 after wide-ranging discussions between the LGA, NALC and Chippenham Town Council’s Chief Executive in 2018/19. Since 2019 several of the larger town councils have taken up the offer. Chippenham Town Council is first ever town council to go through the process for a second time. Local authorities are responsible for their own performance and improvement and are primarily accountable locally for this, through their local democratic mandates. The Local Government Association offers all principal councils a Corporate Peer Challenge (CPC) every five years.

We would like to thank the Peer team, Kathryn Trant – LGA Adviser – Local Government Support (South West), Ian Morris – Chief Executive, Spennymoor Town Council, Cleo Newcombe-Jones – Regeneration Services Manager, Bath & North East Somerset Council and Cllr Mike Drew – Yate Town Council & South Gloucestershire Unitary Councillor, for their work in guiding us through the Challenge and the development of the Feedback Report.

We welcome the opportunity to work with the team again in the near future when the action plan and progress will be reviewed.