FIGURES from a recent benchmarking exercise against efficiency indicators has shown the Cotswold District Council as the highest ranked of the 201 shire district councils.

The basket of indicators includes measures such as overall cost of council services per head of population, increase rate in council tax, time taken to process housing and council tax benefits, percentage of council tax collected, amount of recycling per household and percentage of major planning applications determined in accordance with relevant timescales.

In 2011/12 CDC established a baseline to measure future improvements against a range of indicators, and assessed at the outset that its overall ranking was ninth out of 201 councils. Since then CDC has risen steadily in the rankings.

Commenting on the move to the top spot in the rankings, CDC Deputy Leader Cllr Nick Parsons said: "I am absolutely delighted that we have reached our stated aim in just five years.

"This achievement -which has, to a large extent, been achieved through Councillor Lynden Stowe’s leadership over 11 years - reflects the success we have had in finding innovative ways to improve our efficiency over many years.

"Towards the end of 2017, we took partnership working a step further with the formation of the Publica Group – involving councils at CDC, West Oxfordshire, Forest of Dean and Cheltenham. This will enable us to make even more savings on the cost of management and administration. In fact, thanks to Publica, CDC expects to reduce current running costs by over £1.8 million per year by 2020.

"It’s essential to stay ahead of the game in local government and efficient working is the key to success. I am very grateful to the officers at CDC who have made this all possible. Thanks to their hard work and dedication, the council is well poised to continue delivering a full range of services in the years ahead.

"Working more efficiently has also enabled us to set aside funding for major projects in the future, the most notable being the proposed Waterloo car park expansion scheme."