Strengthening Political Leadership in UK Local Government

Many councillors and officers in local government have begun to question long-established approaches to local authority leadership and management. This article shows that there is growing interest in developing new ways of revitalizing local democracy and projecting the value of local government. It examines some of the models of local authority management found in other countries, including the directly elected mayor. The article argues that the responsibilities of the executive need to be separated from those of the council. Legal barriers which prevent UK local authorities from reshaping their organizations to meet new challenges need to be removed.     

Feasible Changes in the UK Controls on Local Government Expenditure

Local government finance has recently been the subject of a review, three consultation papers, a White Paper and major reports from both the House of Lords and House of Commons. This article examines current and feasible changes to the system of local government finance with particular reference to the effects they have on marginal and average accountability. Council tax capping, council tax benefit subsidy limitation, business rates and capital expenditure are among the topics discussed.     

我国地方政府融资平台贷款及风险控制

地方政府由于财力和事权不相匹配,只有构建融资平台筹集建设资金,而政府绩效评价机制和商业银行经营体制等因素决定了融资平台过度负债的必然性.地方融资平台贷款规模出现了快速增长,不仅加大了地方政府的债务负担,也对银行业的经营风险形成了显著的潜在压力.融资平台贷款有二个主要风险:一是政府领导任期内具有无限上项目和投资的冲动,地...     

地方政府融资平台贷款的风险管控

近年来,地方政府融资平台贷款已经成为不容忽视的潜在金融风险,深刻影响我国的金融安全.为此,本文提出强化贷前审批、做实贷后管理、加快信贷资产证券化试点、展期平台贷款四个举措,着力加强我国地方政府融资平台贷款风险管控.     

中央与地方在物业税税权划分中的博弈行为研究

物业税又称房地产税或者不动产税,主要是针对房屋、土地等不动产,要求其承租人或保有者每年都按物业评估价值缴付一定税款。本文利用博弈分析的方法,分析了即将开征的物业税和中央与地方政府财政分权之间的关系,并得出结论,由于信息不对称,物业税的开征所带来的效率损失是在所难免的,其开征的关键还在于理清中央和地方政府之间的财税关系。     

地方政府如何引导地方金融平稳转型

在目前我国特定的政治体制和经济背景下,地方政府对于改善当地金融生态环境、促进金融效率的提高仍然起着重要作用。大多地方金融机构正处于艰难转型的十字路口,平稳走过这个十字路口当然需要政府助一把力。那么,面对依然问题丛生的地方金融,地方政府应该和能够做些什么呢?     

Best Value and the Control of Local Government: Challenges and Contradictions

This article offers some understanding of the early experience of implementing Best Value in the local authority sector. Implementation is dependent on how local government understands the concept; what local government is able to deliver; and what central government is prepared to accept. For the case study authority described in this article, Best Value is understood to depend on three deliverable 'cornerstones', embedded in a context that emphasises accountability, seeks to develop 'learning' and pursues change in organizational culture, emphasising the tenets of 'business excellence'. The authors conclude that Best Value represents an unusual cocktail of top-down concept and bottom-up realization, providing a new twist in the control of the local government sector.     

Accounting and Competitive Tendering in UK Local Government: An Institutionalist Interpretation of the New Public Management

The paper applies institutional theory to analyse the changing role of accounting and contracting in UK local government as the compulsory competitive tendering (CCT) regime was extended to white-collar activities such as housing management, finance, legal services and information technology. Employing an organizational fields model, accounting changes were seen to be influenced by a combination of legal coercion, normative and competitive forces, the resistance and manipulation of the large local authorities together with the facticity of the new accounting and contracting regimes. The theoretical framework is applied to field-work carried out in a large metropolitan authority in the north of England where CCT methodologies directly affected housing management but not other services such as finance. Although resisting CCT for finance, the authority subsequently introduced a radical scheme of voluntary competitive tendering for selected finance processes. The paper examines how accounting and contracting may be adapted to emerging trends in the New Public Management associated with Best Value policies.     

Budgetary Stewardship,Innovation and Working Culture: Identifying the Missing Ingredient in English and Welsh Local Authorities’ Recipes for Austerity Management

Drawing on fieldwork with 70 local authorities in England and Wales, this paper builds on previous studies of austerity management by highlighting the importance of organisational cultures to achieving strategic objectives. It finds that, in line with their prevailing ‘belief system’ of budgetary stewardship, local authorities in both countries are holding down input costs to deal with austerity. However, the scale of funding cuts means that this strategy is unlikely to be successful over the longer term. Instead, they need greater freedom to generate revenue, in order to facilitate innovation and develop more sustainable business practices and service models.     

House Prices and Local Taxes in the UK

In this paper, estimates of the effects of local domestic property taxes (rates) on local house prices are presented, and the effect of local taxes on owner-occupied dwelling prices is calculated for a number of English cities for the period up to 1990. The methods used enable estimation to be made of the effect of the introduction, during 1990, of the Community Charge or poll tax in England, when the local tax base was moved from housing consumption onto individual residency. It is estimated that the reform could have increased house prices by around 15 per cent and contributed substantially to house price inflation.     

Local Culture and Dividends

I empirically investigate whether geographical variations in local culture, as proxied by local religion, affect dividend demand and corporate dividend policy for a large sample of US firms. Firms located in Protestant counties are more likely to be dividend payers, initiate dividends, and have higher dividend yields, while firms located in Catholic counties are less likely to be dividend payers and have lower dividend yields. There is a geographically varying dividend clientele effect consistent with the variations in risk aversion among different cultural groups. My results suggest that firms largely held by local investors determine their corporate policies in line with local culture.     

Government spending on research and development in the UK

This paper explores the extent of current UK government spending on science and technology placed in its recent historical context. The allocation of this spending across the different arms of government, the primary purposes of the expenditures undertaken and the extent to which the government performs as well as funds R&D are also explored, with some international comparisons analysed. The political and institutional processes that determine the revealed patterns of expenditure in the UK, the rationales behind such spending and the aims and objectives of the main spending departments are discussed, as is the interaction with EU expenditures on science and technology. The effectiveness of or pay-off to government support of this kind is also considered before future spending plans are addressed.     

Fiscal Reconstruction and Local Government Financing

This paper investigates the dynamic properties of intergovernmental financing during a fiscal reconstruction process by analyzing the dynamic game among local governments, which operates with soft budget constraints because of concessionary region-specific transfers from a central government. The existence of intergovernmental transfers induces the free-riding behavior of local governments, thereby bringing considerable deficits to the central government. Raising local and/or national taxes is desirable for fiscal reconstruction, but is unable to attain the Pareto-efficient fiscal reconstruction. Taxes on lobbying activities, combined with uniform transfers, induce earlier concession and can attain the Pareto-efficient outcome in the long run.     

Trust-Based Relationships in Local Government Contracting

This article examines issues of trust and competition as they relate to a number of services provided by British local government. The first section outlines the changing policy context of competition for local authority services and is followed by a discussion of the nature of trust under contracting, drawing on elements of (primarily) economic theory to identify the features of contracting which we would expect to find in a 'low trust world'. The authors ask whether these features appear to be present in contracting and point to some features of the CCT legislative framework which may help to explain this. After reviewing private sector practice, the extent to which it could be replicated under CCT is examined.     

External Regulation and Best Value in Local Government

Best Value has been presented by central government as a means of promoting local diversity and innovation. However, it contains a large superstructure for regulating the behaviour and performance of local authorities, through performance indicators, audit, and inspection. The characteristics of these regulatory instruments are analysed and their potential strengths and weaknesses are assessed. The instruments overlap not only with local authorities' own internal management processes, but also with each other. Therefore it is concluded that the costs of regulation may outweigh the benefits.     

Competitive Tendering and Best Value in Local Government

The Government has introduced legislation to replace compulsory competitive tendering (CCT) with a new regime of Best Value (BV) in local government. Although CCT is to be abolished, competitive tendering is retained as part of the BV framework. The specific role of competitive tendering in BV has not been identified—what are the circumstances that determine whether councils should provide services themselves or seek external suppliers? The authors develop a theoretical framework that may help central and local policy-makers to answer this question. The framework emphasises the joint importance of organizational performance and contracting costs. Practical issues that arise in the application of the framework are also identified.