Comprehensive Performance Assessment—Springboard or Dead-Weight?

Since its election in 1997, the Labour Government in the UK has emphasised the need to improve the quality of public services. In the case of local government, this emphasis has led to the introduction of Comprehensive Performance Assessment (CPA). This article considers the merits of actual and intended CPA strategy within the wider context of public service performance measurement. The author concludes that the methodology leading to the December 2002 results and the intended way forward raise legitimate questions as to whether CPA can justifiably lay claim to being a comprehensive measure of performance.