Conclusions from the LGA conference

There are three main messages to be drawn from last week's successful LGA conference in Birmingham.
The first is that DCLG ministers appeared to be making a real effort with the sector. Last year at the 2010 LGA conference the papers were full of the planted 'non jobs' story. This year there were no planted stories slagging off the sector. Indeed in an exclusive interview with The MJ last week Eric Pickles went out of his way to praise local government for bearing the burden of the cuts and announced the 'second phase', a warmer relationship with the sector driven by the localism agenda.
He and his colleagues made a point of being out and about among delegates with Bob Neill and Greg Clark also attending the evening receptions. Many delegates said to me they had noticed the more positive difference in tone this year. The question is whether this is all a deliberate part of the 'second phase' or they are carrying out instructions from No 10 to be more constructive with the sector or, as more than one delegate said to me, DCLG permanent secretary Sir Bob Kerslake has got to grips with his department and put the special advisers (the SPADS) back on their leashes - or in likelihood a mix of all three. Either way, the change was noted and appreciated.
The second message from last week is that despite criticism from some councils during the past year that the LGA should have been more forthright about the cuts, it continues to command respect in the corridors of power. How many conferences can boast having all three party leaders as speakers? And it was also the first time the LGA was addressed by a Prime Minister who also went out of his way during questions and answers to praise councils for being more efficient than central government.
Thirdly, this was the conference which for the first time heard the words 'Total Place' emanating from a senior Coalition minister when Nick Clegg uttered them as he announced new pilot programmes for community budgets. These two words have been out of favour for the past year since they were associated with Labour. But even without this shift, it is clear community budgets/Total Place are at last rising up the political agenda. Greg Clark may have his fingerprints all over this announcement of more pilots but the Treasury is also behind the concept thanks to support from Lib Dem chief secretary Danny Alexander - hence the pilots being announced by Nick Clegg ratheer than say Pickles.
And further evidence of this rediscovery of the value of merging public sector budgets came from Andrew Lansley who extolled their virtues in dealing with preventative health - to the extent of praising the health authority which gave some of its budget to the county highways department to de-ice roads, thus preventing elderly people from having accidents, thereby saving money in A and E. Now that is a perfect example of Total Place in action.