Darlington Borough Council’s award winning risk management strategy has been recognised at national and European level in 2009.
Partnership working and building relationships is now fundamental in public service delivery. Darlington’s Borough Council’s Sustainable Community Strategy, ‘One Darlington: Perfectly Placed’, sets out a vision for Darlington, where partnership working is key to its delivery.
With partnership working involving risks as well as opportunities, embedding risk management within the culture of partnerships and developing effective governance arrangements has become vital for their success.
Darlington’s successful approach to managing partnership risk has been recognised at a European and national level with the Authority winning two prestigious Risk Management awards this year.
In June they won the ALARM (The Public Risk Management Association) Strategic Risk Management Award at their awards presentation held in Bournemouth.
Following this success ALARM submitted the Darlington entry as their only UK submission within the PRIMO (Europe) (Public Risk Management Organisation) European Strategic Risk Management Awards in October. Darlington Borough Council won this European Award with competition from organisations from France and the Netherlands, at an awards ceremony held in Brussels.
The awards are recognition for the development of the Council’s Partnership Toolkit to assist their risk management process. Rather than it being the traditional paper-based manual, the Authority developed an on-line, electronic, interactive toolkit.
Some very positive initiatives and outcomes have been achieved during the past year by adopting this risk-based approach with partnership working and these include:
- Recognition within 2008 CPA Report for effective partnership working between the Council and local agencies
- 39% reduction in theft from motor vehicles
- 10% reductions in criminal damage, 15% reduced violent crime
- A successful Local Motion project produced a 9% reduction in the number of car trips, 15% increase in walking, 65% increase in cycling including 30% of schools taking part in the ‘Bike it’ initiative.
- Successful multi-agency campaign ‘Summer Nights’ Initiative tackling youth anti-social behaviour, street drinking reduced by 50% and a 28% reduction in incidents
To assist the risk management process within the Authority, Zurich Municipal has, for many years, provided risk management support as the Council’s Insurer. As part of this initiative, Zurich Municipal facilitated Partnership Risk Management Training Seminar for appropriate staff and advised the Council regarding partnership insurance cover - another example of successful partnership working.
To find out how Darlington Borough Council approached this initiative, contact George Cornforth, Risk & Insurance Manager, Corporate Services on
01325 388324.
For more information about Zurich’s Risk Management Services, speak to your usual Risk and Insurance Consultant on
0870 241 8050.
