Our first Place Survey was conducted by Ipsos MORI in the Autumn of 2008.
The Place Survey is a new statutory survey, which all English local authorities are required to carry out every two years. It asks residents about perceptions of their local area and views about local public services. It replaces the Best Value User Satisfaction Survey, which was last carried out in 2006.
The survey was conducted via a postal questionnaire of 4,000 residents selected at random to represent the population of the High Peak and achieved a 38% response rate.
The survey asked local residents for their views and experiences of the local area and local public services including Derbyshire County Council, Derbyshire Police and Derbyshire Fire and Rescue.
Residents were also asked to comment on specific services provided by the Council and it’s partners and how concerned they were about different aspects affecting their communities including anti-social behaviour.
The results show that High Peak Borough Council is Derbyshire's best performing local authority for value for money and overall public satisfaction with services. The survey also showed that residents’ satisfaction with their local area had risen from 78 per cent to 85.4 per cent, compared with a similar survey two years before. Satisfaction with kerbside recycling and local recycling facilities also increased from 62 per cent to 67.7 per cent.
High Peak has performed well nationally and locally on satisfaction with the local area, satisfaction with the Council and Value for money. Here are some of the headline results:
The results will be used by the Council and it’s partners to gain a better understanding of our local communities and the issues they face. The results will also be used to measure performance and improvement against each of the questions, and will provide key feedback to inform the priorities for the future that the Council and it’s partners will focus on. The survey will be carried out every two years so that we can monitor how perceptions change over time and what progress has been made.
The next survey will take place in Autumn 2010. If you receive a survey please fill it in as your views are important to us and will help us to improve the services we provide.