Moray Council warned over 'significant' service decline

Moray Council accepted it needed "considerable focus"

Moray Council needs to make "difficult decisions" to improve services across the region, the public spending watchdog for local government has said.

The Accounts Commission's Best Value Audit Report highlighted "deteriorating performance" and evidence of declining satisfaction in many services.

Educational attainment in schools was one area of particular concern.

The council said it accepted it needed "considerable focus in the months and years ahead".

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The watchdog's report said: "The council needs to make some difficult strategic decisions on areas such as asset management, leisure services, flexible working, income generation and service transformation in education and social work."

'Significant changes'

It added that the medium and longer-term financial position needed to be addressed and the continued reduction in the council's reserves needed to be halted before they became "acute".

The report added: "Considerable development work and additional measures are required to improve educational attainment, alongside making significant changes to the school estate.

"The council should investigate and better understand the reasons for poorer satisfaction levels in housing, learning from councils with higher satisfaction results."

The local authority is said to face several challenges

Council leader Graham Leadbitter said the report identified a number of key areas that were challenging for the council.

He said: "Some of those areas, such as school attainment, are already being tackled by a renewed focus on numeracy and literacy and a more in-depth, forensic assessment of attainment that enables schools to focus in on where support is most needed."

He added that, as with councils across Scotland, there was growing pressure on finances, especially as people lived longer and required more health and social care support.