Benchmarking highs and lows for Orkney’s infrastructure

Issues important to the Orkney community such as digital connectivity were highlighted today (Tuesday, 30 March 2021) as members of the Development and Infrastructure committee considered a national ‘benchmarking’ report.

Councillors were considering the performance of the Development and Infrastructure Service against the Local Government Benchmarking Framework Indicators (LGBFI) for 2019/20.

According to the LGBFI, Orkney ranked first for street cleanliness, and fourth for levels of satisfaction by the public in this area.

The Council also had the third highest rate of local spend – with 40.64% of Council procurement going to local enterprises, against the Scottish average of 28.51%.

In 2019/20, the town vacancy rate – vacant properties on the high street - in Orkney was the lowest in the country at 2.27%, which is better than the 2018/19 figure of 3.79%, and the 2019/20 Scottish average of 11.71%.

And the quality of Orkney’s roads continue to perform well – with costs per km of road the fourth lowest in Scotland (In 2019/20, the cost of maintenance per kilometre of roads in Orkney was £5,464, against a Scottish average of £11,262) - although it was noted this is down to good maintenance in years past, with road conditions a challenge in coming years.

On the flip side, Orkney is lagging behind the rest of Scotland for digital connectivity – ranking bottom of Scottish council areas, with 63.40% of properties in Orkney were receiving superfast broadband against the 2019/20 Scottish average of 93.27%.

Orkney also had some of the highest costs per head of population for services such as waste – ranking 31 out of last for the cost of waste disposal and 29th for cost of environmental and trading standards services. Officers described this as being down to the unavoidable fixed costs of providing services to a small population base.

Chair of the Development and Infrastructure Committee, Graham Sinclair, added: “This benchmarking shows that while there are clearly challenges for us as a county in terms of economies of scale and remoteness, our staff and community continue to punch above their weight.”

Notes:

The LGBFI is compiled annually by The Improvement Service – the national improvement service for local government in Scotland. Some indicators are reported directly to the Improvement Service, with data for other indicators being gathered by the Improvement Service from various sources, to which all local authorities make annual returns.