Pooled service budgets
This is a concept that's recently been picked up by the community budgets approach, although the principles have been used for a number of years.
The concept is, broadly, to bring together all the funds that are spent on a particular service or issue across a range of providers and involve citizens in how that money is spent more efficiently and effectively. Often when more than one organisation has responsibility for overlapping services there's duplication, lack of communication as well as gaps that appear.
Citizens involved in that service, theme or issue are best place to know what the issues are with the service, and with the issue and how they might be resolved.
Community budget pilots that the government has been championing have been looking at this approach with families with multiple complex needs. So far, the focus has been on identifying and pooling budgets and different organisations working together, which is necessary. But when citizens are involved in making the decisions on the budget, we expect that the benefits will be far more significant than they have been to date.
The government is piloting two further community budgets which specifically involve citizens in the decisions - we're hoping to see PB feature in those pilots.
This is an emerging and innovative approach to PB so there have yet to be many case studies. However, with a focus on specific budgets, Newcastle have implemented PB using carer's budgets, Salisbury with young carers and young people with disabilities, East Devon with development funding and Tameside with recycling funding.
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PB masterclass: commissioning and budget cycles
