Case studies

Healthy Start is a national scheme which helps young families and those pregnant on low incomes to access nutritious food, milk and vitamins. Figures are published on its take-up at local authority level, with one of the best rates of take-up being County Durham. In February 2023 the England average uptake was 63.5 per cent, while the figure for County Durham was 73 per cent.

Procurement fraud is regularly reported to be the single largest area of financial loss to local government. It is vulnerable because there are multiple ways to commit fraud and is also vulnerable to being exploited by Organised Crime Groups (OCGs).

Ealing council's COVID-19 Vaccine Working Group made important decisions through analysing data on vaccine uptake in the borough to engage communities from low socio-economic groups and ethnic minority backgrounds.

Early Help 4 Mental Health is a prevention and early intervention programme operating across Devon, working with schools to promote and build mentally healthy behaviours and resilience.

Peopletoo carried out an evaluation of Bristol City Council's targeted Early Help and commissioned services to assess the current model and offer an independent assessment of its effectiveness and value for money, while also considering further opportunities to provide a more joined up and cost effective approach. This case study forms part of our productivity experts resource.

The Somerset Preschool Lifestyle Activity and Skills for self Help programme aims to develop family-focused early intervention and prevention strategies, emphasising the importance of mental wellbeing alongside physical health.

Poverty prevention and alleviation is a priority for East Devon District Council. The council set up a working panel in 2020 to lead the creation of a poverty strategy and action plan, and then to monitor progress against it. The strategy has five objectives – including to help people on low incomes build financial resilience and reduce indebtedness.

Partners East Dorset and Christchurch Councils identified licensing as an area of high demand and volume, with the majority of the process being handled offline. The current processes took up a considerable amount of customer time and effort, while officers were involved in re-keying data and reconciling payments. This case study forms part of our digital experts resource.

East Riding Archives’ Blockdown project harnessed the possibilities of the videogame Minecraft as an interactive learning environment and as a tool to collect young peoples’ experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic in the region.

East Suffolk Council has worked with partners across sectors, through a series of workshops, to develop a wide reaching programme to support local residents with the rising cost of living.