The Audit Commission has written to local authorities to announce that Comprehensive Area Assessments have been scrapped with immediate effect, including asset management targets.

Gareth Davies, managing director of local government, housing and community safety at Audit Commission – the local government watchdog – told councils, PCTs, and other public bodies that the coalition was ending the performance assessment, which had good asset management as one of its “key lines of enquiry”.

The letter says: “We are in discussions with the government, the LGA and other representative bodies about the future approach to inspection.  In the meantime, we will continue with the limited programme of Audit Commission risk-based inspections currently underway.

“We will inform you of any developments in our approach as soon as they have been agreed.”

The new government has eradicated the assessments in a bid to cut red tape for local government bodies, and it plans to introduce new transparency measures to allow local people to scrutinise the public sector themselves

Among the Audit Commission’s guidance on CAA is advice encouraging councils to manage their assets better, in line with the savings demanded by the government’s Operational Efficiency Programme, which asks councils to save £13bn over the next 10 years.

The guidance says asset management was “high” on the previous government’s agenda.

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