Local Area Agreements: Enabling Measures

Local government

Local Area Agreements (LAA) Enabling Measures or 'LAA freedoms and flexibilities' were introduced in 2004-05 as part of the LAA pilots. They were designed as mechanisms to help overcome potential obstacles to the delivery of LAA outcomes and targets. Local areas developing LAAs requested such measures as part of the development of their LAA outcomes and targets.

In the new LAAs, there will no longer be a formal enabling measures process. The new performance framework with its dramatic reduction in targets, a greatly reduced set of national indicators and the removal of ring fencing in LAAs, will provide many of the freedoms agreed during the Enabling Measures process.

Where there are issues which impact on the level of targets that need to be resolved, these should be raised as part of the negotiation with GOs. It may be possible to resolve the issues locally but where changes to national arrangements are required, these will be resolved as part of the negotiation of targets. The Regional Director's (RD) recommendation will make clear where targets have been influenced by this.

The lists of Enabling Measures requests for the LAA Pilot Round, Round 2 and Round 3 can be downloaded from below.