A report by APSE – the Association for Public service Excellence – has highlighted the benefits of bringing back services in-house which had previously been outsourced to private sector contractors.

The advantages of insourcing include better performance, increased public satisfaction, greater value for money, and efficiency savings. It also helped councils meet strategic goals such as tackling climate change, and boosting local employment and economic development, the report revealed.

The research found that street cleansing, waste and recycling were most likely to be returned in-house, but some councils were also insourcing highways. The report concluded that the decision to insource was being taken for pragmatic rather than ideological reasons.

It found that satisfaction with street cleansing in Southwark rose from 30% to 70% post-insourcing, while the return of waste services in-house in Three Rivers delivered efficiency savings of £1.5M.

Thanet District Council had seen annual efficiency savings of £500,000 from returning refuse collection, recycling and street-cleansing services in-house, and Oldham was able to meet key targets after bringing its waste service in-house and combining it with parks and street cleansing. APSE’s chief executive, Paul O’Brien, said: ‘The days where it was unfashionable to question the value of outsourced services are over.

‘In these turbulent economic times, local authorities are looking at all options available to them and what this research shows is that more than 50 of them have decided that, based on their experience of the market, it is more economic, efficient and effective to deliver services directly themselves.’

• Insourcing: A guide to bringing local authority services back in-house : www.apse.org.uk