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Single Outcome Agreements

In November 2007 national and local government signed a historic concordat, which committed both to moving towards Single Outcome Agreements (SOAs) for all 32 of Scotland's councils and extending these to Community Planning Partnerships (CPPs).

The Scottish Government and local government share an ambition to see Scotland's public services working together with private and voluntary sector partners, to improve the quality of life and opportunities in life for people across Scotland. Single Outcome Agreements are an important part of this drive towards better outcomes. They are agreements between the Scottish Government and CPPs which set out how each will work in the future towards improving outcomes for the local people in a way that reflects local circumstances and priorities, within the context of the Government's National Outcomes and Purpose.

Last year, the Government agreed SOAs with all 32 Councils and, in some cases with CPPs. This year, the aspiration was that the SOAs would be agreed with CPPs right across Scotland. The Government and the CPPs have spent the last year developing new SOAs which were formally agreed on 16 June 2009. Over the course of summer 2009 Ministers will visit CPP areas to officially sign the agreements with local partners.

All of the outcome agreements are uniquely shaped to reflect the needs and circumstances of the areas they cover and designed to ensure local people know exactly what their CPP is committed to provide on their behalf. But in one crucial way the agreements are also all the same: each of the 32 maps out a brighter, more successful future for the people of Scotland, with all levels of government working together to deliver better services across the whole of the country.
Providers may wish to get involved with the drafting of Single Outcome Agreements in the local areas in which they operate, or to be aware of the content of SOAs and how their services might help councils and their community planning partners to achieve the outcomes and indicators in them.  Further information on how to get involved can be found on the Community Planning pages of the website here.

CCPS carried out a major analysis of the first set of SOAs from the perspective of voluntary sector social care providers during summer 2008, providing information for CCPS members on the content of individual SOAs and writing a ‘state of the nation’ report for distribution to other stakeholders.  A similar exercise will be carried out with the second set during summer 2009.  A copy of CCPS’ report can be downloaded using the link x and CCPS members can access more detailed information on individual SOAs on the local authority pages of the CCPS website.

Latest news

CCPS analysis of 2009-10 Single Outcome Agreements

In November 2009, CCPS published its analysis of the 2009-10 Single Outcome Agreements.  The report considers the coverage of social care in the documents, comparing this to the 2008-09 tranche and considering what this tells us about the development of the SOA process, concluding with concerns that reading the Single Outcome Agreements is not enough in itself to allow conclusions to be drawn about the implications for social care services in local areas.  The report also contains statistical information on the coverage of different social care client groups in the SOAs.  A full copy of the report or a summary of key findings can be downloaded using the links on the right of this page, or from the research reports page.

CCPS gives evidence to Scottish Parliament inquiry into Single Outcome Agreements and Community Planning 

On 20 May, CCPS Policy and Development Manager Kirsten Gooday gave evidence alongside SCVO to an enquiry by the Local Government and Communities Committee of the Scottish Parliament into the Single Outcome Agreement (SOA) process.  The focus of the session was on the involvement of the voluntary sector in the development of SOAs, and Kirsten highlighted some of the particular difficulties facing national voluntary organisations and contracted service providers in their efforts to become involved with SOAs, community planning and other local strategic planning structures.  The official report of the session can be viewed on the Scottish Parliament website.