COUNCILS across Scotland have reduced spending on nurseries and schools, care for the elderly, street cleaning and road maintenance, with some costs slashed by up to 15% in just one year.

An analysis of the Improvement Service figures by the Sunday Herald shows the costs associated with many key services fell between 2010-11 and 2011-12.

Concerns have been raised that services are being squeezed as local authorities are forced to tighten their belts in the tough economic climate, under pressure from central government austerity in Westminster.

One of the biggest drops in spending was on road maintenance per km, which plunged by more than £1000 – equivalent to nearly 15% –across Scotland, from £7921 per km to £6211 per km.

In the Western Isles spending on road maintenance dropped by 46%, and in the Borders it was reduced by 38%. Only six councils spent more on roads in 2011-12 compared to the previous year.

Paul Watters, spokesman for the AA, said the figures sounded alarm bells. "If you don't spend what you should, you store up troubles," he said.

The figures show that costs associated with nursery places per child also dropped in three-quarters of councils (24 out of 32). Spending in this area dropped by 8% across Scotland, from £3360 per place to £3091 per place.

The biggest decrease was recorded in Shetland, which had a 48% drop.

Jackie Brock, chief executive of charity Children in Scotland, said the reduction in spending was of concern.

For primary schools, the overall cost per pupil dropped by 1.6% across Scotland in 2011-12 compared to 2010-11. The biggest drop was of 9.5% in Inverclyde.

Some 20 out of 32 councils reduced costs in this area.

For the cost per secondary school pupil, the figure was down by 1.7% across Scotland. The biggest decrease, of 16%, was in East Dunbartonshire.

Nearly half – 15 – of councils showed a decreased cost per pupil.

Half of councils also had reduced per-hour costs on home care services for people aged over 65. Here drops ranged from 64% in the Western Isles to 28% in Clackmannanshire.

A spokesman for Age Scotland said the "provision of high-quality home care cannot be compromised" even though budgets were being constricted and councils were having to make less money go further than ever.

Stephanie Herd, chair of Unison's Scottish local government committee, said the public did not want "to see such a squeeze on services with big reductions in spending on their children's nurseries and schools, on care for their elderly relatives, on keeping streets clean and tackling the dreadful state of our roads."

Spending on street cleaning dropped in 19 councils, including by nearly a half in the Scottish Borders.

Mark McAteer, director of governance and performance management at the Improvement Service, described the development of the benchmarking data as a major innovation for public services in Scotland.

However, he emphasised that data collected so far was only a snapshot and more work had to be done over a number of years to try to determine the reasons for variations among councils.

"High spend might not be a good or a bad thing in itself – there are other factors you need to take into account in genuinely understanding what is going on at a service level," he said.

"If you look at some of the more capital intensive areas, like roads for example, some councils may well be coming to the end of an investment programme so the spend is going down.

"Others might be at the start of one – so different councils are at different points in journeys for their different services."

Western Isles council said savings had been made in winter road maintenance over the past two years due to mild winters.

It added that £1 million had been taken out of the maintenance budget in 2010-11, but £5m had been invested in road infrastructure between 2010-2013.

On the issue of home care costs, it also disputed the accuracy of the figures.

East Dunbartonshire said the reason for the decrease in secondary school costs was due to the exclusion of PPP costs in the figures in 2011-12.

When this was taken into account, the spending in this year was broadly the same at £6481 in 2011-12 compared to £6451 in 2010-11, the council said.

A spokesman for Inverclyde claimed the council had improved "the efficiency of school use", which had assisted the overall reduction in costs.

Clackmannanshire, Borders and Shetland councils did not respond to requests for comment.

George Black, vice-chairman of Solace Scotland, said the differences among local authority areas meant there was always going to be disparities in the amount of money councils spend on the same service. He said: "All local authorities have faced unprecedented budget pressures and each has had to make savings based on their own priorities."

A spokesman for the Scottish Government said: "Scotland's local authorities receive a higher share of revenue funding in 2014-15 than they did in 2007-08, including full funding for the council-tax freeze.

"It is the responsibility of each local authority to allocate the total financial resources available to it on the basis of local needs and priorities and to manage their budgets sensibly and responsibly."

COVERING vastly different areas, from tiny island communities to cities with large pockets of deprivation, it is easy to see why it has traditionally been difficult to compare how Scotland's 32 different councils are performing.

But for the first time a set of benchmark measures has been developed to compare how they are spending funds and how satisfied residents are with the results.

The initiative has been launched by Improvement Service, a body set up to drive up standards within councils, which is a partnership between the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (Cosla) and the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives (Solace).

The first set of data, which covers the years 2010-11 and 2011-12, has revealed everything from the funds spent on education and cleaning up the streets to satisfaction levels with museums, leisure facilities and bin collection services.

It shows the corporate and democratic costs associated with councils works out at about £31 per person per year across Scotland. An average of £19 per person is spent on street cleaning and £23 per head on trading standards and environmental health. Maintaining parks and open spaces works out at about £34 per person.

Here we take a closer look at the figures to examine the variations in how taxpayers' money is spent.

COUNCILS across Scotland have reduced spending on nurseries and schools, care for the elderly, street cleaning and road maintenance, with some costs slashed by up to 15% in just one year.

An analysis of the Improvement Service figures by the Sunday Herald shows the costs associated with many key services fell between 2010-11 and 2011-12.

Concerns have been raised that services are being squeezed as local authorities are forced to tighten their belts in the tough economic climate, under pressure from central government austerity in Westminster.

One of the biggest drops in spending was on road maintenance per km, which plunged by more than £1000 – equivalent to nearly 15% –across Scotland, from £7921 per km to £6211 per km.

In the Western Isles spending on road maintenance dropped by 46%, and in the Borders it was reduced by 38%. Only six councils spent more on roads in 2011-12 compared to the previous year.

Paul Watters, spokesman for the AA, said the figures sounded alarm bells. "If you don't spend what you should, you store up troubles," he said.

The figures show that costs associated with nursery places per child also dropped in three-quarters of councils (24 out of 32). Spending in this area dropped by 8% across Scotland, from £3360 per place to £3091 per place.

The biggest decrease was recorded in Shetland, which had a 48% drop.

Jackie Brock, chief executive of charity Children in Scotland, said the reduction in spending was of concern.

For primary schools, the overall cost per pupil dropped by 1.6% across Scotland in 2011-12 compared to 2010-11. The biggest drop was of 9.5% in Inverclyde.

Some 20 out of 32 councils reduced costs in this area.

For the cost per secondary school pupil, the figure was down by 1.7% across Scotland. The biggest decrease, of 16%, was in East Dunbartonshire.

Nearly half – 15 – of councils showed a decreased cost per pupil.

Half of councils also had reduced per-hour costs on home care services for people aged over 65. Here drops ranged from 64% in the Western Isles to 28% in Clackmannanshire.

A spokesman for Age Scotland said the "provision of high-quality home care cannot be compromised" even though budgets were being constricted and councils were having to make less money go further than ever.

Stephanie Herd, chair of Unison's Scottish local government committee, said the public did not want "to see such a squeeze on services with big reductions in spending on their children's nurseries and schools, on care for their elderly relatives, on keeping streets clean and tackling the dreadful state of our roads."

Spending on street cleaning dropped in 19 councils, including by nearly a half in the Scottish Borders.

Mark McAteer, director of governance and performance management at the Improvement Service, described the development of the benchmarking data as a major innovation for public services in Scotland.

However, he emphasised that data collected so far was only a snapshot and more work had to be done over a number of years to try to determine the reasons for variations among councils.

"High spend might not be a good or a bad thing in itself – there are other factors you need to take into account in genuinely understanding what is going on at a service level," he said.

"If you look at some of the more capital intensive areas, like roads for example, some councils may well be coming to the end of an investment programme so the spend is going down.

"Others might be at the start of one – so different councils are at different points in journeys for their different services."

Western Isles council said savings had been made in winter road maintenance over the past two years due to mild winters.

It added that £1 million had been taken out of the maintenance budget in 2010-11, but £5m had been invested in road infrastructure between 2010-2013.

On the issue of home care costs, it also disputed the accuracy of the figures.

East Dunbartonshire said the reason for the decrease in secondary school costs was due to the exclusion of PPP costs in the figures in 2011-12.

When this was taken into account, the spending in this year was broadly the same at £6481 in 2011-12 compared to £6451 in 2010-11, the council said.

A spokesman for Inverclyde claimed the council had improved "the efficiency of school use", which had assisted the overall reduction in costs.

Clackmannanshire, Borders and Shetland councils did not respond to requests for comment.

George Black, vice-chairman of Solace Scotland, said the differences among local authority areas meant there was always going to be disparities in the amount of money councils spend on the same service. He said: "All local authorities have faced unprecedented budget pressures and each has had to make savings based on their own priorities."

A spokesman for the Scottish Government said: "Scotland's local authorities receive a higher share of revenue funding in 2014-15 than they did in 2007-08, including full funding for the council-tax freeze.

"It is the responsibility of each local authority to allocate the total financial resources available to it on the basis of local needs and priorities and to manage their budgets sensibly and responsibly."

CHILDREN

Spending on schooling by councils is categorised using a "total spend per pupil", which takes into account factors such as the costs of teaching staff and the provision of school buildings. The average cost per primary school pupil across Scotland was £4792 in 2011/12, but this varied by as much as £4500 among councils.

In the Western Isles, which has the highest spend, the figure was £8675, and for mainland councils the highest spend was in Argyll and Bute at £5720. Renfrewshire had the lowest spend at £4121 per pupil.

For secondary-school pupils the average cost per pupil across Scotland was £6321 in 2011/12. The highest spend was in Shetland at £12,826, followed by Highland at £7211, while the lowest was in Renfrewshire at £5346.

In Shetland, 52% of fourth-year pupils achieved the equivalent of five or more Standard Grades, well above the Scottish average of 37% – which Highland achieved. The lowest-achieving council was Dundee, with just 26%.

The highest level of satisfaction with local schools was in Orkney, at 95.6%, followed by East Dunbartonshire at 89.7%, while the lowest was in Aberdeen City and Edinburgh, both at 75.1%.

The percentage of pupils entering "positive destinations" – such as higher or further education, employment, training or voluntary work – varied from 85.4% in Midlothian to 95.5% in the Western Isles.

When it comes to children in care, the percentage being looked after in the community – rather than a care home – ranged from 94.8% in North Lanarkshire to 76.9% in Orkney.

The cost of residential-based services for children in care in 2011 ranged from £10,519 per child per week in Shetland to £1697 in Clackmannanshire.

SUPPORT

One of the areas on which the Improvement Service data focuses is how much a council spends on overheads – such as finance, IT, legal and administrative services. In 2011/12, the average spend on support services as a percentage of total expenditure ranged from 2.7% in Inverclyde, to 7.8% in Shetland and 7.5% in Perth and Kinross, with an overall Scottish average of 4.8%.

The figures also show the figure associated with corporate and democratic costs – which include councillors' expenses and allowances, the chief executive office and providing information to the public – varies from £11,444 per 1000 population in North Lanarkshire to £383,911 in Shetland. The highest cost among councils in the mainland is in Renfrewshire at £51,902.

The statistics also record what proportion of a council's highest-paid 2% of staff are women – this ranges from 24.6% in Shetland and 25.6% in Dumfries and Galloway to 54.8% in Clackmannanshire.

When it comes to sickness absence, the average for councils across Scotland was 9.3 days per employee in 2011-12. This ranged from 7.6 days in Clackmannanshire to 13.5 days in East Dunbartonshire.

The figures also looked at how effective local authorities are at collecting council tax – which is affected by factors such as the willingness of individuals to pay and the extent of enforcement action. The average collection cost across Scotland per dwelling was £13.15. Fife had the lowest cost at £2.98, and Orkney the highest, at £24.20.

CULTURE

Culture costs revealed by the data include the financial spend on sports facilities, libraries, museums, parks and open spaces by councils.

The cost to the public purse per attendance at sports centres across Scotland averaged at £4.15, with 74.6% of adults saying they were satisfied with leisure facilities on offer. South Ayrshire had the highest cost, at £10.23 per attendance, with 64.4% of adults saying they were happy with leisure facilities. However in Shetland, where the cost per visit was just £1.41, the satisfaction rating was 96.8%.

For libraries, the average cost to the public purse per visit in Scotland was £3.43, with 83.5% of adults saying they were happy with the facilities provided. This figure ranged from £7.29 in Orkney – where the satisfaction rating was 90.8% – to £1.41 in Clackmannanshire, where 79.3% of adults said they were satisfied with the libraries in their community.

When it comes to Scotland's museums, the average cost to the public purse per visit was £3.81, with a satisfaction rating of 75.5%. The Improvement Service report notes that this indicator is influenced by the number of visitors – and so very high costs per visit reflect low visitor numbers. The highest spend was in Renfrewshire, at £24.35 per visit, where 75% of adults said they were happy with museums and galleries. In Argyll and Bute the cost per visit was £0.24, with a satisfaction rating of 50%.

With no way of measuring the number of visitors going to parks and open spaces, this was assessed on the spend per 1000 members of the population. Across Scotland the spend was £34,237, but this varied from £58,725 in East Lothian to just £4640 in the Western Isles. The report notes that the highest spend is by semi-rural and suburban councils, which have a higher need for parks than rural areas but do not have the same concentrated areas of parkland found in urban areas.

SOCIAL

Home care services – which can include help with personal care, domestic tasks and shopping for the elderly – account for one of the largest areas of spending in council social work departments. The data measured this by the cost of home care per hour for each council.

Larger councils in urban areas and smaller rural and island councils had the highest costs in 2011/12. The figures show the average spend in Scotland was £19.22 per hour for people aged 65 or over – ranging from £29.98 in the Highlands to £8.76 in the Western Isles.

The statistics also measure how many people aged 65 or over with intensive needs are receiving home care, allowing them to stay in their own house instead going into a nursing home, for example. The average is 33% staying at home across Scotland, but this ranged from 51.3% in Dumfries and Galloway to 12.2% in Angus. The report notes there is no statistically significant relationship to explain this variation in terms of population distribution, deprivation or size of council.

Other measures for social work include the spend on "self-directed support", an initiative that allows people in need of social care support to choose what is provided within a budget – which can range from for example, arranging for help with getting washed and dressed to going to college or paying for a personal assistant to help attend local leisure classes. Overall in Scotland, 3.1% of total social work spend was on self-directed support, ranging from 18% in the Western Isles to 0.4% in Aberdeenshire. The data also found 62.1% of adults in Scotland were satisfied with social care or social work services in their area, ranging from 84.4% in the Western Isles to 46.9% in Moray.

HOUSING

The data in this category measures a number of different factors, ranging from tenants' arrears to the quality of housing provided by the council. It shows that tenants in Stirling are the most likely to be behind on their rent – with arrears accounting for 11.2% of the total rent due in 2011/12. The best-performing area was East Ayrshire at 2.8%, while the Scottish average was 6.1%.

Another cost to councils is the amount of rent that has been lost due to housing remaining empty – this varied from 0.4% in North Ayrshire to 3.7% in Renfrewshire, with the average at 1.3% across the country.

By 2015, all council housing is expected to meet the Scottish Housing Quality Standard (SHQS), which sets out various criteria for properties such as being energy efficient, safe and secure and free from "serious disrepair". Across Scotland, 66.1% of all council housing met this standard in 2011/12, but in Renfrewshire the rate was just 15.1%.

The best-performing area, Clackmannanshire, had 89% of council dwellings meeting the standard.

Other figures show there is wide variation in the number of council housing deemed to be energy efficient according to the SHQS standard.

East Dunbartonshire recorded 100% of its council houses meeting the criteria, while in Orkney the figure was just 42.9%. The average across Scotland was 81.2%.

ENVIRONMENT

When it comes to keeping the streets clean, the data show the cost per 1000 population in Scotland averages £19,380. Across the country, the average cleanliness rating out of 100 was 75 in 2011/12, and 73.3% of adults were satisfied with street cleaning in 2011/12.

However, while the spend in Edinburgh was nearly twice the Scottish average at £33,957 per 1000 population, the street cleanliness rating was one of the lowest out of all the councils at 72, and 69% of Edinburgh adults said they were happy with street cleaning. Glasgow, Inverclyde, and South Lanarkshire also had a street cleanliness score of 72.

The lowest spend on street cleaning was in East Renfrewshire at £6,689 per 1000 population: here the rating for street cleanliness was 73 and the satisfaction rating, at 65.8%, was the lowest in the country. The area with the highest cleanliness rating was Dumfries and Galloway at 82, and 74.6% of adults said they were happy with the street cleaning service.

The total maintenance cost per kilometre of road looked after by the council was also measured, with the average spend in Scotland £6,211. The data also show 30.5% of class A roads, 36.3% of class B roads and 36% of class C roads across Scotland are considered to be in need of maintenance treatment. The highest spend was in East Renfrewshire, at £18,018 per km. The proportion of class A roads in this area in need of repair is below the Scottish average at 23.7%, but class B and C roads in need of repair are above the Scottish average at 41.5% and 37% respectively.

The Scottish Borders had the lowest road costs at £2,351 per km. About 26% of class A roads are in need of repair in the area, fewer than the Scottish average. However, for class B roads the figure was 38.6% and for class C roads it was 39.5%, both above the Scottish average.