Protecting the public

East Staffordshire and Lichfield have developed the partnership CRM product as their back office system for environmental health. In particular, they are using the system to book appointments for food safety inspections and to record the findings. As part of this work, they have developed an understanding of how business addresses in the CRM database are updated from the National Land and Property Gazetteer, ensuring the most up-to-date information on businesses in the county.

Now, Staffordshire County Council is considering adopting the CRM product as its back-office system for trading standards - recognising the value of real-time updates of business addresses. Shared use of CRM by district environmental health teams and county trading standards will pave the way for joined-up delivery of services that protect the public.

Meanwhile, the county council and South Staffordshire Council are developing plans to share environmental health and trading standards inspections. And the two authorities are bringing their experiences to the partnership's Public Protection Project Board so that the two projects can help each other.

The project board appointed consultant Mark Baxter as project manager/business analyst before Christmas to develop a detailed plan to involve other districts in two-tier working to deliver public protection services. The fruits of Mark's labours will be reported in a forthcoming edition of the newsletter. Mark reports to Lichfield but the costs of his post are being funded by the partnership.

Project executive Rita Wilson, from Lichfield District Council, said: "The project board is very enthusiastic about the benefits that can derive from this work, and it is intended to share more widely the proposals and opportunities for all the Staffordshire partners".