BOLTON headteachers have given Bolton council top marks for services such as school dinners, which they rate amongst the best in the country.

The accolade for the education department came during a detailed survey of council services.

And councillors are hoping the results will stand the education authority in good stead when schools are given their own bank accounts to buy in services from wherever they choose.

Education chairman Cllr Don Eastwood said: "We are delighted to see schools value LEA services so strongly. It means these services can look forward with confidence to the future."

Education chiefs decided to find out what schools thought of their services ahead of an OFSTED inspection they are expecting some time over their next three years.

They used an official Audit Commission questionnaire which has been used to ask schools in 25 towns already inspected to rate 50 aspects of their own LEA services on a five point scale.

Report

And Bolton education chiefs were delighted with the resulting end of year report which gave nearly all local services above average marks with 28 rated significantly better than the same functions in the other 25 authorities.

Indeed, Bolton headteachers gave approval ratings higher than schools in any of the other councils for four local authority run services -school dinners, statements of special educational need, building maintenance and support for information technology.

Now LEA chiefs are to concentrate on the handful of services where schools said they "could do better" - services for excluded pupils, support for pupils with behavioural problems and grounds maintenance.

The reports points out that providing services for difficult pupils is proving a problem nationally and Bolton is currently working on strategies to stop pupils being excluded and filling gaps in provision with successful schemes such as Youth Challenge.

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