UofG Centre for Public Policy

START Lightning Talk by Annette Hastings, Professor of Urban Studies at the University of Glasgow 

We need to start using floor targets to enable public services to get serious about tacking unequal outcomes.   

So what are floor targets? They are indicators or targets that measure performance in meeting a minimum standard. They aim to focus policy efforts and resources on the hardest to reach groups – children in the deepest poverty - or on improving the worst performing schools. They are designed to countermand targets that enable policies and services to meet outcome thresholds that are focused on quick wins, or those that can cream off the easiest to reach groups or easiest to improve organisations.  

Floor targets were used most extensively in UK Public Policy as part of the public sector reform instigated by the Westminster New Labour government. Public Service Agreements aimed to improve public services via targets and performance management. For example, a target focused on improving literacy among 11 year olds forced education authorities to focus attention on the worst performing schools. A shared target on child obesity required health, education and culture and sport departments to work together, again with an emphasis on the most deprived neighbourhoods. In current Scottish policy the Scottish Attainment Challenge is arguably the closest we have to floor target approach with its focus on the poverty-related attainment gap.

In my view, floor targets very much reflect the spirit of Christie and of contemporary public service reform agendas. They are essentially preventative in nature by stopping the gap widening and the floor falling. In this way, they are a key mechanism to reduce ‘avoidable spend’. Shared targets can challenge services to think strategically about action needed for joined-up thinking and policy design.

An example from research conducted with colleagues from the Universities of Glasgow and Heriot Watt illustrates how such targets can work to address unequal outcomes. It is also an example of how differences in the detailed design of a target can produce divergent effects. In this case, a difference between Scotland and England arises.

In the 2000s, there was a push across the UK to improve local environmental conditions, especially street cleanliness. Armies of people were employed to walk the streets and monitor litter, graffiti and so on against a specified target. Our research team used these data to get an understanding of inequalities in environmental conditions in more and less deprived neighbourhoods and of the mechanisms producing unequal outcomes.  

A key finding related to the design of the targets. In both Scotland and England there was apparently the same basic target: local authorities were assessed and rated according to the propensity of streets to meet an acceptable ‘B’ standard.  

However, the way in which this propensity was measured differed. In England, councils were rated according to the proportion of streets falling below that B score. The fewer the better. In Scotland performance was measured by reporting on B equivalised average scores across four bands A-D. This allowed high A scores to cancel out low C and D scores.  

In England, authorities were incentivised to address the worst outcomes. In Scotland, the target could be met by improving outcomes in cleaner areas – by moving streets from B to A bands. England had a floor target, Scotland did not.

We found in the English local authorities we were working with, that this target incentivised them to put some extra resource into improving outcomes in worst performing areas. Importantly, it also led to innovation in the design and delivery of services in order not to compromise the services in the cleaner, more affluent part of the authority - a process we have called Managing the Middle Class.

In the Scottish local authority in our study, our findings clearly touched a nerve with council officers. They were already aware that resources were effectively skewed towards protecting outcomes in the top two bands but were uncomfortable with this. Indeed, they used our research to advocate with elected members for a different approach which focused on improving the worst outcomes.  

In this Scottish case, officials were looking for a way to legitimate a focus on targeting the floor in the worst places for outcomes. This desire is something that I’ve seen played out in other contexts. For example, work with council leaders on the implementation of austerity budget cuts on services revealed an appetite for enhanced public sector accountability for the socio-economic impacts of policy decisions. In our local authority case studies, both officials and elected members sought a means to legitimate the active protection of poorer households from budget cuts. Floor targets are an underused tool that can be used to achieve this.  

Author and about this blog

START Lightning Talk by Annette Hastings, Professor of Urban Studies at the University of Glasgow 

This is a written copy of a talk that was delivered at the University of Glasgow Centre for Public Policy’s event Stop/Start: Making Public Service Reform Stick in Scotland, on Monday 19 January 2026. 

It was part of a set of START talks, quick fire provocations from leaders in this space, focused on what works and what we should be doing more of, drawing on real success stories. 

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First published: 11 February 2026