Last week, after successfully defending a judicial review which went to the Court of Appeal, Barnet Council signed contracts to externalise £500,000,000 (half a billion pounds) of services, pioneering the Commissioning Council model.

Why is this significant?  It resets the dividing line between public and private sector delivery of services – although the court case confirmed rather than changed the law.

The Council has signed a £150m joint venture for its regulatory and development services (planning, licensing, environmental health, trading standards, regeneration, land charges, cemetery and crematorium management, highways network management, traffic and development strategy and building control) simultaneously with an outsourcing contract for customer services, estates, procurement, finance, human resources, IT, revenues and benefits and corporate programmes.