Introduction

The Strategic Social Plan (SSP), introduced by the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador in 1998, outlined a vision, goals and principles to guide social development in the province. The vision is of a healthy, educated, distinctive, self-reliant and prosperous people living in vibrant, supportive communities within sustainable regions.

The SSP emphasized a new approach for dealing with social issues. It called for greater collaboration among government departments and with community partners, using solid evidence for making decisions about policies and programs, and sharing resources to offer better services to people. Government committed to report on its progress by the end of 2003 through a social audit.

The Social Audit is an independent review of the social and economic well being of communities. It's about taking stock, finding ways to measure what is happening in our daily lives and making certain that our programs and polices are meeting people's needs.

From the Ground Up: Benchmarking the Values and Vision of our Strategic Social Plan is one of the first steps in completing the Social Audit. You will hear much more about our social and economic progress over the next several months.

This report presents a picture of where we are today in terms of our health and well-being around a number of key topics, or indicators. We selected these indicators because they are used nationally and internationally to measure well-being, and this makes it possible to compare the province to other jurisdictions. Where possible, information is presented according to SSP regions (see the map on page 4). The exception to this is for our health data where information is broken down by health regions. No conclusions are drawn in this report, though information presented is likely to raise plenty of questions.

Future audits will use the same indicators so we will be able to measure our progress over time. Data used can be verified through Community Accounts, the information system that was developed for the Strategic Social Plan and its Social Audit. Community Accounts contains a wealth of information about communities, regions and the province as a whole, and was designed to help us measure social and economic well-being. For a look at Community Accounts, go to www.communityaccounts.ca

Other phases of the audit include:

Implementing the Goals of the SSP - Changing the way that government programs and policies are developed and implemented is a major goal of the SSP. Is there greater collaboration among government departments and with key stakeholders in the community? Are we working together to share limited resources and address regional issues? This phase will look at strategies implemented over the past five years to improve the social and economic well-being of our citizens. This phase is due to be completed by late spring, 2003.

Evaluation for the Future - We need to make sure that government programs and polices are developed and implemented based on strong statistical evidence, have clear target groups and measurable results. In this final phase we assess a selected number of programs that are financed by government to see if they are making a difference in the lives of people and communities. Are we getting the best value from our limited resources? The phase, along with the consolidated Social Audit report, will be ready by late fall in 2003.

The Social Audit is about taking stock, about finding ways to measure what is happening in our daily lives, and about making certain our programs and policies are meeting the real needs of people.