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Serious questions were raised at the Local Government Association's sixth annual conference in Bournemouth about the new comprehensive performance assessment and its ability to improve services.

Concerns about the system, which is being introduced this year to assess councils' performances, were voiced throughout the three-day conference. Many delegates questioned the amount of time and money spent preparing for it and whether it could force councils to concentrate on national targets at the expense of local priorities.

At their general assembly meeting before the conference opened, LGA members passed a motion warning government that the CPA system would not work unless it was open and transparent.

They also insisted that it must deliver freedom and flexibility to all councils, be accompanied with additional resources, focus on improvement plans rather than council league tables, and result in a lighter touch inspection regime.

Two days later, a meeting of more than 250 LGA conference delegates voted two to one in favour of a motion that stated the CPA would not improve services.

Speaking at the meeting, leader of Kent's Shepway District Council Rory Love said: "The question for me is whether it is right that we should divert our resources from our manifesto pledges in order to give a good account of ourselves to the Audit Commission."

Calling for local people to be allowed to judge for themselves their council's success, Love added: "I believe the CPA is fundamentally anti-local and anti-government, and therefore anti-democratic."

But director of inspection at the Audit Commission Paul Kirby said that local priorities and agendas were being taken into account during the assessment process, and that it was right to tell local people where their council stood in relation to others.

Addressing the whole conference, deputy prime minister John Prescott denied that the CPA was anti-local government or anti-democratic, and insisted the system would help improve performance and sharpen accountability.

"The scheme is rigorous but it is not just about grading councils. CPA is about improvement. We need to know what each council does well and where it needs support. CPA will mean opportunities for good performers - through new freedoms and flexibilities - as well as help for weaker performers," he said.

The star ratings for social services departments will feed into the CPA for each top-tier council, along with scores for other council services, to give overall council performance ratings by December 2002.