They include some of the most desirable areas across Scotland to live - and that standing has been reflected in each local authority area being rated on factors such as their education, health and community services.
A survey of Scotland’s 32 local authority areas, carried out by The Sunday Times, has revealed a huge variation in public service performance across the country. Some councils recycled twice as much as others, while some residents are half as likely to have their first cancer treatment within 62 days as those in other areas.
The rankings used 11 indicators from five key categories - education, health, community, policing and finance - and weighting was applied by population size and the importance of each category, with health and education deemed the most important.
Three councils, Orkney Islands, Shetland Islands and the Western Isles, were scored separately because of a huge variation in population size and different methods of data collection.
Highland Council, the largest local authority by area in the UK, emerged as having the worst public services in Scotland, ranking ranked bottom for both health and education, and also performed poorest for literacy. East Renfrewshire came top for education and community, while Ayrshire as a general region was a strong performer. The best performing area for crime was Aberdeenshire.
Magnus Llewellin, editor of The Times and Sunday Times Scotland: “We all understand that where you live has a huge bearing on your quality of life. But quantifying those differences across areas such as health, education, community and crime isn’t readily available for readers.
“That is why the Sunday Times has carried out this analysis across Scotland. It gives people a measure of the differences which, in a number of cases, are stark.”
Here are the top ten council areas in order of how they ranked overall.
9. Falkirk
An aerial view along the A904 towards the Falkirk Stadium, left, and The Helix, right. Falkirk was rated as the tenth best council area in Scotland to live, performing especially well in health and community outcomes | Falkirk Council
10. Orkney Islands
Copinsay in the Orkney Islands. Under the rating system, Orkney, the Western Isles and Shetland Islands were ranked separately because of the difference in population size and different methods of data collection, meaning none of them technically fit into the top ten. But the Orkney Islands was the best in all, but one category amongst the trio - finance, where Shetland Islands came out on top | Contributed