A new Highland Council survey shows that people living in the Highlands are happy with community life and services in the region.
A total of 93% said that they rate quality of community life in their neighbourhood as very or fairly good and almost 97% said it is very or fairly safe.
However one area of dissatisfaction was road repairs and potholes.
The survey received 1,148 responses from the Citizens’ Panel – a 41.9% response rate.
Positive results include 67% agreeing that the council maintains good quality local services compared to a national benchmark of 45%. More positive responses than negative ones were received for 45 of the 46 services surveyed.
Some 91% said they find it easy to contact the council, with the preferred method being a personal visit, followed by online and then telephone.
The council acknowledges in its report that work must be done with road repairs services, and a total of £1.25 million was allocated in April this year to fund an action plan to address this issue.
A progress report will be presented to the Community Services committee in February 2015.
The three other most important services listed in the survey were winter road maintenance, refuse collection and recycling services.
Steve Barron, chief executive said: “We are listening and where there are areas of concern, we have put improvement plans in place. However, this report gives us really important and positive evidence which demonstrates that the Highlands is a great place to live and do business.”