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County Treasurers
New figures from the RAC have shown the number of vehicle breakdowns caused by potholes have increased by 9 per cent in the past 12 months. Cllr Darren Rodwell, Transport spokesperson for the LGA, previously said: “Councils are doing all they can to tackle the £16.3 billion backlog of road repairs, including learning from and adopting innovative techniques.”
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Sales of council homes under the Right to Buy scheme have increased over the past 10 years, and are expected to reach 100,000 between 2021 and 2030, according to the Housing Federation. The LGA's previous calls for reform of the scheme are reported, including for councils to be able to set discounts locally.
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There’s a growing awareness of the crisis in local government finances. But there’s another ticking time-bomb – the subsidies that charities and the social sector are providing.
Our new research, State of the Sector 2024: Ready for a Reset, estimates that charities are propping up the public purse by £2.4bn a year by making up shortfalls in public sector contracts. With charities’ other sources of income under pressure, this puts services delivered by charity contracts at risk. Services ranging from mental health support and care for those who are unwell or unable to work to tackling poverty and reducing homelessness.
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Forest of Dean District Council has called on ministers to fully fund trade unions’ pay claim for local government workers.
Councillors at the Gloucestershire authority voted for a motion backing the 2024-25 pay claim for a 10% or £3,000 pay rise for council and school employees in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
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A new National Office for Care and Support has been launched in Wales, with this focusing on innovation, improvement, and transformation.
The primary focus of the National Office for Care and Support will be to support the Chief Social Care Officer for Wales, to deliver a National Care Service, and to implement the National Commissioner Framework for Care and Support in Wales.
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As many as half a million unpaid carers in the UK who look after frail, ill and disabled loved ones are failing to claim the £4,200-a-year carer’s allowance despite experiencing high levels of poverty, according to new estimates. Campaigners said unpaid carers may have not claimed the benefit partly because of strict limits dictating the amount of paid work they can undertake on top of their care duties, and the penalties they face if they breach those rules.
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There was a worse than expected performance for retail sales last month, despite predictions of a consumer-led pick up from recession for the UK economy. The Office for National Statistics reported sales volumes were flat in March, following an upwardly revised figure of 0.1 per cent for the previous month and said sales at non-food stores helped offset declines at supermarkets.
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Ministers have demanded councils improve their productivity in the same week as the Government quietly published a report revealing Whitehall makes the sector less efficient.
Local government minister Simon Hoare wrote to chief executives on Tuesday, formally asking councils to produce productivity plans.
Hoare claimed he was ‘not looking to impose excessive burdens’ or ‘issue you with a formal template or a detailed list of criteria to meet’ but suggested an astonishing 51 questions the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) would like councils to answer.
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Further coverage of Freedom of Information requests that revealed a 70 per cent rise in the total amount of council tax arrears over the last 5 years, with almost 600,000 residents referred to bailiffs have been reported. The LGA said: "Enforcement agents should only ever be used as a last resort. Before the situation reaches a stage where enforcement agents are involved, several letters should have been written, people should have been encouraged to apply for financial support, and efforts should be made to arrange new payment plans."
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Productivity plans are a "diversion tactic" from central government to "change the narrative" ahead of the general election, local government figures claim.
Local government minister Simon Hoare wrote to council chiefs on Tuesday asking them to "formally begin" compiling productivity plans, which were first proposed in the as part of this year's financial settlement.
These documents should be three to four pages in length and "set out" what councils have done to "transform" their organisation and services, Mr Hoare wrote.
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Former Wigan MBC chief Donna Hall was appointed to Nottingham City Council’s improvement board by the government in 2021. However, she became frustrated and stood down after two months.
“My experience was there was no deep transformation and building a partnership relationship with citizens, as we did in Wigan. It’s heavily governance and finance focused, often in a strategic and relational vacuum.”
She told LGC she would now not want to be a commissioner as she has not been a chief executive for more than four years, during which time a lot has changed.
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LGC looks at the characteristics of the individuals charged with turning around the most troubled councils
Almost 70% of commissioners sent into struggling councils are male and more than a quarter have not worked in local government for four years or more, exclusive LGC analysis has found.
LGC research shows there are currently 26 individuals involved across eight active statutory interventions by the Department for Levelling up, Housing & Communities.
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The government will not "rate or score" council productivity plans or create "any kind of league tables", a letter to chief executives has revealed.
Local government minister Simon Hoare wrote to council chiefs on Tuesday asking them to "formally begin" compiling productivity plans, which were first proposed in the as part of this year's financial settlement.
These documents should be three to four pages in length and "set out" what councils have done to "transform" their organisation and services, Mr Hoare wrote.
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A GRIEVING mother has described the intimidating moment bailiffs turned up at her door after she fell behind on her council tax bill.
Jess King, from Yorkshire, fell behind on her priority bills after losing her newborn baby, but she isn't alone. It comes 600,000 people were referred to bailiffs for not paying their council tax on time.
The data came from a Freedom of Information request by ITV News which asked 100 of the country's biggest councils about council tax arrears.
The responses revealed that the total amount owed in council tax arrears has increased by over 70% in the past five years.
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Fresh concerns have been raised over the remit for local government’s new ombudsman.
Fears were raised by experts that Oflog’s remit is and relationship with other oversight organisations is unclear.
Members of the levelling up committee were told that its focus on collecting data will be useful for the government but will be of limited use to the councils that have either already issued Section 114 notices or may do so within the next two years.
CIPFA chief executive Rob Whiteman told the committee its remit is “pretty limited… given the challenges facing local government”.
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New safeguards have been introduced to curtail “excessive borrowing” by local authorities which puts them at heightened risk of financial failure.
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Local authorities referred almost 600,000 people to bailiffs last year due to failure to pay council tax, according to a freedom of information request.
ITV News sent FOI requests to around 100 of the biggest councils in England.
The responses revealed that the total amount owed in council tax arrears has increased by over 70% in the past five years.
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Around £6m in funding promised to local authorities to help tackle air pollution will be withheld, a Defra spokesperson has confirmed.
The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) is also considering a redesign of the Local Air Quality Grants scheme.
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A report by the Child of the North All-Party Parliamentary Group, researched and funded by Health Equity North, has found that while the north of England accounts for 28 per cent of the child population, 36 per cent of children are in care. The analysis suggests that due to the higher burden, the north has faced service costs of at least £25 billion in the last four years.
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Councils face a £300 million funding gap to support their efforts to tackle homelessness, the charity Centrepoint has claimed. The research is based on the results of freedom of information requests to councils in England. Cllr Darren Rodwell, housing spokesperson for the LGA said: “Councils have consistently raised significant concerns about the impact rising cost of living, multiple asylum and resettlement programmes, and an insufficient supply of affordable housing, are having on driving increases in homelessness. Currently, councils are spending £1.74 billion on supporting households living in temporary accommodation, with this spend predicted to increase by a further 19.9 per cent in 2023/24.”
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The Local Government Association (LGA) is to introduce a ‘significant new foundation programme’ for newly-appointed chief executives after a ‘successful’ pilot.
Launching its sector support programme for 2024-25, the LGA said it would expand its range of officer and councillor development opportunities, including for statutory officers.
The LGA will also launch a ‘flagship’ national recruitment campaign to ‘attract new talent and promote the benefits of a career in local government’ amid recruitment and capacity challenges.
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The Government has ignored Local Government Association (LGA) calls for the sugar levy to be spent by councils to tackle physical inactivity.
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Councils in England placed hundreds of vulnerable school-age children in unregulated homes last year due to the shortage of secure places, an investigation has revealed.
In 2022-23, over 700 looked after children were placed in homes that were not registered with Ofsted, the children’s social care watchdog, according to the Observer.
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A report by the Fawcett Society has claimed that the UK’s childcare system has fallen behind international comparators. The charity compared the affordability, quality and levels of public spending with childcare in Australia, Canada, Estonia, France, and Ireland.
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Campaigners have warned of a growing decline in the condition of local roads and have called for increased levels of funding for councils to tackle the issue. Analysis last year by the LGA of OECD figures found that spending on local roads had halved between 2006 and 2019. The LGA’s position on road funding has been reiterated in today’s print edition of the Telegraph.
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The UK economy has grown slightly for the second month in a row. Gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 0.1 per cent in February, the Office for National Statistics said.
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Seven more areas in England have been selected to trial the Families First for Children (FFC) scheme, a £45m child protection programme.
The scheme was launched in three areas in 2023 after reports into the murders of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and Star Hobson in 2020 and a child care review in 2022.
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A decline in the number of school-age children could lead to schools losing over £1bn in funding by 2030, education experts warn.
Pupil numbers in state-funded primary and secondary schools are projected to fall from over 7.5 million in 2022-23 to just over 7.1 million in 2028-29, according to a new report from the Education Policy Institute (EPI).
The decrease in the number of pupils could mean a reduction in school funding from £42.7bn in 2024-25 to £41.6bn by 2029-30, which would force schools to consider mergers, cost-cutting measures and closures to remain viable.
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One in seven eligible English highway authorities have failed to detail their plans for the Government’s £300m of redirected HS2 road resurfacing cash.
The Department for Transport said that as a condition of the funding and to make sure the money was being spent on pothole repairs, local authorities were required to publish a two-year plan detailing exactly which roads will benefit.
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Urban wealth funds could invest in local assets to avoid selling them at fire-sale prices and alleviate the financial crisis across councils.
Andy Haldane, former chief economist at the Bank of England and current chief executive of the Royal Society of Arts, made the case for urban wealth funds operating in such a way in a recent contribution to the Financial Times.
An income stream of £100bn each year could be generated for local councils, he conservatively estimated, if half of all public assets were placed in commercially-managed urban wealth funds with a rental yield of 5%.
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Bristol City Council will have to issue a section 114 notice if it fails to meet the terms of a government programme that aims to wipe an escalating deficit in its special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) budget.
The council’s Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) reserve, which finances the SEND budget, is forecast to be £56.1m in deficit as at 31 March 2024, rising to £114.2m by 2027/28. The latter figure, though, assumes that all currently planned mitigations “have been successfully delivered in full up to that date”, according to a new report presented to the council’s cabinet.
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The final requirements for determining minimum revenue provision (MRP) for local authorities in England have been laid out in parliament.
Amendments to the Local Authorities (Capital Finance and Accounting) (England) Regulations 2003 have been made, and specify additional requirements that local authorities must comply with – with most of the changes coming into effect on 1 April 2025.
MRP is an amount of money set aside each year by local authorities to ensure they can repay the principle of their debt, essentially stopping authorities from taking on more debt than they can afford to repay.
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Schools in England could lose up to £1bn in funding by 2030, researchers warn, with exceptional falls in pupil numbers prompting a wave of closures as some establishments cease to be financially viable.
Mergers and closures are already under way in parts of London, where pupil numbers have been falling for some time. According to the Education Policy Institute (EPI), a thinktank, the north-east is projected to see the greatest decline in primary pupil numbers, down 13% by 2028/9.
At secondary level, Yorkshire and the Humber, as well as the north-east and London, are projected to have the largest falls in pupil numbers, whereas in other areas, including the West Midlands, the south-east and east of England, numbers are rising.
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Local authorities have published which pothole-stricken roads will benefit from the first tranche of an over £8bn package of reallocated HS2 funding.
The £150m of the £8.3bn pot was paid to councils for fixing roads last year (2023/24) and another £150m will be released this year (2024/25).
As a condition of this funding, local authorities are required to publish a two-year plan detailing which local roads will benefit.
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English Councils received nearly £2bn in income from on and off-street parking in 2022-23, but paid out nearly £1bn in running and enforcement costs.
Outturn data for the year published by the Department for Levelling up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) showed that councils in England had a total income including fines from on-street parking of £1,196m and £730m from off street parking, totalling £1,927m.
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Staff at Derbyshire CC working across various departments are being balloted for industrial action by one trade union.
Unison is calling on its members in children’s services, day centres, libraries, homecare, community services, tourism, and schools to vote on whether to strike due to planned recruitment freezes and expenditure controls.
This recruitment freeze would "inevitably lead to already stretched staff taking on more work and stress" there is a "sizeable number of job vacancies at the council", Unison say.
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History reveals four significant obstacles to putting councils on a sustainable financial footing, writes a PhD student at INLOGOV.
An enticing set of options for the much-needed reform of local government finance was presented recently in LGC by Mark Sandford in his review of international examples. A historical perspective, however, leads to a more pessimistic assessment of the prospects for change.
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We often look to others to understand ourselves better. If we want to develop, professionally or personally, it can be good to examine our peers to help take stock of what is going well, where there is room for improvement and maybe highlight things we didn’t even know we were – or weren’t – doing.
Evening out the stark social and economic inequalities between regions in England is a huge policy, funding and delivery challenge for local authorities and their civic partners, and so looking elsewhere at what has worked is a useful strategy and starting point.
CIPFA’s 2022 research with the University of Birmingham looked at four international cities — Cleveland, US (above); Fukuoka, Japan; Nantes, France; and Leipzig, Germany — and identified nine common factors that were key to their levelling-up successes. These range from political will and partnerships to long-term investment to monitoring and evaluation (see panel, below).
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Every constituency in Britain saw a rise in sickness benefit claims last year, with Conservative areas experiencing some of the biggest increases.
Affluent southern areas have seen the numbers of people claiming the main incapacity benefit jump a third or more in a year, according to constituency-level analysis by the Labour Party, with experts warning that mental health is worsening nationwide and Britain is getting sicker.
While the highest absolute number of incapacity claimants are in Labour seats, dominated by inner-city parts of Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham, as well as towns such as Hartlepool and Middlesbrough which have been hit by de-industrialisation, the biggest proportional increases are in commuter and rural areas, which traditionally have lower benefit numbers.
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Children from low-income families who grew up near a Sure Start centre did better than their peers at GCSEs, says the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS).
Its research says those living near a centre performed up to three grades better than those further away.
Sure Start centres started in 1998 to give parents of toddlers extra support, especially in disadvantaged areas, but many have closed.
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Campaign group TaxPayers’ Alliance has published its annual ‘town hall rich list’ today as it continues to raise the issue of public sector pay.
The list shows that 3,106 council staff in the UK received total remuneration of at least £100,000 in 2022-23, the second highest figure since the list began in 2007.
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The Liberal Democrats would deliver tax reforms to ‘revive struggling high streets’, leader Ed Davey will announce today.
Under the proposals, business rates would be replaced with a new commercial landowner levy, with local authorities still able to keep 50% of tax returns from businesses.
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An independent review of Homes England has urged officials to 'build closer relationships' with councils.
The review by Tony Poulter, a non-executive director at the Department for Transport, reaffirmed Homes England’s status as the appropriate national public body of scale for place-making.
However, in his report published today, Poulter makes 34 key recommendations to ministers and Homes England designed to improve the workings of the under-fire organisation.
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Councils have increased parking charges over the last year, according to government figures. Reports suggest that councils received £1.93 billion in fees and fines in the year to April 2023, up from £1.76 billion the previous year. A spokesperson for the LGA said: “Income raised through parking charges is spent on running parking services. Any surplus is spent on essential transport projects. Motorists can avoid fines by ensuring they observe parking and traffic rules that are only there to help all drivers get around and find parking safely, smoothly and fairly.”
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Grant Thornton has been fined by the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) for ‘failures’ in its audit of an unnamed local authority’s pension fund.
The FRC’s inspection found two uncorrected material errors in the pension fund’s audited financial statements included in the local authority’s annual report for 2020-21.
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Council directors have praised the Children’s Homes Association (CHA) for tightening its membership criteria to crack down on firms based in tax havens.
The CHA has insisted that members must now be ultimately owned in the UK, have majority shareholders who are registered UK taxpayers and cannot receive loans originating from tax havens.
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Up to 15 new children’s homes, which aim to provide the 'right care in the right place at the right time', could be created across Lancashire.
The homes would provide a total of 40 places, including two crisis beds, for looked-after children with complex needs.
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Cash-strapped Birmingham City Council has launched a consultation on how it will cut £2.3m from its library budget.
The local authority, which issued a section 114 notice in September, said the number of community libraries could be cut from 35 to 25.
It has also proposed reduced opening hours, transferring library services to community groups, and expanding libraries at home and mobile provision.
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The outgoing leader of Nottingham City Council has said there ‘simply isn’t enough money’ in local government to ‘run the services our citizens depend on’.
Nottingham, which has had to make sweeping cuts to its services to balance its budget after issuing a section 114 notice, was among 19 councils forced to agree capitalisation directions this year.
In newly-published minutes of a council meeting, Nottingham’s Labour leader David Mellen said:
‘This callous and cruel-hearted Government has brought local government in this country to its knees. I would like to be clear on one point right at the start – this is not a Nottingham problem. This is a national problem caused by a government that has failed to fix social care, caused massive inflation and generated a cost of living crisis that has seen soaring rates of homelessness. A failure of central government, but for some reason the buck stops with us – Nottingham City Council, and the people we represent. We are the ones that must pick up the pieces of their broken Britain without the resources to do so. Years of Tory underfunding of councils has led us to this day - years of austerity, years of rising prices and inflation and years of a broken care system.’
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The outgoing leader of Nottingham City Council has said there ‘simply isn’t enough money’ in local government to ‘run the services our citizens depend on’.
Nottingham, which has had to make sweeping cuts to its services to balance its budget after issuing a section 114 notice, was among 19 councils forced to agree capitalisation directions this year.
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The Department for Transport (DfT) has shelved the further rollout of powers for English councils to enforce moving traffic violations like dangerous driving outside schools.
Ministers were due to lay regulations in Parliament last month to allow a tranche of 22 local authorities to enforce contraventions such as driving the wrong way down one-way streets and ignoring no entry signs from tomorrow.
The DfT suggested the designation order may be shelved until after the General Election.
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Teachers and support staff have warned of a crisis in funding for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), with seven out of eight saying the resources available in schools are insufficient to meet need.
In a survey of 8,000 members carried out by the National Education Union ahead of its annual conference, one in three respondents said their school had no behaviour support team whatsoever, while two in five reported no counsellor or occupational health specialist.
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In the 50 years since the structure of local government was overhauled, the search for efficiency has won out over community representation again and again, writes the director of LSE London.
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On the 50th anniversary of the most significant local government reform for generations, one of the ministers involved tells LGC the government should have gone further.
For those with a passion for local government, this week marks a moment in history: 50 years since a landmark restructuring of local government in England took effect.
But for one of the key figures involved passing the legislation that abolished hundreds of councils and created the system that remains in place in much of the country, the reform should have gone much further. It was “a big step” but “not the whole step”.
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Terence Herbert is set to join Surrey CC as chief executive after Joanna Killian left to head up the Local Government Association.
Mr Herbert is currently chief at Wiltshire Council and is expected to join Surrey in the summer. The appointed should be ratified at a full council meeting next Tuesday.
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A think-tank has called for a portion of the proceeds from landfill tax to be devolved to councils.
Chief executive of Localis, Jonathan Werran, said there was a ‘need to allocate a portion of landfill tax revenues to fund research and development aimed at advancing technologies for waste recovery, reuse and recycling, as well as for legacy chemical cleanup, as well as a portion allocated to funding the prevention of waste crime’.
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Teachers and support staff are ‘losing faith’ in the special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) system due to inadequate resources, a union has warned.
The National Education Union (NEU) asked its members in England and Wales what provision they had at school or local authority level to support pupils with an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) or who may need to be referred for one.
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Council payouts for punctured tyres and damaged suspension are down 13% since 2020 despite reports of pothole-riddled roads increasing by almost a quarter over the same period.
New analysis by insurance website, Confused.com, has found that almost one million potholes were reported by drivers in 2023. This represents an increase of 24% since 2020.
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The Government has rejected a request for a public inquiry into Thurrock Council’s financial failure and significant levels of debt.
Thurrock Council members wrote to secretary of state Michael Gove on behalf of more than 1,500 residents who called for a public inquiry into the local authority’s financial issues.
Minister for Local Government Simon Hoare MP responded that a public inquiry would not ‘provide further understanding into the historical failings or management of the council that is not being achieved through statutory intervention’.
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Ministerial promises to ‘co-design’ the Office for Local Government (Oflog) with the sector have been broken, councils have claimed.
Then local government minister Lee Rowley said last year that ‘co-design will underpin the development and success of Oflog’.
But, in written evidence to MPs, the Local Government Association (LGA) said the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) ‘did not engage with repeated efforts by the LGA and colleagues in the wider local government sector to co-design’ with them.
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Local government should be given NHS England’s £169bn budget to deliver most health services, the Reform think-tank has suggested in a report.
The proposed radical shake-up would see NHS England phased out and an “appropriate tier” of local government in each area take on all but the most specialised functions, with a block grant lasting at least five years and freedom to spend it according to local needs.
As long as a centrally set minimum service level is reached, local government would be allowed to deliver services as it sees fit – part of a change in emphasis from reactive, acute, episodic treatment to a service that creates health in the first place.
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More than three quarters of England’s second home owners are set to be charged double council tax next year. An analysis by the Telegraph has found that at least 153 local authorities will impose the levy next April, in a move which is likely to affect up to 130,000 homes.
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The minimum wage, known as the National Living Wage, is increasing by more than £1 for the first time. The main wage rate is rising from £10.42 to £11.44 an hour and will apply to workers over 21 rather than over 23.
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Parish and town councils will spend almost £800 million in the next financial year after increasing their average council tax surcharge by 8.5 per cent, according to official figures. Data from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities shows parish and town councils will increase their spending from £708 million in 2023/24 to £783 million in 2024/25.
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Bus services supported by councils have been reduced by more than 90 per cent over the last decade, analysis by iNews has revealed. The loss of services means that across the 10 worst-affected areas, a combined 16 million miles of bus routes have been lost.
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People on the lowest incomes will be able to apply to have their debts wiped out for free as rules change in April. Debt Relief Orders clear existing debt on everything from council tax to energy bills and rent and cost £90 to apply for, which charities said many people in debt could not afford, but from 6 April they will be free in England and Wales.
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One in every 25 bridges on Britain’s local roads are unable to carry the heaviest vehicles, new figures show. The RAC Foundation, which carried out the analysis, expressed concerns over the impact of severe weather and a shortage of engineering skills. Cllr Darren Rodwell, transport spokesperson for the LGA said councils want to “focus on preventative measures to make all of our local highways infrastructure more resilient.”
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Interim chair of the Office for Local Government (Oflog), Lord Morse, has announced he will be stepping down at the end of March due to ‘unexpected health reasons’.
‘I am proud of the model for Oflog that we have developed in close collaboration with the local government sector and set out recently in our draft Corporate Plan,’ he said.
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The special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) school transport system must be reformed or else it will ‘threaten the financial viability of councils’, council leaders warn.
The cost of SEND school transport has increased from £727m in 2019 to £1.4bn in 2024, freedom of information requests by the BBC have revealed.
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The prime minister rejected the idea that there is a crisis in council finances during a grilling by MPs at the Commons liaison committee today.
Clive Betts (Lab), the chair of the levelling up, housing and communities committee, told Rishi Sunak that while there were recent financial problems that “have been specific to some councils, there's now a more general problem. And in the next year or two, about half the authorities will be in financial distress, potentially. Isn't there a fundamental crisis in local government finance?”
Mr Sunak acknowledged that councils “face challenges”, adding that in this parliament “significantly more funding has gone into local government,” such as the £600m boost in the most recent financial settlement.
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The prime minister Rishi Sunak has defended the pace of system-wide reform for councils with high dedicated schools grant deficits.
Last week four councils joined the Department for Education's safety valve programme.
During the liaison committee hearing yesterday, the education committee chair Robin Walker (Con) asked if the prime minister can “address” the high needs budgets for councils that “that seem to be getting larger and larger over the years without actually reducing or removing those deficits” despite councils being part of the safety valve and delivering better value programmes.
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There has been an increase in councils not accepting requests for education, health and care needs assessments (EHCNA), according to campaigners. A Freedom of Information request by website Special Needs Jungle claimed that on average councils refused 26.4 per cent of requests for an EHCNA in 2023, up from 21.6 per cent in 2022.
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There have been increasing numbers of people in rural areas forced to access the private rental market due to rising house prices, according to a report by the County Councils Network. There has been a 19 per cent increase in rural renting, which has outpaced rises in London and England's other cities. The report warned that the number of households in private and social rental properties in rural areas has increased by 550,000 between 2011 and 2021. Cllr Richard Clewer, CCN's housing and planning spokesperson, said: "It is widely accepted that the housing crisis is one that is worsening, with rising unaffordability locking hundreds of thousands out of getting onto the property ladder”. Speaking to Radio 4’s Today programme, Cllr Linda Taylor, housing spokesperson for the LGA said: “What I would like to see is a change in planning use, so if anyone is renting out a private property and want to go into the holiday market they should have to apply for a change of use so you can start to control what is happening in your communities.”
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Local authorities in England will share up to £295m in funding to help them introduce weekly food waste collections, Recycling Minister Robbie Moore has announced.
Weekly collections of food waste will be rolled out for most households across England by 31 March 2026 as part of the Government’s Simpler Recycling plans.
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Ministers have reiterated to MPs there are ‘no plans’ to revalue council tax bands due to the cost and disproportionate impact on lower-income households and pensioners.
In its official response to the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities select committee report into councils’ financial distress, published on 26 March, the government has stood firm on its refusal to consider reforming the regressive tax soon.
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Special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) services in Bristol are to receive a nearly £54m bailout, the Government has confirmed.
The Department for Education has announced that Bristol City Council has been included in its Safety Valve (SV) Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) management programme.
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MPs have called for the introduction of an ‘uprating guarantee’ to uprate working-age benefits and the Local Housing Allowance rate on an annual basis.
A report from the Work and Pensions Committee also recommended that the Household Support Fund be made a permanent part of the social security system.
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West Sussex CC has named Surrey CC’s interim boss Leigh Whitehouse as its new chief executive.
Having recently stepped up from his substantive post as deputy chief executive and executive director of resources to cover Joanna Killian’s departure from Surrey for the Local Government Association, Whitehouse was expected to be among applicants to be Killian’s permanent replacement
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A ‘complex web’ of hard-to-reach Whitehall funding pots is hampering councils’ net-zero initiatives – with two-thirds of town halls not confident of hitting crucial targets.
A survey by the Local Government Association (LGA), published today, reveals the potential for local action on climate change is being ‘strangled’ by the bureaucratic system of bidding for central government funds.
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Public satisfaction with social care services has slumped to the lowest level ever recorded, according to a new survey.
The British Social Attitudes survey findings, published today by the Nuffield Trust and The King’s Fund, found just 13% of respondents were 'very' or 'quite' satisfied with social care services.
Conversely, 57% were either ‘quite dissatisfied’ or ‘very dissatisfied’ – an historic high level.
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The government‘s response to the Levelling Up, Housing, and Communities Select Committee’s inquiry on financial distress in local authorities.
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The Work and Pensions Committee has called on the Government to reform the social security system with new benefit levels that take into account living costs. They said that benefit payments are “too low” to cover daily living costs and the Government must act to increase financial support. Cllr Pete Marland, Chair of the LGA’s Economy and Resources Board, said: “While it’s good that the household support fund was recently extended, councils now want to work with the government to deliver a sustainable, long-term solution to support households out of poverty and improve residents’ financial resilience and wellbeing.”
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Schools with leaking roofs and decades-old temporary classrooms are concerned they will not be able to make repairs, as most of the last places on a scheme to rebuild schools went to those with reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC). The School Rebuilding Programme aims to rebuild or refurbish 500 schools in a decade.
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The average cost of rent in the UK rose by 9 per cent in the 12 months to February this year - the highest annual increase since records began in 2015. There were price rises in all parts of the country, according to the Office for National Statistics.
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Across the country, average council tax bills from April 2024 will be 5.1 per cent higher than 2023 – or £106 more – for band D households. LGA Chair, Cllr Shaun Davies, said councils were starting the financial year in a precarious position and scaling back or closing a wide range of services. “This means many are again left facing the difficult choice about raising bills to bring in desperately needed funding. It is unsustainable to expect them to keep doing more for less in the face of unprecedented cost and demand pressures. Keeping councils on a financial drip feed has led to the steady weakening of local services. Local government needs greater funding certainty through multi-year settlements to prevent this ongoing decline.”
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Nearly all local authorities in England are raising council taxes by the maximum amount permitted, according to new data from the Department of Levelling up, Housing and Communities. While the increases were not unexpected, think-tanks and local government groups have said the data highlights stark regional disparities, with poorer areas in the north in particular forced to raise the levy more than richer areas. People across the board were paying more and more for increasingly threadbare services, they added.
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The energy price crisis caused the sharpest increase in UK absolute poverty in 30 years, new figures from the Department for Work and Pensions show. Steep price rises, following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, meant hundreds of thousands more people fell into absolute poverty. The figure jumped to 12 million in 2022-2023, a rise of 600,000. This means the rate of absolute poverty in the UK now stands at 18 per cent - a rise of 0.78 percentage points.
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Accommodation for lone asylum seeker children who arrive on the Kent coast in small boats could run out before the end of this month, a council has warned, placing them at risk. Kent County Council has legal duties under the Children Act to take these children into care on arrival in the UK. Under the national transfer scheme, many of the children are subsequently moved to different local authorities around the country after arrival. However, due to high numbers of children arriving on their own on small boats and delays in moving them to other areas, Kent Council say it is struggling to cope and that its spaces for these children could run out before the end of March.
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The co-operation between local government and the NHS hoped for with the advent of Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) is faltering, experts have said.
Windsor and Maidenhead LBC chief executive Stephen Evans told The MJ’s Future Forum cross-sector co-operation seen during the pandemic had dissipated since.
‘In the last year or so, we’ve retreated back into siloes – that’s a massive missed opportunity,’ he said.
‘I feel like that collaboration has gone backwards.’
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Labour could be presented with an opportunity to reform council tax if election polls are borne out, The MJ’s Future Forum has heard.
Director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, Paul Johnson, was asked if the chance for an overhaul of the system had passed.
He said there could be hope for reform of the ‘out of date and regressive’ tax should Labour win a comfortable majority after the General Election, but harboured doubts over whether the political courage was there.
‘That’s an opportunity to do radical stuff. I don’t know how willing they will be to do something radical.’
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This week marks the first anniversary of the signing of the West Midlands trailblazer devolution deal.
A good time then to take a step back and reflect on what we have learned about being at the vanguard of English devolution.
There will of course be a range of perspectives, but here are five reflections from the ‘frontline’ on negotiation and implementation.
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Forty-four local authorities are set to receive a share of £185m to help accelerate the rollout of electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure, the Department for Transport has announced.
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The boss of the Bank of England has said it is "not yet" the time to cut interest rates leaving them unchanged for a fifth time in a row at 5.25%.
The widely-expected decision means the cost of borrowing remains at its highest level for 16 years.
Eight of the nine Bank rate setters voted to leave rates unchanged, with only one voting in favour of a cut.
The Bank has kept interest rates at a high level in a bid to slow the pace consumer prices have been rising at.
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A new cross-party report from MPs has warned that the Department of Health and Social Care is failing to provide the leadership required to deliver a social care sector sufficient to meet the country’s future needs. Initiatives to support the workforce have so far only been short-term, while a long-term and comprehensive workforce plan is lacking, the Public Accounts Committee said. The LGA said it strongly supports the call for long-term financial support and certainty, as it described the sector being in “a precarious position, with overstretched budgets, significant unmet and under-met need, and remaining instability within the provider market”.
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The rate of pothole repairs on local roads in England and Wales has reached an eight-year high, according to a new report. The Asphalt Industry Alliance said highways are heading towards “breaking point” after its ALARM survey found that councils expect to fix two million potholes in the current financial year. Meanwhile, the amount needed to fix the backlog of local road repairs has reached a record £16.3 billion, up 16 per cent from £14 billion a year ago. LGA transport spokesperson Cllr Darren Rodwell said: “This report reveals in stark terms the huge challenge facing councils in maintaining the local roads network, which nearly everyone relies on. The backlog of repairs now stands at almost double the extra amount that government has promised over the next 11 years.”
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Ministers are considering removing the power for councils to make profits when fining motorists for minor traffic offences, such as stopping in yellow box junctions or driving in bus lanes. The Department for Transport has put out a call for evidence on “restricting the generation of surplus funds from traffic contraventions.”
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The pace of general price rises has slowed, falling to 3.4 per cent in February, according to official figures from the Office for National Statistics. This is down from 4 per cent in January and December, and the lowest rate for nearly two and a half years, but the rate of inflation is still above the Bank of England's 2 per cent target.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has hinted a general election could be held in October. He told a Lords Committee the Government's next spending review had to be completed before next April and “if the general election is in October that will mean it's very, very tight”.
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A survey of more than 200 LAs in England and Wales prompted warnings that entrenched regional disparities would only be exacerbated, resulting in “levelling down”. Poorer areas of the country will pay more council tax than wealthier ones, warned CIPFA which carried out the survey.
It found that band D properties, which are used as the baseline for setting other band rates, will rise by 5.2% across England and Wales from April — 0.3% more than this year. The contrast was most stark between the northeast and London. Households in the former will pay £420 more for an average band D property in council tax next year than those in Greater London.
“The continuous council tax gap between London and the rest of the country further reflects the profound regional inequalities that exist,” said Iain Murray, Cipfa’s director of public financial management.
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Roads in England and Wales are at "breaking point" due to potholes, with repairs at an eight-year high, according to a new report.
The Asphalt Industry Alliance (AIA) said councils were expected to fix two million potholes in the current financial year. That is up 43% on the previous year and the highest annual total since 2015-16. Ministers highlighted their pledge to provide £8.3bn of extra funding over 11 years for road improvements in England.
The AIA's annual report found that 47% of local road miles were rated as being in a good condition, with 36% adequate and 17% poor. The survey also found that average highway maintenance budgets increased by 2.3% in the 2023-24 financial year compared with the previous 12 months. But the impact of rising costs due to inflation meant local authorities "effectively experienced a real-terms cut".
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Now analysis of council budgets by Pixel Financial Management for the CCN finds that social care and children’s services account for 65% of LA spending, up from 57% in 2014. This ranges from 77% in Devon to 39% in Westminster. But only three councils, all in London, spend under half their budget on these two services.
Roger Gough, CCN spokesman for children’s services, said that councils were increasingly asking “what is left after spend for care services is factored in? These services are some of the most important we provide — they change peoples’ lives and they protect the most vulnerable in our society — but the fact remains they are not used by the majority of the population.”
He said: “With more than two thirds of the average county LA's budget now spent on just children’s services and adult social care, rising to three quarters in some areas, there is simply less and less each year for us to spend on highly valued services such as libraries, road repairs and street lighting.”
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Some coastal councils have warned of growing pressures on housing services due to a steep decline in landlords in the long term private rented sector. Hastings Borough Council has seen over 1,000 properties become Air BnB’s, with this pushing up rents in the long term rental market and forcing more households into temporary accommodation. Analysis by the LGA shows that the number of households living in temporary accommodation is the highest since records began in 1998, costing councils at least £1.74 billion in 2022/23
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The amount councils spent on placements at children’s homes has risen by 72% in five years, LGC analysis has found, but sector leaders claim the quality and quantity is not reflected in the price.
According to the Department for Education’s latest data, local authorities spent £2.5bn on residential placements last financial year, £1.1bn more than 2018-19. More than two-fifths of that increase occurred in the last year.
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Rishi Sunak is promising to create up to 20,000 more apprenticeships with a series of reforms including fully funding training for young people and cutting red tape for small businesses.
The government will pay the full cost of apprenticeships for people aged 21 or under at small firms from 1 April.
To enable this, it is pledging £60m of new investment for next year.
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From bin collections and street lighting to child protection and elderly care, councils provide services we all use, but in England more and more are in danger of going bust. BBC Panorama has followed the struggles of one such authority and the people who rely on it.
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Rishi Sunak has wasted tens of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money by chickening out of a May election.
The PM still refuses to say when he will go to the polls - but has ruled out holding a general election on May 2, the same day as local elections, as Labour did for every election when they were last in power. Doing so would save the country around £33.2m, according to the Mirror’s analysis of previous election costs.
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Schools are finding beds, providing showers for pupils and washing uniforms as child poverty spirals out of control, headteachers from across England have told the Observer.
School leaders said that as well as hunger they were now trying to mitigate exhaustion, with increasing numbers of children living in homes without enough beds or unable to sleep because they were cold. They warned that “desperate” poverty was driving problems with behaviour, persistent absence and mental health.
The head of a primary school in a deprived area in north-west England, speaking anonymously to avoid identifying vulnerable children, said: “We have a child who we put in the shower a couple of times a week.” He described the family’s bathroom as “disgusting” and said they couldn’t afford to buy cleaning products.
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Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer have been challenged to sign up to cross-party talks finally resolving the impasse over social care, as part of a Liberal Democrat plea to “grasp the nettle” after years of failure.
Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, said that his party would include in its forthcoming manifesto a promise to attend cross-party talks on social care after the election. He called on both the Tories and Labour to do the same in a bid to agree a financial package that helps the NHS and deals with the high costs some face.
“We’ve got lots of ideas to bring to the table,” Davey told the Observer. “But we’re only going to ultimately solve this if we have a cross-party consensus. It’s just been knocked out for far too long. We need to do it right this time. We cannot wait.
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The Prime Minister has ruled out holding a general election on the same day as local elections on 2 May. The Prime Minister told broadcasters it would be in the “second half” of the year.
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There are an estimated one million potholes on Britain’s roads and last year the AA received 632,000 callouts to vehicles damaged by road defects, a 16 per cent increase. Research by Halfords found that a quarter of motorists say their vehicle has been damaged by a pothole in the previous 12 months, causing an estimated £7.5 billion in damage. The LGA said central government spending on local road maintenance fell from £4 billion in 2006 to £2 billion in 2019.
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Fees for councils should be slashed if auditors are forced to give qualified opinions due to failing to meet the backstop deadline later this year, English councils have said.
Public Sector Audit Appointments has strong powers to impose variations to reduce fees for audit work that has not been carried out but said last week it was ‘not currently able to quantify fees’.
In a consultation response, the Local Government Association (LGA) called for ‘clear proposals’ to be brought forward.
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Ministers will today come under fresh pressure at a High Court hearing to enforce a mandated National Transfer Scheme (NTS) for asylum-seeking children.
The Home Office and Kent CC have been told to reveal improvements to the scheme after a High Court judge gave them until the end of last month.
Sources familiar with the High Court case said there was ‘little chance’ of a lasting solution being agreed this week.
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Local government employers will not make a pay offer until after the upcoming local elections in May.
They are consulting on trade unions’ 10% pay claim - which would increase the national pay bill by more than £1.94bn - throughout this month but are not expected to meet to discuss the results until April.
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South Cambridgeshire DC’s decision to continue with its four-day week is ‘disappointing and arrogant,’ local government minister Simon Hoare has said.
Hoare suggested the Government could legislate to stop councils adopting the practice after the Government said ‘financial levers’ would be used from 2025-26 to ‘disincentive’ councils from following South Cambridgeshire.
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The struggling adult social care system is set to benefit from a £20m boost, the Government announced today.
The Accelerating Reform Fund will expand community-based care models such as Shared Lives, a service that matches people aged 16 and above with approved carers.
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Council funding should have been reformed by now and structures need to be ‘rationalised’ the local government minister told the District Councils’ Network (DCN) conference.
Simon Hoare told delegates: ‘At some point, we are going to have to look at what the birds eye view of local government looks like from above.’
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The Government’s levelling up agenda has been characterised by ‘astonishing delays’ and blind optimism, according to Parliament’s spending watchdog.
The Public Accounts Committee has found that councils have only spent £1.24bn of the £10.47bn available to them to reduce inequality.
The PAC also discovered that by December 2023 only £3.7bn had been given to local authorities out of the total allocation by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC).
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Overhauling the charges for landfill waste could cut crime and costs for councils, according to a report by the Localis think-tank.
It argued that the current charging regime’s gap between standard levels of landfill tax at £102.10 per tonne for ‘active’ and lower levels at £3.25 per tonne for ‘inactive’ material, has led to an escalation of waste crime, in the form of illegal dumping and fly-tipping.
The report, ‘Cleaning up our act - reforming landfill tax for place resilience and best local outcomes’, claimed there are too many incentives for commercial waste operators to either mis-classify loads or simply dump material in rural areas.
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There was a rise in new outlets opened by UK chains last year, dominated by coffee drive-throughs, bubble tea shops and fast food restaurants, mostly located outside city centres.
But they were not enough to outweigh the places where chains shut up shop, new figures show.
High profile failures at Wilko, Lloyds pharmacy and Paperchase meant in total there were more closures than openings.
The result was a net decrease of 5,000 in stores across the UK.
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The period after most “fiscal events” ushers in a wave of disappointment. Last week’s budget is no exception.
Conservative MPs have realised that it will not transform the economy and their political prospects. Economists recognise that unreasonable assumptions about future policy flatter the public finances. And then there’s been the host of complaints from lobby groups, MPs, think tanks and trade bodies about all the wonderful policies the chancellor failed to deliver.
After the 2021 budget, I observed a growing trend of PR agencies and campaigners branding each overlooked budget policy as a “missed opportunity”. Since then, I’ve been collating these reactions. The sheer number of “missed opportunities” and the range of issues covered sheds light on the farce that budget days have become and the inflated hopes pinned on them as cure-alls for every social problem.
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Senior Conservative MPs are said to have warned the Prime Minister against a May general election, amid reports that some No 10 advisors are pushing to hold the poll alongside local elections on May 2. Downing Street insiders, however, insist the chances of a May poll remain “vanishingly small”.
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The UK economy picked up in January, boosted by stronger sales in shops and online and more construction activity. The Office for National Statistics said the services sector led the bounce back.
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Private care homes in England are being shut down at a rate that is 22 times higher than state-owned facilities, a study has found. The Care Quality Commission has closed 816 care homes between 2011-2023, of which 804 were for-profit facilities, according to an analysis of the CQC data by a team at Oxford, Michigan and Roskilde universities.
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Demand for adult social care services has reached an unprecedented high.
The King’s Fund’s annual social care report published today found adult care requests hit a record high of two million while costs for councils have outstripped inflation, with average weekly fees rising from £670 in 2015-16 to £840 in 2022-23.
It found the sector’s vacancy rate of 152,000 was its second-highest-ever level - despite the arrival of 70,000 overseas workers.
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The Office for Local Government (Oflog) should consolidate the financial results and position of local authorities on a monthly basis, accountants have suggested.
A submission to MPs by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) said Oflog was ‘handicapped by the lack of a monthly financial consolidation and the absence of an ability to mine monthly financial reports’.
It added introducing the change would bring local government in line with ‘basic practice in the private sector’.
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The average council tax rise for Welsh local authorities will be just over 8% next year.
Unlike counterparts in England, Wales’s 22 councils do not face a cap on increases and rises from April are set to range from 4.9% in Rhondda Cynon Taff to 12.5% in Pembrokeshire.
Pembrokeshire stepped back from imposing a proposed hike of 16.3%.
Deputy leader Paul Miller said: ‘We have listened to concerns from colleagues across the chamber regard the budget and the representations they have put forward on behalf of constituents.
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Council tax sits at the heart of the debate about the funding of local public services and the balance between the citizen, local democracy and central Government.
Since its introduction in 1993, it has remained unreformed, and while the Lyons inquiry findings may be almost 20 years old, they remain as relevant as ever.
Council tax holds a dual purpose – first as a local tax, and second, as a way to fund local government. But concerns persist about its perceived fairness – in terms of both the way it distributes the tax burden and the weight of spending pressures it has to support.
Both challenges have been exacerbated by the depth and duration of austerity and subsequent developments in the housing market. Prior to any reform of council tax, we need to be very clear about purpose.
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Local government has almost become immune to the news of financial failures as more and more councils struggle with budgets and warn of impending section 114 notices, and last week’s Budget offered no respite.
Even so, the startling news a fortnight ago that 19 authorities have been given capitalisation directions totalling £2.5bn was a stark reminder of how difficult it has become to balance the books.
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Social care services for adults ‘continue to stagnate’ due to a lack of government reform, the King’s Fund has concluded.
Its annual review of the sector confirmed another year of huge pressure, high staff vacancies and a lack of funding needed to improve provision.
The health think-tank confirmed the warnings from local authority leaders that the crippling costs of provision are increasing at a rate faster than budget provision.
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Social care is under ‘intense pressure’ and must be reformed after a record 2million adults asked for support last year, a report warns.
Local authorities have seen a surge in applications for publicly-funded care over the past decade but the number receiving it has actually fallen.
The Social Care 360 report, published by the King’s Fund think-tank, reveals thousands of people are being left to struggle without the support they need.
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Despite a £600 million package of support granted to local government before the Spring Budget by the Government, the LGA has warned that it is not enough to plug the funding gap that councils are facing over the next two years and making council tax rises ‘vital’. Cllr Peter Marland, Chair of LGA Resources Board, said: “Councils have led the way at finding ways to save money and reduce costs and this work will continue, but they will still need to raise Council Tax this year and many will need to make further savings to local services in order to plug remaining funding gaps.” This comes ahead of council tax rises in the new financial year, set to begin in 20 days, with 3 in 4 councils preparing to increase council tax by at least 4.99 per cent.
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An independent group of experts is preparing to pile pressure on ministers to back fiscal devolution, The MJ understands.
A number of key members of the Levelling Up Advisory Council’s London steering group, which last week met for the second time, are believed to be supportive of fiscal devolution.
One source close to the group said they would be lobbying for a ‘rewiring’ of local government finance, which was too grant-based, to provide a ‘much stronger incentive for growth’.
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A report has called for councils to get more resources to tackle the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS) backlog.
The report by the charity Age UK found the number of cases awaiting authorisation had remained at more than 100,000 since 2015-16 and was ‘so big it will probably never be eradicated’.
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Speaking during an interview on Sky News' Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips, the Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves said Labour will not bail out bankrupt councils and she is "not going to be able to fix all the problems straightaway.” She added that her focus was “on reforming the planning system to get Britain building again.”
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The population of young children is expected to fall by more than half a million by 2030, new analysis suggests. This is the equivalent of 17,000 primary school classes - or 1,800 primary schools. New data suggests the issue is also transferring to secondary schools with 4,000 fewer children applying for places this year.
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The amount spent by local authorities on promoting equality and diversity almost doubled in a three-year period, campaigners have revealed.
Research by the TaxPayers’ Alliance has found that spending on equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) roles rose from just over £12m in 2020/21 to almost £23m in 2022/23.
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Councils will face only a limited number of exemptions from new powers allowing them to levy higher taxes on empty homes, ministers have confirmed.
In what will be viewed as a positive step for the hard-up local authority sector, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) today revealed there will be few exceptions to the planned crackdown on long-term empty homes.
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Political editor Beth Rigby writes about the fallout from this week's Budget, and the impact on councils and local services. In a discussion on new Sky podcast Electoral Dysfunction, the recent LGA survey showing 1 in 5 council chief executives fear having to issue a section 114 in the next two years was referenced alongside the LGA warning that "severe pressures" remain on council budgets despite additional government funding for 2024/25.
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The Treasury has confirmed councils will no longer keep 100% of Right to Buy (RTB) receipts after the current financial year despite lobbying by the sector.
To help boost social housebuilding, the Treasury had announced a temporary two-year measure to allow councils to retain receipts in full until the end of 2023-24 - a policy thought to have raised up to £400m across local government.
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The local government minister Simon Hoare has "commended" the progress at four local authorities that have either been placed into statutory intervention or under independent review.
Sandwell MBC, Liverpool City Council, Thurrock Council and the Tees Valley CA were the subject of a written ministerial update this lunchtime.
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Warwickshire County Council has been given more powers over its funding in a devolution deal announced in the Budget. It was one of three county councils to be given more control over their funding announced by Jeremy Hunt yesterday. The Chancellor also announced £100 million of levelling up funding for areas to “support cultural projects in these communities”. The LGA said it was disappointed the Government had not announced “measures to adequately fund the local services people rely on every day”. LGA Chair Cllr Shaun Davies said: “It is unsustainable to expect them to keep doing more for less in the face of unprecedented cost and demand pressures.”
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Local people have been speaking of their experience living in areas which have issued a section 114 notice. Some of these councils have reportedly been struggling to provide some basic services, such as bin collections and street cleaning. A recent LGA survey of council chief executives found 85 per cent of local authorities continue to plan reductions in spending on key services, despite the Government making an extra £600 million available for 2024/25.
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Tax cuts announced in the Budget will not make up for the impact of tax increases and rising prices, a leading think tank has said. The Institute for Fiscal Studies said households would be worse off at the election, expected this year, than they were at the start of this parliament despite the Chancellor announcing a cut to National Insurance worth £10 billion.
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The chancellor has "kicked the real decisions" around local government finance "into the long grass" after yesterday's Budget failed to provide long-term solutions, say finance experts.
Sector leaders shared their frustration more about what was not included in the Budget that are impacting local government finance. The omission of proposals on net zero, adult social care and homelessness.
Chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy (Cipfa) Rob Whiteman accused the chancellor of using the Budget as "a political announcement rather than an economic budget event, doing little to help move the needle in boosting public sector productivity".
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The Government will use the Budget to urge councils to “do more for less” and reduce their spending on consultants and diversity schemes, it has been reported. Cllr Shaun Davies, Chair of the LGA, said this is a “distraction” in the debate around council funding. He added that councils have led the way in finding efficiencies but that many councils use consultants in order to bid for an increasing number of pots of government funding allocated through competitive bidding processes.
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The chancellor will seek to appease a raft of powerful critics in the last Budget before the general election.
Jeremy Hunt is expected to set out plans aimed at reducing tax that will appease backbenchers demanding cuts in personal taxation while meeting demands from the International Monetary Fund for the UK to focus on long-term stability.
It follows a weekend of negotiations between the chancellor and the prime minister – with the PM making clear he thinks there is room to put more cash in the public’s pockets.
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The government should avoid “prioritising politically driven tax cuts while decimating services” during Wednesday’s Budget, public sector unions have said.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has unveiled a Budget with little respite for local government but demands for increased public sector productivity.
As expected, he announced a further 2p cut to employee National Insurance to ‘make employment pay’, and pledged to continue to cut the tax when it was affordable.
Patrick Melia, Solace spokesperson for local government finance, said: ‘The Government has, once again, failed to properly address the extreme financial pressures facing local government.
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Funding for preventative services has been announced as part of the Budget in an attempt to relieve local government’s demand pressures.
In his speech, chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced £105m would go towards creating 15 new special free schools, with locations to be confirmed by May.
Another £45m of match funding will also be provided to local authorities to provide 200 open children’s home placements, alongside £120m for maintenance of the secure children’s home estate.
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The North East has secured a trailblazer devolution deal that could provide a package of new funding potentially worth more than £100m, chancellor Jeremy Hunt has announced in his Budget.
Hunt’s announcement comes ahead of the election in May of a mayor for the expanded North East region.
It comes after trailblazer deals with the West Midlands and Greater Manchester committed the Government to confirming a single financial settlement for the two regions in the next Spending Review.
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A scheme aimed at supporting the most vulnerable households will be extended for another six months, chancellor Jeremy Hunt has announced in the Budget.
The Household Support Fund, which has provided £2.5bn in Government funding for local welfare support over the past two-and-a-half years, was due to end at the end of this month.
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The Treasury's productivity drive ignores "real issues we are facing and instead makes misleading statements about councils’ spending," a senior council chief said following the Budget.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt today confirmed a "public sector productivity programme" that also includes funding for the NHS and the criminal justice sector, as well as local government.
Mr Hunt said: "Good public services need a strong economy. But a strong economy also needs good public services."
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Three counties are to get devolution deals, the North East has got a trailblazer deal and 20 more towns have joined the government's towns programme under plans announced by the chancellor this afternoon.
During the Budget speech chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced that Buckinghamshire Council, Warwickshire CC and Surrey CC would get level two devolution deals.
These areas had been in-line for level two, non-mayoral devolution deals for county areas that do not have a nearby unitary to combine with, which were announced at the Autumn Statement.
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The chancellor Jeremy Hunt has confirmed an additional £165m for local authorities towards the creation of 200 more children's social care placements to "combat profiteering" and strengthen "preventative action to reduce demand on public services".
Mr Hunt announced in the Budget today that the Treasury will match funding of up to £45m to build children's homes placements and an additional £120m to fund the maintenance of two secure homes in Devon and Hampshire.
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The chancellor has announced new reporting requirements designed to increase the amount council pension funds invest in the UK.
The move, announced in today’s Budget, ramps up pressure following previous action over past two years. In 2022, it set a target for the Local Government Pension Scheme in England and Wales to invest 5% of its assets in levelling up, and last year it added an aim for it to invest a further 10% in private equity.
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Chair of the LGA, Cllr Shaun Davies, spoke to BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme this morning about the financial challenges facing councils, as many are having to approve cuts to services to set balanced 2024/25 budgets. Ahead of this week’s Budget, Cllr Davies said: “We’ve been a lot doing more with a lot less and that is not sustainable going forward. The demand for services is at a record high, the cost of providing those services is at a record high. This is a systematic issue that the Government needs to address.”
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Health spending in England is due to suffer a 1.2 per cent cut – worth £2 billion – in the new financial year starting next month, according to an analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies. The health budget, almost all of which the NHS gets, is to go from £168.2 billion in 2023/24 to £166.2 billion in 2024-25, after adjustment for inflation, in 2022/23 prices.
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Proposals to reset the local audit system and clear the backlog of accounts could drive up the lending rates offered to the sector, councils have warned.
With almost all local authorities in England two years behind with their audited accounts, auditors are expected to issue a raft of qualified and disclaimed opinions later this year.
It comes after the Government proposed implementing a ‘backstop’ date of 30 September for the publication of audited accounts for all outstanding years up to 2022-23.
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It is ‘unrealistic’ to think the Office for Local Government (Oflog) will not pile fresh resource pressures on councils, finance experts have warned.
In written evidence to MPs, the Chartered Institute for Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) said there would be a cost to the sector that ‘should be kept to a minimum’.
CIPFA’s evidence urged Oflog to maximise its use of existing data - including local authority accounts and its financial resilience index - to avoid creating onerous data collection costs.
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A delay allocating government funding to safeguard the future of England’s leisure centres and swimming pools has left local authorities and pool operators confronting "difficult decisions" about the future of their facilities.
Only a third of the funds announced in last year’s Budget to keep leisure centres "afloat" has been distributed. The first tranche was allocated in November with nearly 200 leisure centres receiving a share of £20m in response to increased operating costs.
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The higher borrowing rate for authorities that have been granted in principle exceptional financial support has been compared to a "payday loan" and branded a "bit of a telling off" by affected council leaders.
All of the 19 local authorities that were granted exceptional financial support in principle for next financial year will face a 1% "premium" on any borrowing they undertake to fund capitalisation directions. Under the terms of EFS they must borrow from the Public Works Loan Board where the basic interest rate is currently just under 5.7%.
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The impact of Birmingham’s cuts on the arts and cultural sector is worrying – and not unique, writes the director of LSE London.
Spending cuts being made by Birmingham City Council include the end of support, by 2026, for the Birmingham Royal Ballet, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Birmingham Rep and other important arts organisations. The Hippodrome, another local icon, is in a better position, because West Midlands CA mayor Andy Street (Con) has recently provided resources for it to expand.
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The government’s short-term plan to address the funding crisis will only make places poorer, writes LGC editor Sarah Calkin.
It is hard to overstate the seriousness of the announcement on 29 February that 19 councils are set to receive exceptional financial support to balance the books next year. Many of them are also set to receive support to allow them to close their accounts for previous years, with the broken audit system meaning issues as far back as 2019-20 are only now being resolved.
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More than 160 councils have signed an LGA letter warning that thousands of vulnerable families are facing a cliff edge of support ahead of the end of the Household Support Fund. The fund will end in a few weeks, unless an extension is announced in the Budget this week. Cllr Shaun Davies, LGA Chair, said closing the fund risks more households falling into financial crisis, destitution, and homelessness. "That increases pressure on already overstretched public services such as the NHS, social care and temporary accommodation," he added.
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Figures have shown that 254 of the 314 councils in England charge to collect green waste. The LGA said: “It should be for individual councils with their residents to decide how to carry out waste collections locally and whether the costs of providing green waste collection should be met by all taxpayers or just those that use the additional service.”
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Improving public services ranks significantly higher in the list of voter priorities than the level of tax on earnings, according to a YouGov poll commissioned by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. It is reported that Jeremy Hunt is drafting plans for up to £9 billion worth of tax rises and spending reductions in next week’s Budget in an effort to pay for a potential 2p cut in National Insurance. In media interviews yesterday, the Chancellor appeared to rule out public service investment, instead arguing that efficiency gains can be found to improve the quality of services while freeing up cash for lower taxes.
[ more...]
The Budget will contain an £800 million package of technology reforms aimed at freeing up NHS and police time, the Treasury has announced, as Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said there was "too much waste in the system". Other key measures include £165 million to cut last year's local authority overspend of £670 million on children's social care places across England, by making 200 additional child social care places available, reducing the reliance on costly emergency places for children.
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Care companies are insisting on unnecessary and expensive support packages for vulnerable children to boost their profits, a council leader has claimed. Cllr Barry Lewis, the Conservative leader of Derbyshire County Council, said that former family-run businesses acquired by private equity groups were trying to get “as much cash as possible” out of local authorities.
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The Chancellor is to launch a £300 million tax raid on second-home owners who make money from holiday lets. He will reportedly abolish a series of tax perks for landlords who rent out their properties to short-term holidaymakers rather than long-term tenants, arguing it will help tackle the housing shortage in coastal areas and holiday hotspots.
[ more...]
Leading economists have warned that Jeremy Hunt will “cost the country dear” if he gambles on pre-election cuts to tax and spending in this week’s Budget. Former Treasury advisers Dimitri Zenghelis and Anna Valero, backed by other economists, said the Chancellor should focus on the long-term national interest with measures to spur investment and growth.
[ more...]
Major retailers including Danone have labelled the delay to the Government’s flagship recycling scheme as “disappointing”, as a three year delay is anticipated. The Government’s plan to give consumers cash to return recyclable bottles and cans is reported to have been halted by ministers until 2028, meaning the policy will have been under development for a decade.
[ more...]
Fewer than a fifth of projects backed by the Government's £3.6bn Towns Fund were on track to be completed by the end of February, freedom of information (FOI) requests have revealed.
[ more...]
Local government associations across the UK have taken the ‘unprecedented’ step of penning a joint letter to the chancellor with a plea for additional funding.
Ahead of this week’s Spring Budget, the associations have urged Jeremy Hunt to provide councils with extra cash to prevent cuts to essential services cut, manage an emerging housing crisis and stave off job cuts.
[ more...]
Changing workstyles are affecting organisational culture, staff wellbeing and value for money, says Martin Forbes, senior strategy director at Local Partnerships. Sponsored comment from Local Partnerships.
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The Treasury has announced an additional £165m to make an additional 200 children’s social care placements available as part of a productivity drive in the public sector.
With the chancellor Jeremy Hunt due to deliver the Budget on Wednesday the Treasury announced a raft of plans that it says will deliver £1.8bn in savings by 2029.
The Treasury pointed to a £670m overspend on children’s social care places and said it aims to reduce “local government reliance on costly emergency places for children”.
[ more...]
Three councils have told LGC they plan to use exceptional financial support for next financial year to plug the gap in funding for children’s services.
Last week, the government announced in principle support for 19 councils for 2024-25 which in principle is worth around £1.5bn to enable them to use capital receipts from asset sales or borrowing to fund day-to-day costs up to that amount. Stoke-on-Trent City Council, Medway Council and West Northamptonshire Council have said they plan to invest in children's services.
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Somerset Council is “rummaging through the attic” for assets to sell because “the family silver has already been sold”, after the government agreed in principle to its request for exceptional financial support, its leader has told LGC.
Less than a year after it came into existence the council declared a financial emergency due to a £100m gap and applied for capitalisation direction and permission to increase its council tax by 9.99%, above the referendum limit. The council tax request has been denied.
Bill Revans (Lib dem) told LGC: “The family silver has already been sold and we’re now rummaging through the attic looking for any old thing we can flog.”
[ more...]
The Chancellor and Prime Minister have been warned by the Office for Budget Responsibility that their draft proposals for next week’s Budget were £2 billion more expensive than allowed by the Government’s “headroom” – the amount of spare cash against a promise to get debt falling in five years. They have reportedly since been working to repackage the Budget, amid intense pressure for tax cuts which can drive economic growth.
[ more...]
Nearly two million people will be hit with higher tax bills in the next year if Jeremy Hunt does not take measures to ease the burden on workers in next week’s Budget, Conservative MPs and economists have warned. Senior Conservatives are among those putting pressure on the Chancellor to ease the burden on workers who face a “substantial” hit to wages as a result of fiscal drag – the stealth tax caused by frozen thresholds which do not keep up with inflation.
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Nineteen councils have been given exceptional financial support by the Government to help them manage increasingly levels budgetary pressure. The Government has given these councils capitalisation directions, giving them permission to use capital funds, often generated by selling assets, to top up spending on services. The LGA said the additional flexibility given to councils should not be a "substitute for a long-term plan to sufficiently fund local services".
[ more...]
More than two thirds (67 per cent) of councils warn that neighbourhood services, including waste collection, road repairs, libraries and leisure centres, are likely to see severe cutbacks due to funding shortages, an LGA survey of council chief executives has found. 85 per cent of councils report that, despite a £600 million funding increase from Government, they will still have to make cost savings to balance their 2024-25 budgets. Cllr Shaun Davies, Chair of the LGA said: “Acute funding pressures remain and are forcing many councils to make stark choices about what popular services to cut. Without further funding, cost and demand pressures will continue to stretch council budgets to the limit and lead to more of the cherished services our communities rely on every day from having to be drastically scaled back or lost altogether as councils are increasingly forced to do more with less.”
[ more...]
The Taxpayers Alliance and MPs are calling for all council officer salaries of more than £100,000 to be voted on and approved by councillors. Conservative MP Paul Birstow is introducing a Private Members Bill to make this law.
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The three unions representing local government staff have submitted a pay claim asking for "£3,000 or 10% whichever is higher" to the National Employers.
Unison, GMB and Unite who represent 1.4 million council and school staff in England, Wales and Northern say that a wage rise above inflation is the "only way" to maintain the staff levels necessary to deliver public services.
The unions added that council staff have seen 25% wiped from the value of their pay since 2010. The joint claim would apply from the start of April.
[ more...]
Wiltshire Council is in a strong financial position because of an approach to running the authority that combines preventative investment with taking a continual long-term view – and there could be lessons for others in local government to learn. Jason Holland spoke to council leader Richard Clewer.
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Two thirds of councils will see cutbacks to local services this year as a consequence of the growing financial pressures facing authorities.
That figure was revealed in a survey conducted by the Local Government Association (LGA), which also showed that 7 in 10 councils are using reserves to set a balanced budget in 2024/25.
[ more...]
More than half of English councils are likely to issue a section 114 notice within the next five years, according to a new report from the Local Government Information Unit (LGIU).
LGIU’s ‘The State of Local Government Finance in England 2024’ report, which anonymously surveyed council leaders, chief executives, chief finance officers and cabinet members for finance, has revealed the worrying statistic.
[ more...]
The exceptional financial support that was announced yesterday "fails to address the underfunding" of local government, according to the Nottingham City Council leader.
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More than half of councils in the north of England are at risk of ‘financial failure’ within the next five years, analysis has found.
Financial adviser Grant Thornton found 40% of councils face their reserves falling below 5% of their net revenue expenditure – described by the firm as ‘financial failure’ – within the next five years, rising to 55% of councils in the North.
[ more...]
The Local Government Association (LGA) has launched its ‘strengthened’ corporate peer challenge (CPC) to help neutralise the threat from Oflog.
However, the LGA has refused to name and shame the 10 councils that have still not committed to a date to have a CPC – 13 years after the programme was launched.
Chief executive of the Office for Local Government, Josh Goodman, has said councils failing to have a CPC for a ‘very long time’ would be a ‘clear warning sign’ but the watchdog has ‘no plans’ to publicly list councils that have not had one.
[ more...]
Shadow local government secretary Angela Rayner has promised to go ‘further and faster’ on devolution if elected to Government.
Speaking at the Convention of the North today, Rayner promised to be a ‘Deputy Prime Minister for the North’ and that the North would be 'in control of its own destiny’ should Labour clinch victory at the next General election later this year.
She reiterated her party’s proposals for a 'Take Back Control Act' to quicken the pace of devolution, and extend powers over skills, planning, housing and economic growth for combined authorities.
[ more...]
West Yorkshire, South Yorkshire and the Liverpool city region will all receive level four devolved powers, local government secretary Michael Gove has announced.
Speaking at the Convention of the North in Leeds today, Gove said the spread of devolution deals currently under way was the 'most profound change to the way England has been governed in generations’ and pledged a ‘power surge for the North’.
Greater Manchester and the West Midlands are the only combined authorities to have previously negotiated level four deals, which include a move to single pot financial settlements and retention of business rates.
[ more...]
Fines for parents taking children out of school without permission will rise across England from September.
The minimum fine will increase from £60 to £80 per parent as part of a government drive to return attendance to pre-pandemic levels.
One school told BBC News one out of every three of its pupils absent without permission had been on a family holiday during term time.
[ more...]
Nineteen cash-strapped English councils will be allowed to sell property and other assets to pay for services next year, the government has announced.
Councils are normally banned from selling assets to cover day-to-day spending.
But the government is relaxing the rules for authorities in deep financial trouble, including Birmingham and Nottingham.
[ more...]
The government is minded to grant Bradford MDC £220m in exceptional financial support for two financial years but also handed out a best value notice due to concerns around “financial resilience”.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (DLUHC) has approved the council’s application for the use of capitalisation direction, but told the met to set up an independent advisory panel to provide “assurance of improvement” over financial performance.
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LGA analysis found that the impact of statutory minimum wage rises and other cost pressures in social care have wiped out any new funds, and still leaves leaving a £2.4 billion gap this year and a £1.6 billion gap in 2024/25. This is alongside it getting harder for the public to access social care as backlogs grow and demand is pushed around the system.
[ more...]
Local government could be left to shoulder the burden of public sector cuts in a new age of austerity, experts have warned.
It is one of a handful of sectors that could be sacrificed in chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s pursuit of tax cuts in next week’s Budget.
In a new report this week, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) think-tank revealed commitments to health, schools, defence and overseas aid left a £20bn gap in funding for local government, further education, courts and prisons – ‘areas which bore the brunt of the cuts to public service spending in the 2010s’.
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The architect of legislation that introduced a new system for children with special educational needs and disabilities calls for new funding models
Councils need more funding in order to fulfil the “original ambition” of legislation reforming the system for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities, the former minister responsible for its introduction has told LGC.
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More than half of charities fear financial challenges in local government pose a threat to their own future, a survey carried out as part of a major new analysis has found.
New analysis, titled Tethered Fortunes, by the charity sector think tank Pro Bono Economics (PBE) found that between 2009-10 and 2020-21 local authorities funding for charities had fall by 23%, equating to a £13.2bn cut over that period.
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The Government has announced £220m for councils to prevent families from becoming homeless and provide support for people sleeping rough.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) said the funding was targeted towards the areas most in need.
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Councils across the North of England are almost twice as likely to fail financially within the next year as those in the South - according to an exclusive analysis for ITV News.
It reveals that 30% of northern Councils could be at risk of financial failure during the next 12 months - with 55% at risk within five years.
That compares to 17% in the first year for those in the South of England, rising to 35% within five years, according to the research by Grant Thornton, published a week before the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announces his latest budget.
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Victims and survivors of domestic abuse will be placed at risk if support services are cut due to the councils funding crisis, ministers have been warned. The domestic abuse commissioner for England and Wales, Nicole Jacobs, said that because local authorities were under no legal obligation to fund most such services, they faced being reduced or scrapped by councils facing acute financial pressures. Heather Kidd, Chair of the LGA’s Safer, Stronger Communities Board, said: “Ongoing funding pressures and competing demands are making it increasingly difficult for councils to ensure that victims have access to all the help they need. Only with long-term, reliable funding can councils help safeguard individuals and families from the physical and psychological harm caused by domestic abuse. Investment in the prevention and early intervention measures are needed to tackle the root causes, support more victims and stop domestic abuse occurring in the first place.”
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Jeremy Hunt is expected to use next week’s Budget to cut national insurance rather than income tax as he announces a new levy on vaping. The Chancellor has significantly scaled back his planned cuts after official forecasts suggested he will have much less money to spend than expected. The two main tax cuts expected in the Budget are a 1 percentage-point reduction in employee national insurance, at a cost of about £4.5 billion a year, and an extension of the fuel duty freeze at a cost of £1 billion a year.
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The Government should not cut taxes in the upcoming Budget, unless it can spell out how it will afford them, a leading think tank has warned. The Chancellor has hinted he would like to lower taxes in what could be the last Budget before a general election. But the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said the case for tax cuts was "weak". The Government said it would not comment on whether further cuts to tax would be "affordable in the Budget".
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An intense process used meetings with members, officers and external partners to explore seven broad lines of enquiry, writes the chief executive of Oxfordshire CC.
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A senior sector figure has expressed concerns about the Office for Local Government’s (Oflog) direction of travel.
Conservative Paul Bettison, a former member of the Oflog political leaders’ group and ex-chair of the Unitary Councils’ Network, said: ‘Right from the early stages we were conscious that if this was going to be accepted by everybody we didn’t want it to be the Audit Commission by another name.
'It’s amazing how much like it it’s started to look.’
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Almost three-quarters of schools in England are facing real-terms cuts since 2010 due to government funding decisions, analysis from a coalition of education unions suggests. New data released from School Cuts suggests before the Spring Budget next month that £12.2 billion of investment is needed to reverse the cuts 70 per cent of English state-funded schools have faced in the last 14 years. That would include funding to repair crumbling school buildings and tackle the crisis in special educational needs funding, the unions said.
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Britain’s stretched public services will buckle under the weight of the spending cuts being planned for after the election, economists have warned, as the Chancellor reportedly prepares for another round of tax reductions in next week’s Budget. Experts say the level of public sector spending pencilled in for the next parliament would mean cuts equivalent to those undertaken by David Cameron’s government from 2010 to 2015, with some warning the next government will not be able to implement them and be forced either to raise taxes or borrow more to fund emergency spending.
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The Government has outlined further details of how it would redirect funding from the cancelled northern legs of the HS2 rail line. Around £4.7 billion from cancelling the high-speed routes is due to be handed to councils outside big cities in the Midlands and northern England, with councils responsible for allocating funds to specific projects, in line with government guidance.
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The county of Norfolk contains some of the best stargazing spots in the UK and was one of the few places where it was possible to see the spectacle of the aurora borealis this winter, thanks to its dark skies unsullied by light pollution.
But the council’s attempts to plunge Norfolk roads into further darkness are being contested by groups worried about personal safety, particularly for women out alone.
The majority of councils across England and Wales have introduced measures to dim or cut street lights altogether over the past 15 years, some saving millions of pounds a year.
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Councils must still have the autonomy to run waste services according to local need under new packaging reforms, the Local Government Association (LGA) has said.
The Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) scheme, which will shift the cost of dealing with waste from councils to producers, is set to be introduced next year after being delayed from 2023.
[ more...]
Local government bodies have raised concerns about the Office for Local Government being “subject to political direction”.
In written evidence to the Commons’ levelling up, housing and communities committee’s inquiry into Oflog the Local Government Association said the lack of independence has “potential implications for public trust in Oflog”.
[ more...]
The chair and chief executive of Oflog were grilled for almost two hours by MPs on the Commons' levelling up committee yesterday.
But despite some startling admissions the experience did little to clear up the confusion over what Oflog is actually for.
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Public services provision is seen as a partnership effort by central and local government in Japan, Germany and Italy, writes a senior research analyst at the House of Commons Library.
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Two former Conservative Cabinet ministers have hit out at plans to wind up England’s 39 Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEP).
The Government is to transfer LEP functions to combined and local authorities from April after arguing there is more scope for efficiencies.
But writing in The MJ this week, former local government secretary Greg Clark said LEPs did ‘outstanding work in bringing businesses and other economic leaders like universities together with councils to improve the economic prospects of their areas’.
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The Department for Education has issued Hertfordshire CC with an improvement notice following a negative report that identified "widespread and/or systemic failings" across the provision for young people with special educational needs and disabilities (Send).
The council has been instructed to "improve" its local offer to address shortcomings outlined by the Ofsted and Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspection on 10 November 2023.
Concerns were raised over the variability of their provision, service gaps and delays, governance and quality assurance arrangements, the quality of their local data dashboard and the quality of educational, health and care plans (EHCP).
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South Cambridgeshire DC is proposing to continue its four-day working week beyond the trial period, without conducting a consultation locally because it needs to wait for the outcome of central government's review.
However, from April office-based staff will be expected to work 32 hours per week instead of 30, aligning them with those in waste management services.
The district started the trial in January 2023 for an initial three-month period, this was subsequently extended until March 2024 after independent analysis found it had been a success.
[ more...]
Civil servants have issued a last-minute invitation for councils to claim cash from a fund that has suffered from poor take up by local authorities.
Councils were last month given just two weeks to submit an expression of interest to claim ‘potential underspend’ from the £750m Local Authority Housing Fund (LAHF), which aims to help English local authorities obtain housing for those fleeing conflicts.
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Cutting taxes ahead of this year’s general election would only meet the government’s fiscal rule if some departments face a “fresh round of austerity”, which is unlikely given the state of public services, the Resolution Foundation has warned.
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The impact of ending the Household Support Fund would be ‘disastrous,’ urban councils have warned.
In a letter to chancellor Jeremy Hunt ahead of the Budget, chair of the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities, Sir Stephen Houghton, said ending the fund would have ‘harmful consequences’.
He wrote: ‘A failure to continue the fund will leave the communities our members serve facing hardship and will squeeze local authority budgets even further as demand for other services increase in the absence of support through the fund.’
[ more...]
Children’s services directors have raised concerns that Government policy does not prioritise children.
According to a paper from the Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS), the number of children living in destitution has risen threefold to 4.2 million since 2017.
The ADCS said the national system for children with special needs was ‘profoundly broken’.
[ more...]
The government removed funding totalling £538.8m from 16 projects that had been allocated grants from the housing infrastructure fund after deciding they were not deliverable.
These projects were intended to unlock over 42,000 homes.
A letter from Sarah Healey, permanent secretary of the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities to Clive Betts, chair of the levelling up committee, which was published yesterday confirmed the projects were deemed not “deliverable within the parameters of the programme or were withdrawn by the local authority”.
[ more...]
The Office for Local Government (Oflog) expects it will complete between four to six early warning conversations with councils that are at risk of failure next financial year, MPs were told yesterday.
Appearing before the Commons' levelling up, housing and communities committee yesterday, chief executive Josh Goodman and interim chair Amyas Morse told MPs Oflog plans to "improve" the early warning system for councils that may be at risk but are currently going unnoticed.
[ more...]
Birmingham City Council is proposing to increase council tax by 9.99% for 2024-25 and again in 2025-26 and seeking a capitalisation direction worth £1.2bn to address the budget deficit.
Documents published yesterday evening ahead of cabinet meeting next week set out planned savings worth £300m over two years alongside a request for £1.2bn of exceptional financial support.
New analysis shows “significant structural issues” with a budget deficit of £165m over two years. This is in addition to the equal pay liability worth £750m.
[ more...]
In response to ongoing funding pressures, 128 of 136 county councils will raise council taxes by UP TO 4.99 per cent in April, according to analysis by the County Councils Network. This analysis shows that at the same time last year, 75 per cent of councils planned to raise council tax by the maximum amount allowed as opposed to 95 per cent this year. The Independent reported a previous LGA survey of council leaders which found that nearly one in five said it is very or fairly likely they will need to issue a section 114 notice either this year or next.
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‘The Government must act now if local authorities are to survive the severe crisis and financial distress that they face.’
This is not a controversial opinion. In fact, it’s not even my opinion. These are the words of the cross-party Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee, quoted directly from their recent report ‘Financial distress in local authorities’.
As the leader of Somerset Council, I have been sharing our story which highlights the scale of the national crisis, and shows just how broken the model of funding local government is. It’s a national problem. It needs a national solution.
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The Government’s proposed timeline for implementing changes to tackle risky borrowing by some councils could end up pushing local authorities into section 114 territory, district treasurers have warned.
A Government consultation on local authority capital flexibilities closed last week – just weeks before the new financial year, when the changes are expected to be implemented.
[ more...]
The Office for Local Government’s data explorer will cover all the main services offered by the sector by the middle of next year, the watchdog has pledged.
The watchdog’s draft corporate plan also said it aimed to rationalise a ‘complex data landscape’ and its data explorer would offer a ‘considerably more exciting and insightful user experience than at present by mid-2025.
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Hertfordshire CC boss Owen Mapley will take over as Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) chief executive officer when Rob Whiteman retires, it has been announced.
Qualified chartered accountant Mr Mapley was Hertfordshire’s executive director of resources for three years, a finance director in the civil service and vice-chair of the Association of County Chief Executives.
CIPFA said there had been an ‘open and extensive recruitment process’ and Mr Mapley was the ‘outstanding choice’ among a ‘strong pool’ of candidates.
[ more...]
Cheshire East Council has become the latest council to approach the Government for ‘exceptional financial support’ in a bid to avoid a section 114 notice.
The council is to ask the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) for a capitalisation direction worth up to £17.6m across the 2023-24 and 2024-25 financial years.
Cheshire East cited the impact of inflation and high needs education spending as reasons for its financial plight, alongside £8.6m of abortive costs related to the now-cancelled leg of the HS2 rail link.
[ more...]
National figures show just under half of all education, health and care plan (EHCP) requests in England are completed within the Government’s 20-week target. The number of children and young people with EHCPs has risen from 240,000 in 2015 to 517,000 last year. Alongside calling for funding to help meet rising demand, Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People’s Board said: “Improving levels of mainstream inclusion is also crucial, reducing the reliance on costly special schools and other settings. Powers to intervene in schools not supporting children with SEND should be brought forward at the earliest opportunity but should sit with councils, not the DfE.”
[ more...]
Most councils have opted for the full council tax increase this year, but a handful of authorities are planning to increase rates by less than the maximum, LGC research has found.
Most councils this year have gone for the maximum rise permissible without a referendum. For upper tier areas this is 2.99% plus 2% social care precept, while for districts it is 3% or £5 whichever is higher.
However Rochdale MBC, Hartlepool BC, Tower Hamlets LBC, Stockton-on-Tees BC and Nottinghamshire CC have all proposed increases below the referendum cap.
[ more...]
The union representing council chiefs has demanded “the same” pay award for its members as others in local government, warning that chiefs’ pay has fallen in real terms by 40%.
In 2023 chiefs were offered a 3.5% pay rise, compared with a 3.88% for those at the top of the NJC pay scale. In 2022 those at the top of the JNC pay scale received around 4% while chiefs are estimated to have seen an average increase of 1.3%.
[ more...]
The "strategic remit" of the Office for Local Government (Oflog) for the next three years has been revealed in a letter by the communities secretary Michael Gove.
Mr Gove has set out the vision, purpose, strategic objectives and priorities of Oflog to the chief executive Josh Goodman, in correspondence published yesterday.
The strategic objectives for Oflog are to "inform" on the performance of local authorities, "warn" about councils at risk of failure that have "not raised the alarms themselves" and "support" local government to improve.
[ more...]
Three districts intend to freeze council tax for 2024-25, with one leader pledging not to increase costs for residents “until we absolutely must”.
Harlow BC, Fenland DC and Harborough DC have all announced that they plan to freeze council tax this year.
Most councils have gone for the maximum rise permissible without a referendum. For upper tier areas this is 2.99% plus 2% social care precept, while for districts it is 3% or £5 whichever is higher.
[ more...]
Second-home owners will have to seek planning permission for future short-term lets, the Government has announced.
A new mandatory national register will also give local authorities the information they need about short-term lets in their area.
Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Michael Gove said the move would help prevent a ‘hollowing out’ of communities and ensure local residents can access housing.
[ more...]
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has announced provisional investment allocations for the second Levelling Up Fund.
One of the programmes that has been selected for funding will be the Mid Cornwall Metro project, which will work to improve transport links in the county. Benefitting from almost £50 million of investment, four of the county’s largest urban areas will be connected through an hourly direct train service on an existing line, with two sections being improved.
[ more...]
Campaigners are urging the government to double maternity pay amid fears mothers are making "drastic" choices because they cannot afford to live on the current statutory weekly amount.
The amount should be increased to £364.70, according to trade union Unison and charity Maternity Action.
Both organisations say they are concerned some women are going back to work early and skipping meals under the current amount.
[ more...]
The LGA has warned that a failure to extend suicide prevention funding across England could have life or death consequences for people and is urging the Government to use the Spring Budget to extend funding for projects which it said provide “vital support” to those at-risk and the bereaved, as well as for awareness campaigns in local communities. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, said: “This suicide prevention funding has been a lifeline for many people. Without a commitment by the Government to extend this funding, these vital local schemes face an uncertain future which could have life or death consequences for those who rely on them.”
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Jeremy Hunt is said to have shelved plans for a 2p cut to income tax at next month’s Budget as it was revealed the economy has entered a recession. The Chancellor had been considering reducing the basic rate of income tax from 20 to 18 per cent and it is reported that he also considered reducing National Insurance employee contributions by two percentage points as an alternative
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People spending less, doctors' strikes and a fall in school attendance dragged the UK into recession at the end of last year, official figures show.
The economy shrank by a larger than expected 0.3% between October and December, after it had already contracted between July and September.
The UK is in recession if it fails to grow for two successive quarters.
The figures raise questions over whether Rishi Sunak has met his pledge made last January to grow the economy.
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A key fund at the heart of the government’s plans to clean up rivers has not been established 15 months after it was promised.
The water restoration fund was first pledged by Thérèse Coffey when she was environment secretary. She said it would redirect millions of pounds of raised from fines headed to the Treasury to pay to improve polluted waterways instead.
However, the fund does not exist, there is no timetable for its establishment and The Times can reveal that steering groups to establish it have not yet even met.
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District councils have warned that they face significant funding shortfalls in implementing the government’s plans to bring in weekly food waste collections from 2026.
Two thirds of councils expect not to hit the government’s deadline for introducing “simpler” recycling services.
The Simpler Recycling plan, published in October, includes plans to require councils to collect food waste on a weekly basis from 2026 – alongside the statutory collection of glass, metal, plastic, paper and card and garden waste.
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Essex CC will hold an inquiry into how it made payments of almost £500,000 to a local social media influencer during and after the covid pandemic.
The council’s leader Kevin Bentley (Con) admitted earlier this week that some circumstances around the payments made to comedian and campaigner Simon Harris had been “extremely regrettable and wrong”.
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Back in 2021, soon after the newly elected prime minister Boris Johnson vowed to “fix the crisis in social care once and for all”, the government proposed changes to the way that people pay for adult social care in England.
The current charging system has remained unchanged in principle for almost a century and has been criticised for its inequity, complexity, variability and unpredictability. It’s time for change.
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Councils have been told Whitehall will be unable to force them to submit productivity plans.
The MJ understands there will be no legal requirement for councils to comply with the requirement, with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) also yet to announce any penalties for missing the July deadline.
There are thought to be no plans for the Government to issue guidance other than they should be ‘short and draw on work councils have already done’.
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Planning authorities in England’s 20 largest cities and towns could be subject to "brownfield presumption" under new government proposals.
The proposals which were launched yesterday by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (DHLUC) were designed to boost building on brownfield sites by giving developers “more certainty” and ensuring that their plans were not “unnecessarily blocked or held up by red tape”.
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The UK's inflation rate remained unchanged in January, despite the first monthly fall in food prices in more than two years, official figures show.
Inflation, which measures how prices rise over time, was 4% last month.
The number surprised experts who had expected a rise in energy bills to push prices up at a faster rate.
However, the monthly drop in the price of food, including items such as crackers, cake and crisps helped offset the rise in electricity and gas costs.
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A bitter row has broken out between Suffolk CC and its districts over proposals to axe the county’s funding for housing-related support (HRS).
In a letter to district and borough councils, which have statutory responsibilities to provide accommodation to eligible people who are homeless, the county council warned the status quo of it being ‘expected to fund non-statutory services, which are then used by other councils to help them meet their own statutory priorities and needs’ could not continue.
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The LGA is proposing reforms to the Right to Buy scheme, ahead of next month’s Budget, in order to prevent the current net loss of much-needed social housing stock year on year currently being experienced by local authorities. The LGA said the main concern for councils is that rising discounts, alongside other measures that restrict councils use of Right to Buy receipts, mean that one household’s home ownership is increasingly being prioritised over another’s access to secure, safe, social housing. Cllr Darren Rodwell, Housing spokesperson for the LGA, said: “Whilst the Right to Buy can and has delivered home ownership for many, the current form does not work for local authorities and many of those most in need of housing support are simply unable to access secure, safe social housing.”
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Executive members of cash-strapped Nottingham City Council have refused to recommend a report that sets out £20m in budget cuts.
Council leader David Mellen said the majority Labour administration decided there was ‘little to recommend’ in a report that proposes cuts to library provision, the number of community protection officers and grants to the voluntary sector.
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Shadow local government secretary Angela Rayner has claimed Labour would treat councils with the ‘respect you deserve’ if the party wins the next General Election.
Addressing the Local Government Association Labour group’s annual conference yesterday, Rayner said Labour would boost council house building. The party also intends to devolve fresh powers over housing, planning, skills and transport to metro mayors and combined authorities.
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A rejected request to raise council tax above the referendum limit has left Somerset Council needing £17m more exceptional government support. The authority has said it is unable to balance its 2024-25 budget without £37m of financing flexibilities from the government.
The council asked to raise council tax by 10% (double the referendum limit, which is 5% including the social care precept) and for a £21m capitalisation direction, allowing the use of capital resources for revenue spending, rising to £38m if the tax request is rejected.
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Michael Gove has promised to prioritise homes for British citizens over foreign investors as he lobbies the Treasury to tax houses bought by foreigners.
The housing secretary said he is pressing “every day” for measures on housing affordability to be in next month’s budget, including a cut to stamp duty, state-backed 99 per cent mortgages and an extension of a discount scheme for first-time buyers.
Planning permission for homes will be automatically granted in urban areas that do not meet their housebuilding targets, while offices and shops will be able to be converted into housing more readily under plans to be announced this week.
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Councils across England are calling for a ban on pavement parking to ensure safer streets, according to a report. The study, commissioned by the Local Government Association (LGA), warns that vehicles parked on kerbs pose risks to wheelchair users, older people and parents with pushchairs.
The investigation revealed that some vehicles completely block pavements, forcing pedestrians to walk on the road. Pavement parking can also damage the surface, creating trip hazards and leading to expensive repairs, added the report by active travel charity Sustrans and disability rights organisation Transport for All.
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Cash-strapped local authorities across the UK took out massive 50-year loans at soaring rates of interest in the aftermath of Liz Truss’s catastrophic mini-budget, according to official figures that reveal more about the long-term cost to the public of her 49 days in office.
Figures from the government’s Debt Management Office show that after the budget on 23 September, 2022, announced by Truss’s chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng, 24 50-year loans of between £590,000 and £40m were taken out by councils at interest rates of up to 4.77 %, over the rest of that year.
During 2023, while rates remained high, a further 29 50-year loans, including one of £80m by Lambeth council at an interest rate of more than 5%, were taken out as local authorities remained under severe financial pressure.
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Local Authorities in England are facing the possibility of a deadline to publish overdue accounts before September. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has announced that it plans to bring in a “statutory backstop” in an effort to clear a high number of audit opinions by September 30. The Department said the backlog had reached an “unacceptable level”, which sat at over 700 at the end of 2023. In its report in June last year, the Public Accounts Committee noted that the market had been severely constrained, with fewer than 100 “key audit partners” registered to carry out the work across England.
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The Department for Education has said that all schools built with RAAC have responded to their survey and investigations into schools suspected of having RAAC have also now been completed. Of those confirmed to have RAAC concrete, 119 will be rebuilt or refurbished under the school rebuilding programme with a further 110 granted funds to remove the material. This comes as the National Audit Office revealed that 700,000 children are being taught in unsafe or ageing buildings.
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Productivity plans are “shallow” and risk over burdening local government, experts have told LGC, with one calling for the Local Government Association to “reflect” on its involvement.
On Monday the final local government settlement confirmed that in return for an additional £600m in funding councils would need to set out how they will “improve service performance and reduce wasteful expenditure” in productivity plans,
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MP for west Dorset Chris Loder (Con), who represents an "enormous county boundary" with Somerset, shared how his constituents were "looking with absolute horror" at the proposed tax rises at the unitary local authority during a Commons' debate yesterday.
Mr Loder also accused the Liberal Democrat administration of following a "mantra" to "raise taxes and cut services" after Somerset Council asked for permission to raise council tax by 9.99% to address a £100m "black hole". The government denied this request.
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MPs across the political divide urged ministers to "break out of the cycle" and work cross-party to reform local government finances in the Commons yesterday.
Throughout the debate on the local government finance settlement, politicians "of all colours" called for a more "strategic approach". The motion to approve the settlement was agreed.
[ more...]
More than 1.5 million pupils in England have special educational needs, with the number of applications for a child Education, Health and Care plan rising by almost a quarter, leading to an increase in waiting times. Almost half of children are reportedly waiting beyond the statutory 20-week timeline for councils to issue a plan. Speaking to Channel 4 News, LGA Senior Vice Chairman Cllr Kevin Bentley said: “It’s not acceptable but because of the number we’re having to deal with and not having always the resources to be able to pay for that, that’s why it happens. It’s not deliberate, it’s bigger than just ‘give me more money’, it’s a society issue that we need to sit down both as politicians, as residents, as parents and have that conversation.”
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Austerity cuts to the NHS, public health and social care in England have been linked with a sharp increase in frailty, in the first study of its kind. The coalition government’s austerity programme in the early 2010s is associated with steeper increases in frailty with age compared with the pre-austerity years between 2002 and 2010, according to a study led by the University of Edinburgh.
[ more...]
The Government has dropped a commitment to increase the amount of money that disabled people in England can claim to adapt their homes. The Disabled Facilities Grant is used to fund alterations aimed at easing living at home, such as installing wet-rooms or stairlifts. The LGA told a committee of MPs this week that £30,000 was "now insufficient for most major building work costs".
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Almost half of multi-academy trusts went into deficit last year, according to a financial health check on more than 2,300 schools in England. The benchmark report by Kreston UK, found that 47 per cent were running in-year deficits.
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‘Backstop’ dates designed to reset the local audit system could become a ‘permanent feature,’ the Government has admitted.
In a bid to slash the backlog, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) plans to introduce a deadline of September 30 to complete all outstanding audits – viewed as a bold and unprecedented proposal.
There would also be further backstop dates for the next five years, with the aim of ensuring backlogs do not reoccur.
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Councils have called for the cap on housing benefit subsidy that councils receive to be unfrozen amid warnings about the ‘spiralling increase’ in temporary accommodation (TA).
In a letter to chancellor Jeremy Hunt, District Councils’ Network (DCN) chairman, Sam Chapman-Allen lobbied for an increase in the subsidy rate that local authorities can claim for TA to 90% of market rent.
[ more...]
A senior sector figure has called for clarity and certainty about how much funding councils will receive when producers start paying to recycle packaging.
Chair of the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport’s waste group, Steve Palfrey, had called for authority-specific funding from Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) to be published by the end of last year so that councils could meet the Government’s timescales.
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Uncertainties over funding have forced councils to push back their budget-setting with the deadline looming.
Both Birmingham City Council and Isle of Wight Council have postponed meetings to confirm their budgets, while Eastbourne BC drew up four different funding scenarios as they awaited confirmation from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC).
[ more...]
Medway Council has asked the Government for an emergency loan to help the struggling local authority avoid being forced to declare effective bankruptcy.
The council, which is facing a £35.8m budget gap in 2024-25 and needs to find £12m for the current financial year, requested to borrow up to £14.6m in 2024-25 and a further £16.2m in 2025-26, and has also published proposals to increase parking charges and end a free swimming programme.
[ more...]
Staffordshire County Council is facing legal action after the triathlete Paul Hughes hit a pothole while cycling breaking multiple bones and damaging a lung.
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A government consultation has revealed huge contentions over plans to crack down on local authorities implementing four-day working weeks.
In the consultation over the provisional local government finance settlement for 2024-25, which was published in December, the government sought views from across the sector on the use of financial levers to disincentivise councils from "operating part time work for full time pay".
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In an opinion piece, Observer columnist Will Hutton references the LGA’s estimates that one in five councils risk issuing a section 114 notice over the next two years. He also quotes the cross-party Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee’s report from last week, which said the financial crisis in local government is now ‘out of control’.
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Labour is reportedly planning only limited first-term reforms of social care and a smaller green investment plan, as part of a stripped-down general election manifesto. Shadow cabinet ministers are said to have been given until 8 February to make policy submissions for the manifesto.
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New analysis ranks councils based on reports from residents sent to FixMyStreet, a website which sends maintenance requests to councils and publishes the response times. Reports are marked as “open”, meaning they have not been resolved, or “fixed”. An LGA spokesperson said: “Councils are working hard to try and tackle the £14 billion backlog of road repairs. Many factors affect repair rates, such as the road profile, traffic levels and available budgets. Councils would much prefer to focus on preventative repairs but only greater, year-on-year funding for maintaining all parts of our highways will help them achieve this.”
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Ministers have been warned that more families risk falling into poverty if a “lifeline” hardship fund used to help struggling households buy food and heat their homes is not extended. The LGA said the Government’s cost of living support provision, the Household Support Fund, is due to end on 31 March and had provided £820 million in funding for millions of households in England facing financial difficulties over the last year. Its own survey of members found more than eight out of 10 local authorities that responded said financial hardship had increased in their areas over the same period. LGA Economy and Resources Board Chair, Cllr Pete Marland, said: “The Household Support Fund has provided an essential lifeline for our most vulnerable residents, but our survey shows this help is needed now more than ever. Now is not the time to scale back support.”
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The retirement age will have to rise to 71 for middle-aged workers across the UK, according to research from the International Longevity Centre. The UK pension age of 66 is set to rise to 67 between May 2026 and March 2028. From 2044, it is expected to rise to 68. But the research suggests that this is not enough, and that anyone born after April 1970 may have to work until they are 71 before claiming their pension.
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Citizens Advice and Age UK have warned of the ‘devastating impact’ of the financial pressures on councils. The charities have said that a number of councils have reduced grant funding to services run by the voluntary sector in attempt to prioritise spending on statutory services.
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Local government should adopt a national branding campaign to recruit and retain staff amid a worsening workforce crisis, the County Councils’ Network has urged.
A comprehensive study of council workforces by CCN, carried out by consultancy PwC and published today, concluded staffing capacity was ‘one of the biggest challenges facing local government in England, worsened by over a decade of funding challenges and exacerbated in recent years by post-pandemic trends’.
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Somerset Council has set out plans to cut its workforce by up to 25% in a bid to close its £100m funding gap.
The Liberal Democrat executive will consider a "workforce transformation" plan on Wednesday that would open up voluntary redundancy scheme later this month and potentially save £40m from their payroll bill.
The plan outlines their hope to "move away from silo working" and "maximise the opportunity of bringing together the five predecessor councils and meet the financial challenge".
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Heightened council tax referendum limits for Thurrock Council, Woking BC, Slough BC and Birmingham City Council have been confirmed in today's local government finance settlement.
Thurrock, Working and Slough now have permission to increase their rates by up to 10%, for the social care authorities this comprises of 2% for adult social care and 8% for the rest.
However, Somerset Council's request for a 9.99% increase was not listed in this announcement.
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The government is offering £1,000 to new childcare staff amid concerns about the rollout of free childcare hours in just two months' time.
Nurseries and childminders say they are experiencing a recruitment and funding crisis which could derail plans to offer 15 subsidised hours a week to all two-year-olds in England.
Thousands of parents who have applied for the funding are thought to be in limbo as their provider hasn't been told what rate they will get for each of these hours from the local authority.
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A file relating to allegedly unlawful exit payments to managers at Northumberland County Council has been handed to police, Northumbria Police has confirmed.
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Analysis has uncovered an almost £500m reduction in councils’ spending on libraries, culture, heritage and tourism since the onset of austerity.
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The government is under pressure over the future of a "vital" fund that councils have been using to support thousands of families during the cost of living crisis.
The "targeted and impactful support" local authorities provide through the Household Support Fund (HSF) is due to end in March, with no renewal nor any other future government grants yet to be announced.
Council leaders across the country have written to ministers calling for the fund to continue or for a new scheme that would address the challenges their residents are facing.
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The financial crisis facing England's councils is "out of control" with even well-run local authorities at risk of going bust, MPs have warned.
A cross-party committee said the government must plug a £4bn funding gap to avoid a "severe impact" on services.
They also called for council tax to be reformed, describing the current system as "outdated" and "regressive".
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Transport spokesperson for the LGA, Cllr Linda Taylor, was interviewed live on BBC Radio 4’s You and Yours programme about the redistribution of funds from the cancellation of the northern leg of HS2, to repair and resurface local roads. Cllr Taylor said: “We’ve had over £300 million for this year and next, but the bulk of the money which is £8 billion is going to be available from 2025/26. So we know what’s going to be happening for this year and next, but we do need to be able to have that assurance about financial commitments from the Treasury for at least the next five years.”
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Jeremy Hunt has said there is likely to be less scope for tax cuts in the March Budget than there was last autumn. The Chancellor said he wanted to “lighten the tax burden” to help grow the economy, but he said this had to be done in a “responsible” way.
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The current funding system is “broken” and the next government should consider options such as replacing council tax with a land value levy and devolving a share of central taxes to authorities, a Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee report said.
[ more...]
Government response to the Levelling Up, Housing and
Communities Select Committee report on Council Tax Collection
[ more...]
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities is consulting on a law that will impose a nationwide salary threshold for new social housing tenants. As part of the plans, the Government said those who commit anti-social behaviour should face a ban of up to five years under the proposals. People with the closest connections to the UK and their local areas would also receive priority for social housing. Cllr Darren Rodwell, LGA housing spokesperson, said: “The vast majority of social housing lettings go to UK nationals, and many councils already have policies relating to anti-social behaviour, criminal behaviour, rent arrears and income thresholds in their allocation policies.” Cllr Rodwell said the LGA is concerned that “restricting eligibility criteria for social housing” could result in a rise in homelessness.
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Analysis of local government finances shows that, between 2010/11 and 2022/23, net spending per person by councils on cultural services was cut by 43 per cent in real terms, on roads and transport spending by 40 per cent, on housing by 35 per cent and on planning and development by a third. This is a result of growing demand for social care and homelessness support. Core spending power available to councils after the recently announced extra £600m uplift will still be 10 per cent lower than in 2010/11, it is reported.
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Under plans being considered by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, councils would be given greater flexibility to use money raised from asset sales to meet their budget pressures. The Government said the consultation – which closes today – aims to encourage the sale of assets held only for revenue, and not buildings or places used for the “delivering of the objectives of the local authority”.
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Debt-ridden Thurrock Council could lose money on investment made in a solar energy company to which it lent more than £650m, it has emerged.
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The government is considering allowing local authorities more freedom to use capital resources to reduce the pressure on their revenue budgets amid dire warnings over the sector’s sustainability, but caution is needed, Nicole Wood, president of the Society of County Treasurers, told PF.
[ more...]
The Government has been accused of ‘micromanagement’ of council finances with the launch of new productivity measures.
Alongside the announcement of a £600m boost to the local government finance settlement, new demands for productivity plans and a clampdown on equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) programmes by local government secretary Michael Gove have sparked alarm.
Councils will be required to submit productivity plans to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) by the summer recess in July, detailing how they will ‘improve service performance and reduce wasteful expenditure’.
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People in Yeovil and Taunton will have to pay nearly two or three times as much council tax from April.
Both town councils approved their annual budget on Tuesday, which included setting their portion of the council tax bill paid by residents.
A Band D home in Taunton will pay an extra £192 a year. A similar household in Yeovil will pay an extra £130.
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Government officials have told councils they expect the maximum possible 4.99 per cent increase in council tax in April, it is reported. Local government leaders and experts have warned that raising council tax is not the answer to the financial pressures facing councils, raising different amounts in different parts of the country.
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Councils are facing growing challenges to provide social care services, including respite care, due to a lack of funding to meet rising demand. Speaking to Channel 4, LGA Community Wellbeing Board Chairman Cllr David Fothergill said that services remain at “crisis point”.
[ more...]
The details of productivity plans that councils will need to produce “haven’t been designed yet”, the director general for local government revealed yesterday.
In a written statement last week, communities secretary Michael Gove announced that local authorities will need to set out how they will “improve service performance and reduce wasteful expenditure” in productivity plans as part of an additional £500m in funding for 2024-25 that social care authorities will share.
[ more...]
Durham County Council will consider seeking a judicial review into how the Government allocated levelling up funding after the authority spent £1.2m on failed bids.
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Isle of Wight Council has insisted it borrows to invest in essential projects after revealing its debt amounts to 42% of the authority’s annual budget.
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An education system divided between academies and council-maintained schools has become ‘undesirable and unsustainable’, according to an education think tank.
A new report from EDSK says that operating two parallel systems with different approaches to funding, curricula, governance, admissions, and oversight has created a ‘fragmented and confusing’ school system.
[ more...]
MPs have been left ‘disturbed’ by the state of the local government audit system, top officials have been told.
The Levelling up, Housing and Communities Committee questioned senior mandarins on plans to reset local audit.
Committee member Mary Robinson, said they had been ‘disturbed’ by the extent of the backlog and late completions.
Director general for local government at the Department for Levelling up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC), Catherine Frances, revealed that consultation on setting a 30 September ‘backstop’ to complete outstanding audits would take place in early February.
[ more...]
South Cambridgeshire DC’s controversial four-day week trial is under fresh scrutiny after data revealed a spike in agency work and opponents challenged costs.
The district was issued with a best value notice by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities in November 2023, amid concerns that giving staff an extra day off weekly could become costly.
Data supplied to DLUHC indicates that, in November, South Cambs spent significantly more on agency workers across two departments – finance and waste – than normal. However, other departments have reduced agency use, and a council spokesperson said the district could still halve its total bill for agency staff.
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The government’s mooted solution to the local audit crisis needs to work, or the Whole of Government Accounts risks being stuck in poor quality for several years, a group of MPs has warned.
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Shadow levelling up secretary Angela Rayner has avoided committing Labour to providing local government with additional funding if the party wins the impending General Election.
In an interview with The Guardian, she branded the Government’s £600m boost to the Local Government Funding Settlement a ‘sticking plaster’ which was ‘cynically’ only aimed at getting the Conservatives through the election.
[ more...]
A better-than-expected outlook for public finances is likely to give chancellor Jeremy Hunt headroom for tax cuts ahead of the general election, an economist has said.
[ more...]
Nottingham City Council has requested £65m of exceptional government support to balance its budgets in 2023-24 and 2024-25.
[ more...]
Work should begin now on the ‘long-overdue’ revaluation of all domestic properties in England to bolster local government finance, a think-tank has argued.
[ more...]
The Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has appointed Adam Hawksbee as interim Chair for the new high-powered Towns Unit to ensure the voices of UK towns are heard loud and clear across government and that vital regeneration comes to life.
Adam, Deputy Director of the think tank Onward, will help deliver the government’s Long-Term Plan for Towns, backed by £1.1 billion overall, to regenerate 55 towns around the country so people can feel proud of the place they call home.
[ more...]
A £600m boost to the Local Government Finance Settlement has been welcomed, but has not resolved the sector’s funding issues, the Government has been warned.
The bulk of the extra funding announced today by levelling up secretary Michael Gove is accounted for by £500m being added to the social care grant.
It was a key demand of the County Councils Network, which led a campaign that saw 46 MPs, including a host of former minister, signing a letter calling for increased funding.
[ more...]
A senior local government figure has struck back at Government efforts to curb the adoption of a four-day working week by councils.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC)’s intention to use ‘financial levers’ to ‘disincentivise’ councils has been described as a ‘slippery slope’ by ALACE honorary secretary and Wyre Forest DC chief executive Ian Miller.
[ more...]
The Government is to clampdown on diversity programmes as part of a drive to ‘reduce wasteful expenditure’.
Councils will be required to submit ‘productivity plans’ to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) setting out how they will ‘improve service performance and reduce wasteful expenditure’.
In a ministerial statement, local government secretary Michael Gove said: ‘I encourage local authorities to consider whether expenditure on discredited equality, diversity and inclusion programmes meets this objective.’
[ more...]
The Government has announced details of a new devolution deal for Devon CC and Torbay Council.
If agreed, after a consultation with residents, the move will create a new Devon and Torbay Combined County Authority (CCA).
The new body will receive £14.8m from the Shared Prosperity Fund over three years, as well as £16m in new capital funding to support housing and net zero priorities; and will have greater collaboration with Homes England to ‘reduce the barriers to affordable housing delivery’.
[ more...]
MPs have been angered by the timing of the Government’s announcement of extra funding for social care.
A ministerial statement revealing councils would receive an additional £500m for adult social care was released while the Public Accounts Committee was holding an evidence session on the subject yesterday afternoon.
Committee chair, Dame Meg Hillier, said the committee would be seeking answers on the timing of the announcement.
[ more...]
Ahead of the roll-out of the expansion to free early education entitlements, local authorities across England have warned there may not be enough childcare places to meet demand.
From April eligible parents of two-year-olds will be offered 15 free hours per week of free childcare. In September, this will be available for children from nine months until the start school.
[ more...]
A new requirement for councils to produce productivity plans shows “central government doesn’t trust local government," the chair of the Special Interest Group of Metropolitan Authorities has warned.
The government today announced an extra £600m for local government, but in a written statement announcing the funding communities secretary Michael Gove also said local authorities will need to set out how they will “improve service performance and reduce wasteful expenditure” in productivity plans, to be submitted before the summer recess.
[ more...]
Leigh Whitehouse has been nominated as the interim chief executive of Surrey CC.
If approved at the full council meeting on 6 February, Mr Whitehouse would be stepping in for Joanna Killian, who has taken up the post of chief executive of the Local Government Association, from March.
[ more...]
The government is expected to announce an extra £500m in funding for social care as part of the 2024-25 local government finance settlement later today, LGC has been told.
This comes days after 46 MPs wrote to the prime minister Rishi Sunak urging for extra funding to be found, in a campaign led by the County Councils Network and the counties all party parliamentary group.
LGC understands that following this letter chair of the APPG and county council leader Ben Bradley (Con) among others have been in talks with senior ministers to negotiate these extra funds.
It is expected that around £500m will be designated to social care authorities to be spent on adults and children's services while districts will see an increase in their funding guarantee from 3% to 4% which will equate to around £40m
[ more...]
Residents in Birmingham are trying to preserve landmarks and public buildings as fears grow that assets will be sold off to balance their books, with historic buildings, libraries, parks, entertainment venues, car parks and community centres all in consideration. The LGA has previously warned that councils face a funding gap of £4bn over the two years and LGA Chair Cllr Shaun Davies told Sky News that: "No council is immune to the growing risk to their financial sustainability and many now face the prospect of being unable to meet their legal duty to set a balanced budget and having Section 114 reports issued. It is therefore unthinkable that the government has not provided desperately needed new funding for local services in 2024-25. Although councils are working hard to reduce costs where possible, this means the local services our communities rely on every day are now exposed to further cuts.”
[ more...]
A Freedom of Information request to 280 councils has found that between April and October 2023 and the same period in 2022, there had been a rise of 20 per cent in occasions that bailiffs were used to recover council debts. Debts can include council tax, parking fines, housing arrears and unpaid business rates among other unpaid fees.
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Almost 30 councils are planning to make use of new powers to increase council tax on second homes in a move which is expected to collectively raise £100m in additional income, LGC research has found.
As part of measures in the Levelling Up & Regeneration Act 2023 councils are able to charge a council tax premium of up to 100% for any property left empty for more than 72 days a year.
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Dozens of MPs, including more than 40 Tories, have written to the PM demanding extra funding for councils in England to avoid big cuts to services.
Several former cabinet ministers are among those who have signed the letter.
The group say they are "exceptionally concerned" at the measures many local authorities are planning as they try to avoid going bust, including raising council tax and cutting services.
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Schools in urgent need of repair have told BBC Panorama they are struggling to keep children warm in buildings that are “not fit for purpose”. The Government's own figures show the average primary in England needs £300,000 worth of maintenance or upgrades, while the average secondary school needs an estimated £1.5 million.
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The LGA’s survey which found nearly one in five councils have warned they could issue a section 114 notice over the next year was reported on BBC Radio 4’s The Briefing Room, in a discussion about the financial pressures facing local government . Recently released figures show councils across the UK are nearly £100 billion in debt.
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The Chancellor says he wants to cut taxes at the spring budget this year, declaring that doing so will be the quickest route to getting the economy growing again. Jeremy Hunt said that while he has yet to see the fiscal numbers ahead of the March event, he is hopeful of reducing taxes.
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An above-inflation increase in council spending power for 2024-25 shows “the government stands behind councils”, levelling up secretary Michael Gove has insisted despite warnings from the sector that it faces a financial crisis.
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Oxfordshire County Council has published proposals to save over £9.8m but is still £900,000 short of what is required for a balanced budget.
The council was facing a budget shortfall of £9.1m but this increased to £11.2m in December when it became clear that grant funding from Government was not as much as anticipated.
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A number of councils have applied to the government for “exceptional financial support”, seeking a capitalization direction that allows them to fund day-to-day spending from their capital resources, including borrowing and asset sales. It is reported that the Department for Levelling Up expects only a small number of councils to issue a Section 114 notice, they do expect more to “go down the EFS route”, according to department sources. A survey by the LGA found that one in five councils believe they are fairly or very likely to issue a Section 114 notice this year or next.
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The Adam Smith Institute think-tank has suggested public funding should not be spent servicing local government pensions when local services are facing cutbacks. Of the 10 councils that have been subject to a Section 114 notice, it is reported that seven are part of a pension scheme that recorded a surplus of assets as of the end of March 2022. One is enrolled in a scheme that was fully funded while only two reported a deficit. The LGA said that pensions are a statutory duty, are legally guaranteed and must be paid. It added that councils had been forced to find savings through redundancies or hold vacant posts open, which reduces councils’ pension payments.
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An inadequate funding settlement means councils face “serious challenges” including further cuts to balance their 2024-25 budgets, the Local Government Association has said.
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The next Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman has been confirmed as Amerdeep Somal by Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove following a rigorous selection process.
Ms Somal will start in post on 1st February 2024, bringing with her a wealth of experience having previously served as the Complaints Commissioner to the Financial Regulators and Chief Commissioner at the Data and Marketing Commission.
She has also been appointed as Chair of the Commission for Local Administration in England, the official body which runs the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman service.
The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman investigates complaints from members of the public about local councils and social care providers. The Ombudsman is appointed by His Majesty the King on the advice of the Secretary of State, and the Ombudsman’s investigations are independent of central government.
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An MP has called for “billions” to be unlocked from section 106 payments to top up funding for levelling up projects.
Earlier this week the Commons’ public accounts committee took evidence from senior officials from the Department of Levelling Up, Housing & Communities on levelling up funding for local governments, reports Sarah Kennelly.
During the meeting Mark Francois (Con), MP for Rayleigh and Wickford, claimed that Essex CC has “£140m of section 106 commitments that have not yet been spent”.
Mr Francois suggested that if this was replicated across England and Wales “you're now talking about several billion pounds of resource yet to be deployed”.
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Middlesbrough Council is applying for exceptional financial support of up to £15m over three years.
Yesterday the council's executive board unanimously approved plans to launch negotiations for emergency funding support with the Department of Levelling Up, Housing & Communities.
According to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, the council's executive member for finance, Nicky Walker (Lab) told the meeting that this is "a move by which we seek to avoid a section 114 notice".
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Millions of pounds of funding into social care last year is said to have made no difference to the financial sustainability of the majority of providers, according to a snapshot report by learning disability charity Hft and Care England. Cllr David Fothergill, Chair of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, said: “This concerning report shows the multitude of pressures care providers are facing due to lack of financial support.”
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The annual rate of inflation has surprisingly risen, official figures show. The consumer price index measure of inflation stood at 4 per cent in the year to December, according to the Office for National Statistics. A fall, to 3.8 per cent, had been expected by economists polled by Reuters. But instead inflation rose from 3.9 per cent in the 12 months to November.
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Appetite for government intervention to reduce the use of packaging, either through taxes or bans, is lower among MPs than with the public, new research has found.
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The election of the first mayor of a new York and North Yorkshire Combined Authority is set to cost £2.2m, a council report has revealed.
At a meeting on 22 January, a committee overseeing the formation of the new combined authority will consider its first budget, which covers a 15-month period from January 2024 to March 2025.
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Social care cuts risk being made ways that risk “removing someone’s right to dignity, choice and control”, a campaign group has told LGC.
Many councils are looking to reduce their spending in adult care services, in a bid to close a £4bn sector-wide budget gap, writes Sarah Kennelly.
In some places this could entail further restrictions on the type of support offered, care home closures and fee increases.
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IMPOWER has announced the appointment of Mark Lloyd as an executive director.
Lloyd, former chief executive of the Local Government Association (LGA), will take up the role later this month.
Lloyd said: ‘I’m a long-time admirer of IMPOWER, having known and worked with colleagues over the years.
‘I am excited about the prospect of working with a dynamic consultancy that is focused on delivering better outcomes that cost less.’
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Distancing the sector from the most serious failures would allow a clearer focus on the struggles of the majority of councils, writes LGC editor Sarah Calkin.
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Cornwall Council is to debate a motion calling for greater protection for elected members against harassment, abuse and intimidation.
The motion, called Defending Democracy, has been submitted for debate by Thalia Marrington and seconded by Karen Glasson.
The motion also points out that the abuse of councillors, especially females, has increased nationally.
It will be discussed on Tuesday at the council's first full meeting of 2024.
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The debt mountain at UK councils has reached staggering levels, posing a risk to local services, the Public Accounts Committee has said.
BBC analysis shows UK councils owe a combined £97.8bn to lenders, equivalent to £1,100 per person, as of September.
Committee chair Meg Hillier warned of an "extreme and long-lasting effect" if more councils go bust.
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Four in 10 councils are at risk of issuing a Section 114 notice over next five years according to analysis from Grant Thornton. The analysis found that in 2025, 25 per cent of councils will have cash reserves of less than 5 per cent of their annual budget, climbing to 40 per cent over the next five years. LGA research has found that half of council leaders were not confident they will have enough funding to fulfil their legal duties in 2024/25. Cllr Shaun Davies, LGA Chair, said: “It is unthinkable that the Government has not provided desperately needed new funding for local services in 2024/25. It urgently needs to address the growing financial crisis facing councils.”
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Almost 630,000 potholes were reported to councils in England, Scotland and Wales between January and November 2023 according to FOI requests from campaign group Round Our Way which it claims is a new five year high. Cllr Darren Rodwell, transport spokesperson for the LGA said: “Councils share the concerns of all road users with the state of our roads and are doing all they can to tackle the £14 billion backlog of road repairs, including learning from and adopting innovative techniques. Greater, long-term and year-on-year consistency of funding for the maintenance of all parts of our highways will help them achieve this.”
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Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council has warned that it could in effect become insolvent because of the deficits it has accumulated on special education needs. The Government has confirmed that the statutory override on dedicated school grant budget deficits will continue until March 2026 but the LGA said councils need longer-term certainty. It said: “We continue to call for the Government to write off all high-needs deficits as a matter of urgency to provide certainty and ensure that councils are not faced with having to cut other services to balance budgets through no fault of their own or their residents.”
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Pothole-related breakdowns reached a five-year high in 2023, new figures show.
The AA said it received 632,000 call outs to vehicles damaged by road defects last year.
That is a 16% increase compared with the previous 12 months, and is the most since 666,000 in 2018 when many roads were damaged by prolonged extreme cold weather from the so-called Beast from the East.
Common vehicle problems caused by potholes include punctures, distorted wheels, damaged shock absorbers and broken suspension springs.
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A council has warned that it could in effect become insolvent this year because of the huge financial deficits it has racked up on special education needs, in the latest development in the local government funding crisis.
Most councils in England have overspent their budgets on special education needs and disabilities (Send) since 2015, when the government extended the age range of young people who qualify for Send support without providing councils with the necessary funding. These deficits have fed into councils’ overall education budgets – known as the dedicated schools grant (DSG).
Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP) council has accumulated a combined deficit of around £60m on its DSG budget in recent years and says it cannot eradicate it without making unacceptable cuts to Send services and mainstream school budgets. Moreover, a recent BCP council report warned that its financial solvency is at imminent risk because of government accountancy rules.
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Households in Birmingham face a 21 per cent rise in council tax, adding £350 to average bills. Birmingham City Council has asked Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove for permission to increase charges by up to 10 per cent in April and up to 10 per cent the year after. If he agrees, the increases of 10 per cent each year for two financial years could add up to a potential 21 per cent overall increase by April 2025. Birmingham, which issued a section 114 notice in September, will set out its final council tax plans next month. The LGA has warned that one in six councils is at risk of issuing a section 114 over the next two years.
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The UK's economy rebounded in November after shrinking during the previous month, according to official figures. The economy grew by 0.3 per cent in the month, which was stronger than expected and came after a contraction in October.
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Councils have begun 2024 by urgently lobbying Whitehall over extra financial support amid widespread concern the provisional finance settlement falls far short of what’s needed.
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The leader of North Northamptonshire Council has banned all but essential spending in an urgent bid to solve the authority’s budget pressures.
Cllr Jason Smithers has warned the council needs to ‘take immediate action' to rein in its spending.
In an email to all council staff, Cllr Smithers said that despite ‘efficiency measures’ being worked on, ‘further robust action’ was now needed ‘immediately’ to reduce spending and balance the budget.
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Cash-strapped Thurrock Council has pledged residents will not face a 10% council tax rise – but still needs to confirm how much extra they must pay.
Councillors met this week to discuss a range of budget saving measures. They approved £11.3m of proposed savings for 2024/5, whilst a further £6.9m savings are still out to consultation or need further development.
Areas facing cuts include moving from weekly to alternate week kerbside recycling collections, and a restructuring of children’s social care.
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Middlesbrough Council is set to ask the Government for Exceptional Financial Support (EFS) as it battles to achieve a balanced budget for 2024-25 and avoid issuing a section 114.
A paper going before councillors next week is expected to call on the unitary’s executive to allow officers to make the plea of the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC).
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Finance experts argue that the proposed 'backstop' for outstanding local audits is necessary but "hundreds" of accounts are expected to be qualified or disclaimed as a result.
A new proposed compulsory deadline of 30 September for all outstanding financial assessments was announced at the Local Government Association (LGA)'s finance conference this week.
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Finance directors have expressed “nervousness” that the timing of government plans for capitalisation flexibilities could lead to “unsustainable” debt for some councils.
Communities minister Michael Gove launched a call for views on “developing options for the use of capital resources and borrowing to support and encourage invest-to-save activity” and “more flexibilities to use capitalisation without the requirement to approach government” in December.
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Proposed changes to the rules governing use of capital receipts are remarkable, writes the director of LSE London.
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The Bank of England may be forced to bring forward the date of its first interest rate cut after three leading forecasters issued a surprise update suggesting the inflation rate will halve to 2% by April.
The Oxford Economics consultancy and analysts at Investec and Deutsche Bank have reassessed their outlook for inflation in 2024 and concluded that the consumer prices index (CPI), which dropped to 3.9% in November last year, will fall below 2% within four months.
A slump in energy prices and the cost of oil on international wholesale markets will, they say, bring down inflation at a faster rate than the Bank of England expected when it reviewed price rises in November.
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Government departments should consistently evaluate which aspects of their work would benefit from local management, writes the director of policy at Reform. Local government in England must navigate a maze of unclear mandates, overcentralisation, constrained resources and rocketing demand.
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A campaign to end a loophole which is estimated to cost councils a massive £250m in lost business rates revenue has been backed by senior politicians.
‘Box shifting’ involves landlords exploiting a legal loophole in business rates relief by placing boxes in an empty commercial property to claim the space is occupied for six weeks. The boxes are then removed to claim three months of empty rates relief, with the cycle repeated. The practice adds little or no social value and causes councils to lose more than two-thirds of their rates income every time it happens.
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A bill aimed at banning local authorities from boycotting Israel has passed the Commons despite being branded as ‘illiberal and draconian’.
The Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill seeks to stop public bodies joining the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) campaign.
The BDS campaign aims to end international support for Israel's oppression of Palestinians. The movement’s critics accuse it of antisemitism.
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Local authorities across England have called on the Government to give them more powers to deal with empty properties and holiday homes. It comes as a log jam in the social rental sector, high costs in the private rental sector and the chronic undersupply of housing nationwide have forced councils to find temporary accommodation for record numbers of people. A lack of government funding has put almost one in five councils at risk of facing a Section 114 notice, according to the LGA.
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Encouraging councils to use reserves as a one-off quick fix during the funding crisis is “misguided and unhelpful” and could put more authorities at risk of Section 114 notice, a finance director has said in response to a minister’s comments.
Local government minister Simon Hoare said “authorities can and indeed should” consider drawing on their reserves to meet any funding pressures because council cash balances have generally increased since the beginning of the pandemic.
However, Michael Hudson, executive director of finance and resources Cambridgeshire County Council, said Section 151 Officers allocate and use reserves with the full understanding and knowledge of their future financial risks.
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Shoppers and retailers are set for a "challenging" year ahead, according to The British Retail Consortium. The trade body has warned that higher living costs will continue to squeeze household budgets.
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Local government minister Simon Hoare has said councils ‘can and should consider drawing on their reserves’ to help deal with the financial crisis.
The suggestion has been labelled ‘ridiculous’ by the shadow minister and faced criticism from sector figures.
‘The overall balance of reserves is up post-Covid,’ Hoare told the Local Government Association’s local government finance conference this week.
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The number of pothole-related claims increased by a record 40% last year when compared to 2022, the latest data from Admiral Car Insurance has revealed.
Ahead of National Pothole Day on 15th January, the insurer said that 2023 was set to be a record year for claims relating to potholes with a 138% increase since 2016.
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The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has failed to commit to making the Household Support Fund (HSF) available to councils in 2024-25.
Writing in The MJ, Camden LBC’s executive director of corporate services Jon Rowney called the HSF a ‘critical feature of our cost-of-living crisis support’.
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Councils face multi-million pound bills as a result of the digital switchover of the telephone system.
The network is due to shift from analogue landlines to internet-based systems by the end of 2025.
Work is still under way to gauge the full extent of impacts on local government, but technology upgrades will be required in areas such as adult social care, IT, transportation and security, and the Local Government Association (LGA) has highlighted the potential for supply chain issues.
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Struggling districts have been advised to consider reorganisation in place of the government increasing the amount they can raise from council tax, LGC has learned, as frustration grows over the £5 cap on increases that has left the police raising more than districts in some areas.
Senior officers have told LGC that during a briefing on the provisional local government finance settlement for leaders and chief executives before Christmas local government minister Simon Hoare (Con) suggested that reorganisation could help to prevent further financial distress.
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Section 114 notices risk becoming “normalised”, the chair of the Local Government Association has warned, branding it “lazy” to lay all of the blame for councils’ financial difficulties at mismanagement.
In a New Year interview with LGC, Shaun Davies (Lab) said he expected more councils to issue 114 notices declaring they are unable to balance the books “over the next few weeks”.
He also hit out at chancellor Jeremy Hunt for failing to act on social care and said the proportion of council budgets now going on adults and children’s services as well as homelessness should spark a “big debate” about what the government wants councils to provide
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Nottingham City Council must publish a report into its accounting practices the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has ruled.
Last year Ernst & Young was commissioned to review how Nottingham managed its finances after it emerged in 2021 that the council had “unlawfully” used funds from its housing revenue account to prop up its general fund.
Nottingham released part of the review’s findings but did not disclose the full document.
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The LGA said councils need assistance from the Government with the transition from analogue to digital telecommunication products for the most vulnerable residents, a scheme which will cost councils millions of pounds. It has said that the move towards digital, to be completed by the end of 2025 and landline calls being switched to the internet, is not being effectively communicated. The Department of Health and Social Care estimates that 1.8 million people used telecare services.
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Official government forecasts show that disability benefit spending could rise by £17 billion a year to £48 billion by the end of the decade as a predicted 2 million more people are expected to claim disability benefit for mental health challenges. Depression and anxiety are now leading reasons for adults to receive benefits, which coupled with our ageing population could see spending rise to £80 billion a year by 2030, about half the current cost of the NHS.
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Jeremy Hunt’s key Budget promise to expand free childcare in 2024 is reportedly fast unravelling amid “chaos” over funding arrangements. The Chancellor had announced a major extension of free care for this spring, but experts say the sector has not been given enough cash or support to deliver his pledge. Eligible working parents of two-year-olds have been told they can claim 15 hours a week of free childcare from 1 April, but councils have warned the funding will not be in place for nurseries by then. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People Board, said: “Unfortunately, information for local authorities and providers has only recently been made available by central government, and this means they are having to work within a challenging timeframe to ensure arrangements are in place to expand before the start of the April rollout.”
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Rishi Sunak has pledged to curb benefits and government spending to fund tax cuts before and after a general election. The Prime Minister said he would use measures such as the hiring freeze on civil servants to bear down on Britain’s welfare bill and overall government spending.
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Baroness Heather Hallett’s independent Covid-19 inquiry will issue a detailed interim report “before the summer” on the first batch of public hearings held last June and July. A second report from Hallett – into the political decision-making during the pandemic (module 2) – will not now be published until early 2025.
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Around two-thirds of the £4.2bn Housing Infrastructure Fund (HIF) remains unspent more than six years after its launch, despite the chronic shortage of housing, according to reports.
The HIF was launched in 2017 and was designed to boost housebuilding by providing local authorities with grant funding for key infrastructure such as transport and utility connections.
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Plans to save Suffolk County Council £11m by restructuring its workforce could result in ‘hundreds of job losses’, Unison has warned.
The council has set out a series of measures aimed at finding nearly £65m in savings over the next two years.
The proposals include reducing staffing costs by £11m by changing the way services are delivered and restructuring across the council, and cutting funding to the art and museum sector by £500,000.
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Somerset Council will have to consider “unprecedented” and “heart-breaking” steps including raising council tax by 10% to bridge a £100m funding gap for the next financial year.
As part of the unitary's budget consultation process it revealed that the executive plans to ask the government for flexibility to increase its council tax by 10%.
Upper tier councils can increase council tax by 2.99% plus 2% for the adult social care precept without holding a referendum. In December LGC's council tax tracker found that most authorities were opting for the maximum increases this year.
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A cut in the main rate of national insurance by two percentage points has been introduced today, from 12 per cent to 10 per cent. The move was announced in last year’s Autumn Statement and Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said it means families with two earners are nearly £1,000 better off, but Labour called it a “raw deal” and economists said many households are still facing the burden of high taxes.
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The Government is planning to fund attendance monitors in areas where unauthorised absence rates remain above national levels. It will work in conjunction with a scheme already run by Barnardos children charity which works with 1,600 pupils across 5 areas and will target 15 areas and 3,600 children initially. The Centre for Social Justice thinktank has called for the scheme to be made national to tackle the 140,000 pupils who miss school above 50 percent of the time.
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From the day I started, I have been clear that Oflog will succeed only if it works closely with local government to shape the new organisation together.
I have been very grateful for the constructive engagement from a wide range of colleagues in the sector. There has been much understandable scepticism and suspicion, but I have seen, especially in recent months, increasing numbers of people begin to coalesce around broad agreement to a vision for what Oflog should do. And I think I have perceived a growing level of trust that we really mean it when we say we want to shape Oflog together.
You can imagine, then, my feelings about some of the recent coverage of an interview I did with the Times. It portrayed me – wrongly – as arguing that any financial failure in the sector could be due only to ‘bad management’. This has, quite reasonably, annoyed and alienated colleagues in the sector. I would like to set the record straight.
I told the Times that, in the case of every council currently subject to formal intervention from central government, the need for intervention has been primarily attributable to a failure of governance or management rather than a shortage of money. I do not think that is a controversial view. Indeed, I do not think I have spoken to anybody in the sector who disagrees that each of the recent cases has been principally caused by some failure of leadership, governance, management or organisational culture, rather than simply a lack of funds.
The media coverage then summarised this as me simply blaming ‘bad management’. It also implied that I was commenting on the causes of possible future Section 114 notices or central government interventions – and that any new ‘bankruptcy’ could only be caused by ‘bad management’. That is absolutely not what I said, nor think.
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The charity representing library services in England, Wales and Northern Ireland has launched a support programme for at-risk services in the wake of proposed budget cuts across the country, including in Denbighshire, Nottingham and Swindon.
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The UK's statistics watchdog is looking into the government's claims to have cleared the asylum backlog.
On Tuesday, the Home Office said it had fulfilled a pledge to clear a "legacy" backlog of 92,000 applications lodged before July 2022.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak also tweeted that the government had cleared "the backlog of asylum decisions".
But official figures show a decision had not been reached in 4,537 of those "legacy" cases.
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The Local Government Association (LGA) has announced Surrey CC boss Joanna Killian will be its new chief executive.
Killian has been chief executive at Surrey CC since March 2018. Prior to taking up the pose she held roles as chief executive of Essex CC, Partner at consultancy KPMG, and as local government lead at the Audit Commission.
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Nottingham City Council has urged the Government not to send in commissioners to oversee the running of the authority.
Communities secretary Michael Gove announced last month he was ‘minded to’ extend intervention following Nottingham’s issuing of a section 114 notice.
However, such a move would ‘undermine senior officers’ according to a letter from Cllr Steve Battlemuch, portfolio holder for skills, growth, economic development and property.
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Levels of homelessness in rural areas have increased by 40% over the last five years, research by a countryside charity has revealed.
A report by CPRE found that a greater proportion of people are sleeping rough in the seven worst affected rural local authorities than they are in London, Leeds, or Norwich.
The seven council areas are Bedford, Boston, North Devon, Cornwall, Boston, Bath and Northeast Somerset, Torridge, and Great Yarmouth.
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Derbyshire County Council is planning to move from its headquarters in Matlock to a smaller office in a bid to tackle a £33m overspend.
The council is set to consider several proposals aimed at balancing the books, including changes to care services, residential facilities, and library and heritage services.
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Being on the government’s “naughty step” has been stressful for the council at the centre of the four-day week debate, the leader of South Cambridgeshire DC has told LGC.
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Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People Board, spoke to BBC Radio 2 and BBC regional radio news bulletins on the changes coming into effect in April on the number of free hours of childcare working parents can receive. It comes amid warnings from day care providers that they won’t have the resources or qualified staff to manage increased demand. Cllr Gittins said that any additional help from the Government must be targeted to ensure all parents and carers can access the new support.
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Bus services have seen the number of miles driven falling by almost a quarter since 2010. Labour analysis of official figures show buses drove 300 million fewer miles, a fall of over 22 per cent, since 2010 despite being the most popular form of transport and there was also a 4.6 per cent decrease in services in 2022/23 compared to the previous year.
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There is ‘a lot to be done’ to improve management in failing local authorities, the sector watchdog’s chair has said.
Lord Morse, chair of the Office for Local Government (Oflog), said the growing number of councils that have suffered financial collapse is due to mismanagement rather than underfunding.
During an interview with The Times, Lord Morse said: ‘In our view the failures are not attributable to shortage of money, or not primarily attributable to shortage of money - they're to do with failures in management, or failures in governance.’
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Local authorities in England are no longer able to charge households to leave small-scale DIY waste at recycling centres in a move aimed at boosting recycling and tacking fly-tipping.
Around a third of councils charged for the disposal of waste, such as plasterboards, bricks, and bath units, at household waste recycling centres (HWRCs).
However, residents will now no longer be required to pay any fees for disposing of small-scale DIY waste – a move local authority leaders have cautioned against.
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Kerbside collections for broken toasters, hairdryers and other electrical goods could be rolled out across the UK, under plans to crack down on household waste. The LGA has raised concerns that retailers are currently only required to offer recycling services for vaping products if they sell more than £100,000 of electrical items per year.
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An opinion piece for the Guardian discusses the financial difficulties councils are currently facing, and the challenges that will come with the next election. The piece references the LGA’s recent survey on the likelihood of councils issuing a section 114 notice in the next two years.
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Costly parking fees are damaging the high street, a FTSE retail chief has warned, amid a tepid turnout to Boxing Day sales.
Gavin Peck, chief executive of stationery and crafts retailer The Works, told The Telegraph that a rise in parking fees had become a “big challenge” for shops as cash-strapped councils hike prices to replace other income streams.
His warning came on what looked like a subdued year for Boxing Day sales. Bargain-hunters queued to get into some shops but others, such as Next and Marks & Spencer, stayed shut.
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Council tax is likely to rise across Telford and Wrekin after it was frozen for two years.
Budget proposals for the 2024/25 financial year will be presented to councillors in the new year before public consultation.
Draft papers released last week recommended increasing council tax by 4.99%, meaning the average home in the borough would pay an extra £1.09 per week.
Shaun Davies, Telford and Wrekin Council's Labour leader, said "difficult decisions" were being made due to central government funding.
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Town halls forked out £1.7million to 23,000 motorists whose vehicles were damaged by potholes last year. Drivers made 63 compensation claims every day because of decrepit roads, new figures show.
The number of pay-outs rose by six per cent on the previous year.
Surrey County Council dished out the most cash, handing almost £237,000 to successful claimants. And Staffordshire County Council paid out £105,000 as a result of dodgy roads.
Many authorities were forced to make individual payments in the tens of thousands of pounds. Last year, one motorist alone was paid almost £40,000 by Stoke-on-Trent City Council.
Leeds City Council had a single £36,000 pay-out, while a driver in Kensington and Chelsea, West London, bagged £26,000 according to Freedom of Information data.
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Serious concerns have been raised over the growing influence of private equity in the provision of children’s care homes, after an Observer investigation revealed that the number of homes backed by investment companies has more than doubled over five years.
The news comes with children’s social care directors, council leaders and campaigners for those in care accusing some businesses of profiteering from their involvement in children’s social care.
Increasing numbers of councils are warning they face bankruptcy as a result of rising costs. Several care home providers backed by investment companies are also heavily indebted.
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The number of children's homes backed by investment companies has more than doubled over five years, according to an investigation. Close to one in four places in a children’s care home in England now have the involvement of an investment company, up from one in six in 2018. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA's Children and Young People Board, said: “Private equity providers are making extremely high profits and carrying concerning levels of debt that risks the stability of homes for children in care, which is paramount if they are to thrive. We continue to call for oversight of the market.”
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Bradford Council has voted to request an urgent government bailout, as an emergency meeting heard the city faces a £73 million overspend this year, which is set to rise to £103 million for the next financial year. Council leader Cllr Susan Hinchcliffe told the meeting 87 per cent of this year's total budget was spent on essential children's and adult services. Earlier this month, the LGA warned councils face a “growing financial crisis” with one in five authorities facing running out of money either this year or next.
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The Government has rowed back on plans to raise the salary threshold to bring family members to the UK to £38,700 next spring. The increase from the current level of £18,600 was announced earlier this month as part of a plan to lower legal migration, but the new threshold will initially be set at £29,000, with further increases at unspecified dates thereafter.
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The West Midlands is to become the first UK region to receive new ‘growth zone’ powers, which the combined authority said could generate £1.7bn.
The councils that host the three new growth zones will be able to retain 100% of business rates for 25 years.
The powers were agreed as part of the Government’s ‘deeper devolution’ deal with the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA).
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England has more than twice as many long-term empty homes this Christmas as there are children living in temporary accommodation, the Liberal Democrats have said, calling this a stark indication of a “broken” housing market. The numbers of families without a permanent home and in short-term housing, whether hotels and B&Bs or temporary rental properties, has reached a record high this year, with latest statistics collated by the House of Commons library showing it now affects 121,327 children.
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UK house prices are expected to fall in 2024, according to analysts and lenders, while the cost of renting a home will continue to rise. The Government's official forecaster said property prices were most likely to drop by nearly 5 per cent, although lenders expect less of a fall, while rents on newly-let properties could go up by a further 5-6 per cent, property experts say, following a year of sharp rises.
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The Government will introduce a new package of support for first time buyers, it has been reported. Options include longer term fixed-term mortgages and a new version of the Help to Buy scheme.
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Councils across England are having to issue Section 114 notices because of poor financial management and not a lack of money, according to Lord Morse, Chairman of the new Office for Local Government (Oflog). However, Cllr John Fuller, of the LGA’s Resources Board, said growing demand pressures meant many more councils face having to make the same decision. He told MPs last month: “There is a general understanding that, if not this year, next year about half of local authorities will be in [financial] distress.”
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Plans to introduce new laws on nutrient neutrality have been shelved by the Government.
It follows the defeat of an amendment to the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill in the House of Lords earlier this year.
It is estimated the issue affects the construction of around 100,000 homes up to 2030.
Communities secretary Michael Gove had suggested further legislation would be introduced to tackle the issue of developments being blocked to prevent rising levels of nitrates and phosphates in waterways.
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The Supreme Court has ruled that Wolverhampton City Council did not have a duty of care to protect a child from harm from a third party because it could not be established that they had assumed responsibility to protect them.
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Councils are considering asking for their pension contribution rates to be cut amid increasing pressure on municipal budgets and improved pension fund surpluses.
One advisor last month said the Local Government Pension Scheme currently has up to £100bn more than it needs to fund its pension promises, and cutting contribution rates could allow a typical large council to “reasonably save at least £20m a year”.
The LGPS advisory board yesterday issued a statement warning councils against seeking reductions to their employer contributions outside of the usual three-yearly pension fund valuation process, and stressing the desirability of keeping contributions stable.
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The Government’s decision to redirect HS2 funding to fix potholes in London under the Network North plan has been strongly criticised by Northern leaders.
The Government yesterday confirmed allocations for a £235m funding pot aimed at fixing London’s pothole-strewn roads.
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The rate of price rises significantly slowed again in November to another two year low, official figures show. Inflation stood at 3.9 per cent last month, according to the Office for National Statistics, a dramatic fall from the 4.6 per cent recorded a month earlier as price increases slowed in transport, recreation and culture, and food with the biggest downward pressure coming from fuel.
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Grant Thornton’s Guy Clifton explains the vital part statutory officers have to play in ensuring councils’ viability in difficult financial times.
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Social care bosses were ‘blindsided’ by ministers’ ban on international staff bringing dependents to the UK and fear an exodus from the sector, an expert has warned.
Speaking to MPs yesterday, Professor Martin Green, chief executive of Care England, made clear his frustration with the government’s decision to ban incoming care staff from bringing dependents – particularly as the NHS has been exempted from the policy.
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A struggling county council wants to determine its legal minimum service level across all services to help close a predicted budget gap.
Hampshire CC estimates that it faces a £42m budget deficit in the 2025-26 financial year – even if it meets strict savings targets before then – and wants to fully assess which costs and services it can cut while still meeting its legal obligations.
The move comes amid a snowballing belief the county faces potential government intervention if it cannot improve its financial position. Officials are even preparing for the potential arrival of Government commissioners by applying a ‘commissioner’s test’ to all spending plans. This aims to ensure future commissioners would not be able to identify instances of expenditure not already at minimum service levels.
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A fair and funded pay rise for council workers would help to alleviate some of the financial strain on authorities and improve recruitment and retention, a senior union official has said.
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Michael Gove has announced the government’s English council funding package for next year, but the sector has warned it will not stop the expected wave of Section 114 notices in the coming months.
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Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove has threatened to strip local authorities of their responsibilities for planning if they ‘drag their feet’ when coming up with housing plans.
Councils in England would have three months to put in place plans to meet their housing needs, Mr Gove told The Times. If they failed, they would lose their planning powers to independent planning inspectors.
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Local government leaders have warned about the future of council services following the publication of a “bitterly disappointing” provisional local government finance settlement.
Levelling up secretary Michael Gove today published a £64bn funding package which did not give councils the extra funding they have been pleading for.
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More than half of the projected increase in core spending power in the provisional local finance settlement comes from increases in council tax.
An LGC analysis of yesterday's settlement for 2024-25 has revealed that 53% of the 6.5% increase in core spending power (CSP) is accounted for by councils increasing tax for their residents.
Authorities with responsibility for adult social care can increase their share of council tax by up to 5% before holding a referendum, while shire districts have a limit of 3% or £5.
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The provisional local government finance settlement for 2024-25 is “much less redistributive” than previous years, with counties set to see the biggest increase in core spending power, an analysis has found.
A report by Adrian Jenkins of Pixel Financial Management about yesterday’s announcement also noted that while the projected increase in core spending power (CSP) is above inflation, “notional real-terms growth is not keeping pace with budget pressures”.
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The local government finance settlement might leave councils in choppy waters next year but the weather will only get heavier afterwards, write a senior research economist and the associate director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
If you had asked us a year ago whether growing numbers of councils would be warning about being able to balance their budgets in 2023-24 and 2024-25 we would have said we wouldn’t be surprised – but to treat those warnings with a pinch of salt.
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Two district councils have been issued with best value notices due to concerns over their levels of debt.
Runnymede and Eastleigh BCs this afternoon received "formal" requests to provide "assurance of improvement" from Suzanne Clarke, deputy director of local government finance at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities.
The letter to Andrew Pritchard, chief executive of Runnymede BC, raised concerns over the authority "borrowing 71 times their core spending power" predominantly in property investments and fears over "anticipated income fail" because commercial income is considered a "substantial revenue source".
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CIPFA’s annual library survey, published today, reveals total expenditure on libraries in Great Britain rose 3% to £12,551 per 1,000 people in 2022/23, from £12,143 in 2021/22. This increase in expenditure marks a positive shift in the year-on-year decrease since 2018/19, when total expenditure stood at £12,646 per 1,000 people.
The survey also shows that the income libraries received rose by 3% over the last financial year, which sees some welcome relief to the financial pressure on libraries as high inflation continues to increase their running costs. This is an increase from £916 per 1,000 people in 2021/22 to £939 per 1,000 people in 2022/23.
Following the end of the pandemic, in-person visits to libraries have increased by 71% since 2021/22, from 1,215 per 1,000 people in 2021/22 to 2,082 per 1,000 people in 2022/23. The number of books borrowed has also increased by 24% to 2,316 per 1,000 people, from 1,868 books in 2021/22.
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Communities Secretary, Michael Gove, will today announce a 6.5 per cent increase in funding for local councils in England, as well as a provisional package worth more than £64 billion with extra support for social care and housing, according to multiple government officials, but it will fall short of the help demanded by councils. The article referenced LGA findings that one in five councils said they were likely to issue a Section 114 notice this year or next.
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Max Caller, the commissioner put in charge of supporting Birmingham City Council after it issued a Section 114 notice earlier this year told the BBC it might have to put up council tax by at least 10 per cent. Mr Caller said such an increase was “par for the course” at authorities which had issued a Section 114 notice. A number of other councils, including Nottingham and Woking, have had to do the same, suggesting theirs will also have to rise. The article referenced LGA findings that one in five councils said they were likely to issue a S114 notice this year or next.
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From Jan 1 councils will no longer be able to charge for disposing of waste such as rubble, which the Government has argued will reduce illegal waste-dumping. Cllr Darren Rodwell, environment spokesperson for the LGA, previously warned: “Where councils are no longer able to charge for DIY waste at recycling centres the cost will be passed to all householders, including households that do not have a car and those with no possibility of carrying out building works, for example people living in rented accommodation.”
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The Telegraph has analysed council tax rates versus quality of services provided across all single-tier authorities in England in an attempt to create a league table of local authority performance. Councils deemed to be providing less value for money, according to the Telegraph matrix, have strongly refuted the findings and methodology.
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The LGC council tax tracker has obtained 2024-25 council tax proposals for 59 councils. Of these, 95% are currently planning to implement the highest permitted rise for their authority.
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The government is due to announce the provisional local government finance settlement for 2024-25 this afternoon.
It is expected to confirm the increase in local authorities’ core spending power to £64bn that was set out in this month’s local government finance policy statement.
All local authorities were promised at least a 3% increase in their core spending power, with council tax rises capped at 3% for upper tier authorities, plus 2% for adult social care precept, without holding a referendum.
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Michael Gove today announced England’s provisional local government finance settlement for 2024-25, with councils set to receive an above-inflation average 6.5% increase in funding.
The proposed spending package for next year is £64bn – some £3.9bn more than the current fiscal year - and includes extra support for social care and housing.
Mr Gove’s deal means England’s councils will receive an average funding increase 1.9% above October’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation rate ‘in recognition of the pressures being faced by local authorities’.
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Councils are to turn to MPs to make the case to the Government following the announcement of an ‘inadequate’ £64bn finance settlement.
Finance spokesperson for the County Councils Network (CCN), Barry Lewis, said they had held ‘several meetings’ with ministers to make the case for emergency funding over recent days, but to no avail.
‘We will now be making our case to county MPs ahead of the parliamentary vote on the final local government settlement to ensure that they are aware of the extent to which highly valued local services will have to be cut next year unless further funding is provided,’ he added.
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Five unitary councils are proposing a devolution deal covering Dorset, Somerset and Wiltshire.
A ‘non-binding expression of interest’ is expected to be submitted to the Government in February for a level 2 deal including Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP), Dorset, North Somerset, Somerset and Wiltshire.
Dorset Council’s leader Spencer Flower told a meeting last week that an executive advisory panel will be established to work on the mooted deal.
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Columnist Robert Colvile debates the funding crisis affecting councils, citing the LGA's recent survey on the number who fear they may have to issue a Section 114 notice in the coming years. He says councils are facing growing costs on statutory services, concluding that "in the longer term we need to think very seriously about what we are asking — and legally obliging — councils to do".
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Nearly a million households face council tax rises of up to 15 per cent after two more local authorities announced they were at risk of effective bankruptcy.
Bradford Council and Cheshire East Council, both Labour-run, said on Thursday that they may have to issue a section 114 notice, meaning they are unable to balance their budgets by the end of the financial year.
They join councils including Birmingham, Nottingham and Woking which have already taken the draconian step.
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The many common “causes, symptoms and consequences” of financial failure at local governments can be identified and used to help prevent future problems, according to a new report from Grant Thornton.
Noting that the specific circumstances at struggling authorities have been “unique”, the professional services firm said that repeated causes of failure include poor decisions, often accompanied by a lack of transparency; risky investments made without the necessary commercial skills and knowledge; the lack of an effective top team; over-reliance on interims in key roles; and the failure of members to ask the right questions.
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Hampshire County Council is looking at defining and establishing a legal minimum service level, while exhausting “all options for saving money”.
But doing even this is not expected to achieve the recurring £41.6m of savings needed to balance the authority’s budget in 2025/26.
Instead, the council is aiming to pass the ‘commissioner test’. This, in essence, means that if commissioners were sent in to review Hampshire’s financial position, they should not be able to find any instance of expenditure that was not already at the legal minimum service level.
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The Financial Reporting Council (FRC) is hoping a series of market studies will generate information and proposals for improvement to help increase competition in the UK’s audit market for public interest entities (PIE).
A new report providing an updated overview of competition in the space showed that while there was a small increase in market share for challenger audit firms, the audit market remains highly concentrated.
The Big Four accounting firms – Deloitte, EY, KPMG and PwC – continue to dominate, earning 98% of FTSE 350 audit fees in 2022.
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Leicestershire County Council has warned of an £85 million budget shortfall by 2028, which may force the council into its “toughest ever budget”. The council has said that this shortfall has been driven by a £113 million rise in wages precipitated by the new rise in the national living wage, as well as the need to invest a further £127 million in social care due to the rise in demand and in the cost of delivering these services.
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Without "exceptional" government support Bradford MBC will have no choice but to issue a section 114 notice, according to a new council report.
The report, that is going before an extraordinary meeting of the council’s cabinet meeting next Thursday, outlines how reserves will be "exhausted" by the end of this financial year so "exceptional" financial support "will be required" to keep their budget balanced or the next two financial years .
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An allowance for kinship carers will be trialled in up to eight local authorities next year as part of a £20m national kinship strategy, the government has announced today.
The strategy, along with an extra £36m to improve recruitment and retention in children’s social care and extra foster care funding, form part of the government’s response to the MacAlister independent review of social care.
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Cheshire East Council has warned that it may have to issue a section 114 notice after spending £11m preparing for HS2, as it continues to press for compensation.
The local authority described the cancellation of the HS2 scheme north of Birmingham as a ‘devastating blow’ for the region.
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A lack of auditor capacity and complex accounting requirements worsened the local audit crisis and meant the Financial Reporting Council could only inspect four financial statements in 2022-23.
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This publication provides guidance on IFRS 16 Leases for 2022/23, which is applicable to those authorities deciding to voluntarily implement the requirements of Appendix F of the Code (which includes the specifications applicable to those entities implementing IFRS 16 as of 1 April 2022). It will also be of interest to those intending to apply as of 1 April 2023 and those mandatorily implementing as of 1 April 2024.
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Conservative ministers were today urged to “grasp the nettle” and pay carers a decent wage as fears the latest Conservative plan to cut net migration will further exacerbate social care workforce shortages. Former LGA vice-president, Lib Dem Lord John Shipley, said: “Local authorities are seriously underfunded for adult and children's social care and are cutting other public services as a consequence.”
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The Association for Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) has announced that Anna Hemmings has been appointed as its new joint chief executive.
She will work alongside Cathie Williams in the role early in the New Year.
Ms Hemmings said: ‘Having worked with people who draw on social care throughout my career, I’m delighted to be joining ADASS as joint CEO at this important time.
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A Government minister has admitted around three quarters of council budgets are now being spent on adult social care and this was ‘not a good situation’.
Asked by Lord Forsyth of Drumlean during parliamentary questions what percentage of councils’ expenditure was now being spent on social care, health and social care minister Lord Markham said local authorities were on average spending around 74-75% on the function.
The minister added: ‘I think that we would all agree that is not a good situation because obviously a local authority has got a number of matters it needs to deal with. I think those are part of the issues around long-term reform that we will need to consider.’
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A specialist school has billed a Leeds City Council almost £2.5 million for the education of a single child with special needs. The placement spanned several years and included accommodation on-site. The LGA has warned of increased costs for children’s placements and rising profits for providers. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA's Children and Young People’s Board: "Councils continue to face significant challenges managing the ever-increasing rise in demand for support from children with SEND. To help alleviate the huge strain they are under, we are calling on the Government to use the upcoming local government financial settlement to eliminate councils’ high needs deficits, which have arisen as a result of the spiralling costs of providing support outstripping the SEND budgets available to councils."
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The Government is due to relax housing targets for local authorities in England, reports suggest. The changes are expected to allow authorities to allocate less land to future development if local officials can argue that more development would damage the character of an area or require building on greenbelt land.
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Nearly 40,000 more people than last year are expected to spend this Christmas homeless, the charity Shelter HAS warned. IT IS predicting a 14 per cent increase in people spending the festive season in hotels, B&Bs and other temporary accommodation.
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Economists are predicting the Bank of England to freeze interest rates later today. The figure was held at 5.25 per cent for the second consecutive time last month.
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The UK economy shrank by more than expected in October, as higher interest rates squeezed consumers and bad weather swept the country.
The economy fell 0.3% during the month, after growth of 0.2% in September.
Household spending has been dented by rate rises as the Bank of England tries to tackle inflation. It is due to make its next rate decision on Thursday.
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New analysis by Queen’s University in Belfast has revealed over a million people in England are living in pockets of hidden hardship, meaning people could be missing out on vital help because their poverty is masked by neighbours who are better off.
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A new report by the Institute for Fiscal Studies suggests secondary schools with the most disadvantaged pupils have been hit hardest by funding cuts. It found rising costs are placing increasing pressure on all areas of education.
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London’s councils are facing a collective deficit of over half a billion pounds, research has found. The figures suggest that council tax across the capital will have to increase further to meet these growing deficits. The LGA recently warned councils across England faced a £4 billion funding gap over the next two years.
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Durham County Council has asked the Government to repay the £1.2 million costs of its failed levelling up bids. The council took action after five of its bids were unsuccessful during the funding process.
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As well as paving the way for more devolution, the levelling up act will mean significant changes for the planning system, but not all will come into force straight away. LGC pulls out the key points for local government.
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The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, Michael Gove, has conceded that “local government faces significant funding pressures” in comments made to the Levelling Up Committee. However, Mr Gove has also claimed there is a link between “poor leadership” and the subsequent Section 114 notice at those councils that have issued it. These comments have been made despite grants to local authorities falling by 40 percent in the last 10 years, according to the Institute for Government. The LGA has warned in a recent survey that one in five Council leaders and Chief executives are very or fairly likely to have to issue a section 114 notice by the end of next year.
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There are fears that further reductions in spending by councils to ensure that budgets are balanced will hit the most vulnerable. Newcastle City Council has reported plans to save £15.4 million by the end of 2024 by halving the money spent on homelessness, closing its crisis support service and reviewing free home to school transport for special educational needs and disabilities students over the age of 16. The council said these measures are due to a lack of funding from government, as well as increased demand and inflation. The LGA has warned that councils across England face a funding gap of £4 billion over the next two years.
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The number of child cruelty and neglect cases has more than doubled in the past five years, police data collected by the NSPCC shows.
The data from police forces in England shows there were 29,405 offences between April 2022 and March 2023 compared to 14,263 offences between April 2017 and March 2018.
The figures, obtained by the NSPCC children's charity by using the Freedom of Information Act, reveal the number of cases increased steadily year on year during that period.
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New Workplace Recycling Regulations have been passed in Wales, which will require all businesses to separate recyclable materials.
The new law, which will come into force on 6 April next year, means all businesses, charities and public sector organisations will have to separate key recyclable materials for collection.
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Owners of long-term empty properties in Lewes are set to be hit by council tax premiums of up to 300% from April 2024.
Cabinet councillors yesterday recommended the increase to tackle the ‘scandalous’ situation of homes sitting empty while there is a shortage of houses.
Subject to approval by Full Council, the premiums would begin at 100% for homes that are unoccupied and substantially unfurnished between one and five years of becoming empty. They would then rise to 200% for between five and 10 years, and 300% for more than 10 years of becoming empty.
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Increasing the local housing allowance will not cover the loss of a council fund designed to help those struggling with the cost of living crisis, sector leaders have warned.
As part of the Autumn Statement, chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced that housing benefits for private renters will be increased to the 30th percentile of local market rates, but papers appeared to suggest that in return the household support fund (HSF) would not be extended.
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Children’s services directors are in an “exceptionally difficult” position where they have to “make the case” for funding to finance colleagues, John Pearce told LGC.
In an interview last week, the president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS), said that being a “key pressure” during financial crisis makes it harder to “make the case” for funding preventative services.
Mr Pearce warned that staff were increasingly at risk of burnout due the way they are being asked to work, and called for better regulation of the “Wild West” private provider market.
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Birmingham City Council, which is currently under government intervention, is set to consider selling assets within its £2.4bn property portfolio to help address its £300m budget gap over the next two years.
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Section 114 notices are the last resort for local authorities in financial trouble. Once rare, there have been several high-profile examples since 2018, with councils of different sizes and located across the country sending out a distress signal over their financial position. Although each situation is unique, there are some common trends and themes around financial management and governance issues, which will be explored in this report. By looking at what went wrong, we can identify preventative actions that will help improve and maintain resilience across the sector.
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A metropolitan borough has become the latest to warn of financial distress due to care demand.
Low reserves and the lack of capacity are key risks to Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council balancing its budget with “urgent action” needed to avoid a Section 114 notice, local leaders have said.
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Almost a fifth (18%) of council leaders and chief executives could be forced to issue the statutory notice either this year or next year, according to new figures from the Local Government Association.
A survey, based on responses from 114 chief executives and 71 council leaders, said around half (54%) were not very confident of funding statutory services up to the end of 2024-25.
Almost two-thirds of respondents (63%) said there was nothing in the Autumn Statement that would help them deal with their financial position.
The County Councils Network (CCN) is also warning that councils are in a ‘significantly worse financial position’ after the Autumn Statement, with seven in 10 county councils now unsure if they can balance their budget next year according to its own survey.
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Local authorities’ core spending power will increase by £4bn to £64bn next year but the sector should not expect any major reforms, the local government finance policy statement published this afternoon has said.
The document, published by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities, says the revenue support grant will be increased in line with consumer price index inflation, but the government has not confirmed which month’s figures it will use. October’s figure is 4.6%, while September’s is 6.7%, according to the Office for National Statistics. LGC has asked DLUHC for clarification.
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The government has pledged to "work closely with councils to increase transparency around the costs of residential placements for children" in the local government finance policy statement.
The commitment follows warnings from councils about the spiralling cost of placements for some vulnerable children putting huge pressure on council budgets.
The statement said the work to increase transparency is set to be a "precursor" to the launch of Regional Care Cooperatives, designed to bring together local authorities to commission fostering and residential care for children.
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Representation from local authorities, including on council tax provision, will be considered the government has announced today as part of the local government finance policy statement.
The statement sets out the government’s intentions ahead of the full details of the local government finance settlement for 2024-25 , which is expected to be announced later this month.
Since 2020 the government has agreed to provide a small number of local authorities with additional resources via the Exceptional Financial Support Framework, following requests from these councils for assistance to manage financial pressures that they considered unmanageable.
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The Local Government Association has long called for councils to retain 100% of Right to Buy receipts, and Treasury permission to combine receipts with other government grants.
But a meeting of the LGA’s local infrastructure and net zero board on 23 November was asked to consider further lobbying positions – including extending the five-year time limit in which receipts must be spent and altering the current cap on acquisitions.
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A metropolitan borough has become the latest to warn of financial distress due to care demand.
Low reserves and the lack of capacity are key risks to Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council balancing its budget with “urgent action” needed to avoid a Section 114 notice, local leaders have said.
The council is facing a “serious financial challenge” due to rising care demands and shortfall in commercial income, which could lead to the further use of already low reserves, an LGA corporate peer challenge said.
Local leaders said current forecasts indicate there could be just £3m in the general fund reserve at the end of this year with cost pressures set to rise.
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The local government finance policy statement provides “nothing to address the general situation” facing council finances, making it “difficult” to see how all authorities will balance their budgets, sector professionals have said.
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Levelling up secretary Michael Gove has stated that Nottingham City Council’s issuance of a section 114 notice (s114) was not caused by a lack of central government funding despite its spending power decreasing by 28% since 2010/11.
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An article explores the financial challenges faced by councils, after Nottingham City Council issued a section 114 notice last week. The LGA has warned councils in England face a funding gap of £4 billion over the next two years. Cllr Shaun Davies, Chair of the LGA, said: “This is just the start of a massive upward trend. I know from speaking to a lot of cross-party councils and councillors that there is not a single one of them that can look past the next three years without falling off a cliff (financially).”
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Communities Secretary Michael Gove has said councils would have little hope of seeing spending pressures relieved under Labour. Mr Gove suggested Labour MPs would be “raising false hopes” if they suggested a victory for their party at the next general election would mean extra funding for councils. Meanwhile local government minister Simon Hoare told the Commons he would not name councils in financial trouble. He said: “I have said to the LGA and to the others that I don’t think it’s right for us to name and shame.”
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Care companies fear the announcement overseas care workers will no longer be able to bring their families will put potential recruits off moving to the UK. Home Office figures indicate nearly 144,000 care workers, who arrived in the UK in the year up to September 2023, brought almost 174,000 family members with them.
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Council tax on second homes in Bath is set to double as the local authority seeks to tackle the local housing shortage.
According to Bath and North East Somerset Council, the increase will come into force from April 2025 and will apply to furnished homes that are only periodically occupied.
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More than 11,000 autistic adults in England are not receiving the care they are legally entitled to, a group of autism charities has found.
Autism Alliance said it means the Care Act 2014, which states that eligible adults must receive support, ‘is being broken daily’.
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Croydon Council has disposed of over £72m of assets since 2021, with a further £52m expected to be sold by the end of the financial year.
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Dozens more councils will learn within weeks whether they will need to issue a Section 114 notice restricting their spending, due to the impact of inflation and a lack of funding. The Government will this month set out its proposed councils funding plan for next year, which MPs will vote through before Christmas. Cllr Pete Marland, Chair of the LGA’s Resources Board, said: “Councils are being faced with tough decisions about cutting valued services, increasing council tax and fees and charges during a cost-of-living crisis.
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To build more homes, councils don’t need false limits and a Kafkaesque sting set by central government, writes Cllr Diarmaid Ward, Islington Council’s deputy leader.
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Thousands of nurseries have shut their doors amid a staffing crisis, leaving the Chancellor’s flagship Budget pledge to expand free childcare for British families “doomed to failure”, according to the chief executive of the Early Years Alliance. New figures from school inspectors Ofsted show that 3,320 of the 62,300 nurseries and childminders for under-fives in England have shut their doors in the past year alone, leaving 17,800 fewer childcare places available.
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Workforces are “vulnerable” during government social care pilots, which can make it harder to recruit and retain staff, trial local authorities have reported.
Dorset Council, Lincolnshire CC and Wolverhampton City Council shared their findings from the first wave of the Families First for Children (FFC) pathfinder at the National Children and Adult Services Conference (NCASC) last week raising concerns about its progress.
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Norfolk CC’s cabinet unanimously agreed to accept the level three devolution deal, but with a one year delay, at a meeting this morning.
Delaying the deal means elections for the new directly elected leader will take place at the same time as the county’s elections in May 2025. This is expected to save money and lead to higher turnout.
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Following the National Children’s and Adult’s Service Conference in Bournemouth last week, The MJ rounds up everything you need to know.
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Only last month the County Councils’ Network (CCN) highlighted that children’s services make up almost half of its members’ overspends this year, driven by demand and costs, particularly placement costs which have spiralled as the number of children in care reaches record levels.
Yet measures in the Government’s strategy to tackle this, such as Regional Care Co-operatives, have struggled to gain support – even for pilots – as councils fear surrendering autonomy over placement commissioning may leave them even more exposed to bureaucracy and expense in this key area of spending concern.
However, the need to regain control of the market is real and for many councils that means looking at different ways of providing and commissioning care. During the last decade a group of county councils came to this conclusion, recognising the cost of care placements needed to be more connected to a child’s identified needs.
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Nottingham has become the latest council to issue a section 114 notice as inflation and growing demands for services have pushed up to half of all local authorities to “breaking point”. Cllr John Fuller, Vice Chair of the LGA’s Resources Board, recently told MPs: “There is a general understanding that if not this year, next year, about half of the authorities will be in distress.”
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The UK Government's proposed ban on the sale of new leasehold houses has not been included in its bill to reform housing rights. Ministers had said this week's new bill would ban the sale of new leasehold houses in England and Wales but the Government says the ban will be added to the bill at a later stage in its passage through Parliament
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A ‘lack of clarity’ around the Government’s recycling reforms are preventing councils from preparing for the upcoming changes, according to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC).
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Birmingham City Council's leader has accused the Government of 'betrayal' by axing the authority's £2.7bn highways Private Finance Initiative (PFI) contract, in a move that could lose the authority more than £500m of roads investment.
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Senior Local Government Association (LGA) figures are pushing the organisation to beef up its peer review offer to help neutralise the threat from Oflog.
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Havering LBC is to apply for a capitalisation direction as it bids to avoid issuing a section 114 notice next year.
Despite making savings, reining in spending and factoring in a maximum increase in council tax, the council still faces a gap in its budget for the next financial year.
A surge in demand for temporary housing and children’s services are the chief financial pressures facing Havering, which has imposed spending controls ‘until further notice’.
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Rising service demands and a “completely broken” funding model could force more councils to declare that they cannot balance this year's budget, sector figures have said following Nottingham City Council's section 114 notice yesterday.
The council’s 151 officer issued the notice yesterday citing a general fund pressure of £57m.
A report to the council’s executive board on 21 November revealed an in-year overspend of £23.3m, against a revenue budget of £261.8m.
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Cuts to local government contribute to a sense of political abandonment that may drive extremism, writes the director of LSE London.
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A proposed real-terms cut to capital budgets risks exacerbating school maintenance backlogs and shows the government does “not care about the state of school buildings”, a union leader has said.
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Following an extensive two-day interview process earlier this month, Nina Philippidis has been appointed deputy chief executive and executive director of corporate resources at Gloucestershire County Council.
As well as being the council's statutory finance officer, Nina will lead a range of other corporate services such as Property, ICT, Communications, and HR.
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The LGA is warning of the spiralling costs of providing support for children with the most complex needs. Its survey of councils reveals the number of placements costing more than £10,000 per week has risen from 120 in 2018 to more than 1,500 in the past year, while the proportion of councils taking these out has increased from 23 per cent to 91 per cent over the same period . The highest cost placement was £63,000 a week and for most councils, the highest cost fell between £9,600 and £32,500 a week. The LGA’s survey comes as the annual National Children and Adult Services Conference gets underway today in Bournemouth.
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All but two Yorkshire councils are set to spend beyond their budgets this year as BBC analysis shows they have lost £945 million in government funding since 2015. The region's 13 major local authorities face a combined overspend of nearly £193 million in 2023/24, with the spiralling cost of social care using up one in every three pounds in their budgets. All of the Yorkshire councils have lost at least a third of their central government funding since 2015/16, the last year for which comparable figures are available, the analysis found. The LGA said it was "hugely disappointed" Chancellor Jeremy Hunt did not announce funding for councils in last week’s Autumn Statement and said local authorities had been "pushed to the brink" by the rising costs of social care.
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The Government is to invest £400 million in its plans to expand free childcare for working parents in England from April. The Department for Education has also announced an increase in funding rates for nursery places, with hourly rates available to providers increasing to £11.22 for under-twos, £8.28 for two-year-olds, and £5.88 for three and four-year-olds.
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Sector leaders must “pool forces” to convince policymakers that social care is a “core” public service, urges the president of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services.
Beverley Tarka told the national children and adult services conference (NCASC) this morning that the sector has been “too fragmented” to secure necessary improvements to funding and social care services.
This comes a week after chancellor’s Autumn Statement, which did not deliver additional funds for adult social care or children’s services.
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There has been a 1,000% rise over five years in the number of children’s social care placements that cost councils £10,000 or more a week, the Local Government Association (LGA) has found.
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Nottingham has become the latest council to effectively declare itself bankrupt as inflation and growing demands for services have pushed up to half of all local authorities to “breaking point”.
The Labour-run council said it was set for a £23 million overspend in its budget this year when councils are legally required to balance their books.
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Research has found bus services have been cut by more than 80 per cent in the past 15 years in some parts of England and Wales. The study by the University of Leeds, in conjunction with the charity Friends of the Earth, found outside London, bus services plummeted by more than 60 per cent in 80 local authority areas.
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Analysis by the estate and lettings agent Savills has found average private rents in Great Britain have soared by more than a quarter since the start of the Covid pandemic and will keep rising.
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Any incoming administration must prioritise making this a country that works for all children, writes the vice president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services.
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Norfolk CC may delay implementing its devolution deal by one year until May 2025 to bring elections for a directly elected leader in line with county council elections, after negotiating timing flexibility from government.
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MPs have called for the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities to outline the degree of independence the Office for Local Government (Oflog) will have.
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The Government should show more urgency in tackling the local audit crisis, a committee of MPs has said.
A report by the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee published today concluded the system was ‘currently in an unacceptable crisis’ with backlogs of accounts stretching back up to seven years.
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Health and care systems lack a shared understanding of the causes of hospital discharge delays and short-term Government funding fails to address this.
These are the findings of a report by The King’s Fund charity looking at the impact of last winter’s £750m investment by Whitehall in addressing the issue of hospital bed blocking.
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Former Oldham MBC leader Jim McMahon has returned to the opposition frontbench as shadow devolution and local government minister.
He joins shadow communities secretary and deputy leader Angela Rayner’s team, alongside Liz Twist as local services and communities minister and Maeve Sherlock as faith minister.
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MPs have warned key services are on a ‘knife edge’ due to the poor financial health of councils in England.
Chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee, Clive Betts, has written to local government secretary Michael Gove to highlight the funding pressures councils are under when it comes to the provision of services such as social care, children’s services and homelessness.
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Councils have welcomed chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s decision to extend preferential Public Works Loan Board borrowing rates for Housing Revenue Account (HRA) expenditure.
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Greater central government support is “clearly required” for local authorities, a parliamentary committee has told secretary of state for levelling up, housing and communities Michael Gove.
Clive Betts, chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (LUHC) Committee, has written to Gove to highlight concerns over the financial health of councils in England that were heard in recent evidence sessions.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has been warned a lack of additional funding for Local Government in this week’s Autumn Statement will trigger a fire sale of public assets, reduce councils to an emergency service and put the vulnerable at greater risk. Cllr Shaun Davies, Chair of the LGA said, there could be a big increase in the number of councils in financial distress. “Any suggestion of any further cuts on top of the current deficit we face and we’ll see the number of councils set to go bankrupt rise from one in 10 to a significantly higher number. My concern is that there is a wave of councils that will effectively return the town hall keys back to the government because there is just no way out of this.”
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A return to “austerity” is about to hit a huge range of public services from courts and social care, swimming pools, libraries and roads; with more councils facing bankruptcy, ministers are being warned. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s failure to boost public spending in the Autumn Statement will push some Government departments back to the last decade, experts say. Cllr Peter Marland, Chair of the LGA's Resources Board, said: “Councils end up cutting back right to the bare bone and the public end up saying ‘what are we paying our money for?’ Meanwhile council tax will have to go up so people are paying more for less.”
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The AA have responded to 52,541 callouts in October for vehicles damaged by road defects. This is a 12 per cent increase compared with the same month last year, and is slightly ahead of the previous October high of 52,152 set in 2017. Cllr Darren Rodwell, Transport spokesperson for the LGA said: “Investing in cost-effective and resilient roads resurfacing, rather than retrospectively dealing with potholes, is a priority for councils. The recently announced extra £8.3 billion of funding will help with bringing more of our local road network up to scratch. Longer term, the Government should award council highways departments with five-yearly funding allocations to give more certainty, bringing councils on a par with National Highways so they can develop resurfacing programmes and other highways improvements, tackling the scourge of potholes.”
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Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove said he is confident a bill reforming the leasehold system in England and Wales will pass by the next general election. The Bill would make it easier and cheaper for homeowners to extend their lease or buy their freehold.
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The government has only met its target to show debt will fall by “pretending” certain measures, including the fuel duty freeze, will end this year, economists at the Institute for Fiscal Studies have said.
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The latest analysis from the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has predicted that local authorities will have to draw down £2.3bn of reserves over the next two years, compared to previous assumptions of no drawdown.
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In the wake of chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s Autumn Statement, section 151 officers and chief executives have reflected on what was an ‘unhelpful’ and ‘extremely disappointing’ financial update.
In his statement, Hunt chose to prioritise boosting business investment and cutting tax instead of increasing funding for public services, vowing to “reject big government, high spending and high tax because we know that leads to less growth, not more”.
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The LGA’s warnings of a funding gap for council services over the next two years have been referenced in an article on the effect that tax cuts announced in the Autumn Statement will have on public spending. Public spending will drop by £20 billion a year by the end of the next parliamentary period at the current rate, it is reported, placing pressure on councils who are dealing with unbalanced budgets and an increased demand for services to cut non statutory services to maintain underfunded services, like adult social care. LGA Economy and Resources Board Chair Cllr Peter Marland also featured in iNews, who said that many councils had “shaved” around their services and “will not be able to deliver their statutory obligations”.
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A former care home could be converted into temporary accommodation for people who are homeless. Great Yarmouth Borough Council is applying for planning permission to use 20 of the rooms for up to three years as temporary accommodation. In October, LGA analysis found that £1.74 billion was spent by local councils in 2022/23 on provide temporary housing.
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The welfare cap, a non-binding limit on tax credits and selected social security, has been breached for the fourth time since its introduction in 2013. The Office for Budget Responsibility has forecast an overspend of £8.6 billion in 2024/25.
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Local government figures warned that today's Autumn Statement does not do enough to address funding pressures facing councils.
Throughout the day local government experts have told the LGC how even with "positive steps" such as devolution deals, investment zones and the decision to unfreeze local housing allowance rates, their concerns have not been addressed.
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The end of the household support fund "leaves a major hole" that councils and charities will not be able to fill, anti-poverty charities have warned after the Autumn Statement.
The fund was first launched in October 2021 by the Department for Work and Pension (DWP) with £500m and has been extended three times. Between the launch and March 2024 £2.5bn has been made available through the fund.
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Surrey CC has announced that it is negotiating a level two county deal with the government, after the chancellor announced plans to extend devolution in two-tier areas.
These deals are being offered to single council areas that do not have a neighbouring or island unitary to form a combined authority with. Level two deals do not require a governance change or directly elected mayor or leader.
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The Lancashire devolution announcement in the Autumn Statement is ‘amazing news for county’, local authority leaders in the region have said.
The announcement to offer the deal to create a Lancashire Combined County Authority. was made by Chancellor Jeremy Hunt as part of yesterday’s Autumn Statement.
Leaders from Lancashire County Council, Blackburn with Darwen Council and Blackpool Council have been working to progress a devolution deal over the past six months.
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More support for private renters, devolution and local planning departments is welcome but cash-strapped councils remain ‘chronically underfunded’, council chiefs say in response to the Autumn Statement.
Cllr Shaun Davies, chair of the Local Government Association (LGA), welcomed the Chancellor’s decision to unfreeze Local Housing Allowance rates and allow councils to recover planning costs.
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The chancellor’s decision to go ahead with plans to pressure the Local Government Pension Scheme to invest 10% of its assets in private equity came despite overwhelming opposition from the sector, the results of the government's own consultation have shown.
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The chancellor has unfrozen housing benefits and announced positive devolution news in his Autumn Statement, but signaled tighter public spending despite raising the National Living Wage.
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More powers will be offered to areas with a level 3 devolution deal, the Government has announced as part of the Autumn Statement.
A framework for ‘level 4’ deals has been published, which will allow combined authorities with elected mayors to apply for devolved powers over adult skills, local transport and housing on a par with the trailblazer deals in Greater Manchester and the West Midlands.
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Councils will be able to recover the costs of business planning applications in return for being required to meet faster timelines, the Chancellor said in the autumn statement.
Mr Hunt also confirmed people living near new pylons and electricity substations will receive up to £10,000 off energy bills over a decade.
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Housing benefits for private renters are set to increase as Chancellor Jeremy Hunt confirms the uprating of Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rates in the autumn statement.
LHA rates, which determine the level of housing support people receive for rent, have been frozen in cash terms since 2020 despite high inflation and rising rental prices.
Rent can represent more than half the living costs of private renters on the lowest incomes, the Chancellor said.
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So-called ‘unprotected’ Whitehall departments face further budget tightening despite a pledge in the Autumn Statement to increase public sector productivity.
The Office for Budget Responsibility’s fiscal outlook published today says ‘it is mainly due to the Chancellor’s decision to leave departmental spending broadly unchanged’ that borrowing is reduced by £27bn in 2027/28 compared to its March forecast.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has confirmed the biggest-ever hike in the UK minimum wage – but the move places strained council finances under fresh pressure.
As expected, Mr Hunt announced that the National Living Wage (NLW) will increase by £1.02 in April 2024: from £10.42 per hour for over 23-year-olds to £11.44. The new rate will also apply to 21 and 22-year-olds for the first time.
Mr Hunt said the new rate was worth an extra £1,800 per year to the UK’s lowest-paid workers.
But while the increase will provide a much-needed boost to public sector personnel at the lower end of wage spines – such as social care staff – the move will increase many councils’ pay bills considerably during continued sector austerity.
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Plans to extend business rates relief will be fully funded for local authorities, the small print of the Autumn Statement has confirmed.
Chancellor Jeremey Hunt extended business rate relief further, following on from moves instigated during the pandemic, when he announced his plans to Parliament today.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has announced a surprise target to ensure all Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) funds are invested in asset pools of £200bn or more by 2040.
The ambitious target goes well beyond ongoing reforms to LGPS guidance on pooling first revealed in the chancellor’s Mansion House speech earlier this year – which requires that all LGPS asset pools reach a minimum of £50bn by 2025.
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Pressure is mounting on the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt to cut taxes in tomorrow’s Autumn Statement. It comes as figures from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation show almost 4 million workers are to pay income tax by the middle of the decade.
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Levelling up secretary Michael Gove hinted Christmas may come early for councils when chancellor Jeremy Hunt unveils his autumn statement this week.
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Britain currently has the ‘highest tax raising parliament in history’, a leading economist has pointed out.
Despite huge levels of taxation, and increased investment in public services, there is still not enough funding to undo a decade of austerity.
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The chancellor has received mixed news on the economy the day before the autumn statement, with official figures showing record borrowing last month and higher interest payments offset by better-than-expected tax revenues.
Borrowing in October was £14.9bn pushed up by benefit payments, the second highest October borrowing since monthly records began in 1993 – only beaten by October 2020 during the pandemic.
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The government is not conducting a formal review of council tax, the new local government minister has said.
Last November levelling up secretary Michael Gove told the Commons levelling up, housing & communities committee he had asked then local government minister Lee Rowley to look at the council tax system.
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South Cambridgeshire DC will continue its four-day working week trial after agreeing to answer up to 80 questions, totalling 186 individual data requests, from the government every week.
At an extraordinary council meeting yesterday, councillors voted to agree to provide the data requested by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) every week for the next six months. This covers staffing, costs, service delivery, performance and resident feedback.
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Current provisions for home to school transport need to be “revisited,” levelling up secretary Michael Gove has said.
Speaking at the County Councils Network conference on Monday, Mr Gove said he understood the pressures facing councils in adult and children’s social care as well as services for children and young people with special education needs and disabilities, and revealed he was looking to "secure more resources".
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Not giving councils additional funding in the Autumn Statement could lead to numerous authorities issuing Section 114 notices, and could damage the government close to a general election, a senior councillor has told PF.
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Councils are likely to receive an above-inflation funding settlement for 2024-25, a senior civil servant has said amid sector-wide concerns over resources.
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Household energy prices will rise in January putting more financial pressure on billpayers. Energy regulator Ofgem said the typical annual household bill would go up from £1,834 to £1,928, a rise of £94 or 5 per cent.
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The third round of the Levelling Up Fund has been awarded to unsuccessful bids from round two.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) said the aim was to ‘move away from the competitive approach’ of the first two rounds, in response to criticism from the sector, and in line with the department’s approach of simplifying funding.
It also acknowledged ‘the large volume of robustly assessed, high-quality projects that were not able to be funded in the second round’.
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The Government is facing calls to provide emergency funding for children’s social care in this week’s Autumn Statement.
The Local Government Association (LGA) and 28 other charities and campaigners including the NSPCC and Barnardo’s have made the case in a joint open letter to chancellor, Jeremy Hunt.
The letter warns of a ‘perfect storm’ of financial pressures and increasing demand that have seen social care budgets increase by £1.5bn in the last year alone.
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Thousands of children are learning in potentially unsafe buildings, with MPs ‘extremely concerned’ about the Department for Education’s understanding of the risks, a new report says.
In its report, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) found that 700,000 children are learning in schools that need major rebuilding or refurbishment.
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Oldham MBC and Oxfordshire CC have received improvement notices for their services for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).
They follow inspections by the Care Quality Commission and Ofsted that uncovered ‘widespread failings’ at Oldham in August and a sense of ‘helplessness’ among families at Oxfordshire in September.
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A ‘perfect storm’ of financial pressures and rising numbers of children needing support are putting more local authorities at risk of bankruptcy, council leaders have warned.
Ahead of the Autumn Statement on Wednesday, the Local Government Association (LGA) has joined with charities and other organisations in calling on the Chancellor to provide the funding children’s social care ‘desperately needs…before it is pushed to the brink’.
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The government launched the UK’s third investment zone in West Yorkshire today, to potentially "unlock" up to £220m of private investment.
The hope is that this opportunity for stamp duty, business rates and national insurance contributions relief would enable the region to create more than 2,500 new jobs over the next five years.
This zone, the third to be announced out of twelve, will be focused on Huddersfield, Bradford and Leeds as hosts of universities and life sciences businesses.
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Dire overspends mean controversial measures have to be considered, writes the children’s services spokesperson for the County Councils Network and leader of Kent CC.
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Eyes will be on chancellor Jeremy Hunt and the Treasury this week as the Autumn Statement is due to take place on Wednesday, chief reporter Caitlin Webb looks at what could be in store for local government.
While the appearance of the chancellor at the dispatch box comes as no surprise, the funding allocations are not as predictable.
This year is no different and council leaders are even holding back on signing off devolution deals in anticipation of the statement
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Cycling campaigners have called on the Government to go further than its £8.3 billion increase in funding for local road repairs in light of recent accidents. Cllr Darren Rodwell, transport spokesperson for the LGA said that the funding was important but "it's not the £14 billion it is estimated we need" to bring local roads up to scratch.
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Reports suggested that households living close to new pylons and electricity substations could receive up to £1,000 a year off energy bills for a decade under new plans to be announced at the Autumn Statement. The plans will also include changes to the planning system to speed up the building of new pylons.
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The Government is considering cutting either National Insurance or income tax in the Autumn Statement, it has been reported. The move is due to improved public finances and better than expected inflation forecasts.
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Proposed government reforms to leaseholds could increase the value of homes with short leases by 9.9 per cent on average, according to analysis published by property consultancy Knight Frank and Bayes Business School. Reforms set out in the King’s Speech on November 7 would give leaseholders the right to extend the lease to 990 years.
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Nursery and childminder places are becoming harder to find for parents because of the plan to expand government-funded childcare hours for working parents in England over the next two years, analysis by the BBC has suggested. Estimates show that demand is likely to rise by about 15 per cent - equivalent to more than 100,000 additional children in full-time care. The LGA has warned that provision was already challenging particularly in more deprived and rural areas. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People’s Board said: “We can't control new providers coming into areas that already have sufficient provision. And then other areas not having enough provision will create a system of inequality - and parents will be disappointed."
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There have been warnings that a number of councils will raise council tax to the 5 per cent limit when they set their budgets at the beginning of next year. Cllr Pete Marland, Chair of the LGA’s Resources Board said: “Severe funding and demand pressures mean that council finances are under pressure like never before. Some councils have warned of being unable to meet their legal duty to set a balanced budget and are close to issuing Section 114 notices.”
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North Northamptonshire Council has warned of a £17 million funding gap due to a rise in demand for services and historic reductions to local budgets. Analysis by the LGA has shown there to be a £4 billion funding gap facing councils over the next two years unless this is address as part of the Government’s Autumn Statement.
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A report by the County Councils Network has found that councils are spending nearly double on special needs transport compared to five years ago. Their report found that councils are spending more than £700 million a year on school transport for 85,000 children with special education needs and disabilities compared with less than £400 million five years ago.
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Norfolk CC is waiting for the government to confirm what new devolution arrangements may be available before the county makes any decision about proceeding with the current deal it has on the table.
At a meeting this morning council leader Kay Mason Billig (Con) told members that the government has been “hinting about all sorts of things” ahead of the Autumn Statement, which may affect Norfolk’s options.
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The Department for Education has published statistics showing the number of unaccompanied child asylum seekers has risen by 29 percent from this time last year. An LGA spokesperson said the figures show “how vital it is that next week's Autumn Statement ensures that children's services are adequately funded so councils can meet this rising demand and ensure children and their families get the support they need, as soon as they need it".
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Derbyshire County Council said ‘serious challenges’ lie ahead despite its progress in tackling its financial shortfall.
A report released in September had forecast £46.4m overspend for the current year.
The latest report, due to be considered by the cabinet on 23 November, says the overspend has been reduced to £33m through measures including the use of reserves, freezing all but essential recruitment, reducing overtime and the use of agency staff, and only carrying out health and safety repairs on properties.
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Transport secretary Mark Harper has confirmed the allocations of an £8.3bn plan to resurface England’s pothole-marked road system, set out in the wake of HS2 cuts.
Under the Network North plan, local highway authorities will receive £150m this financial year, followed by a further £150m for 2024/2025. The remaining funds will be allocated through to 2034.
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Inflation and government delay will probably mean many levelling up projects miss their deadlines, the National Audit Office warned.
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New government ministers have been urged to make the council funding crisis a top priority.
Leading experts had warned action is needed to plug the gap in budgets and find funding for the long-term to offset the huge rise in inflation.
The drop in the rate in inflation announced in official figures today should not be seen by Whitehall as a fix in itself, ministers were warned. Councils will still be grappling with costs for projects that have increased with no extra funding to counter it.
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Thousands of people who need support at home face an increased risk of poor care because of low fees paid by the NHS and councils, care companies say.
Only one UK public authority in 20 pays enough to fund the minimum wage and other staff costs, research suggests.
This means some companies struggle to find enough staff to support people with complex needs, while others face going under.
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Nearly a quarter of a million people in England were waiting to have their care needs assessed by the end of summer, according to a report which warns of ongoing “significant budgetary challenges” impacting on the social care sector.
Almost a third of directors of adult social care services said they had been asked to make savings collectively totalling £83.7 million for the year to March 2024, research by the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (Adass) said.
The organisation, which has published the results of its autumn snap survey – sent to every director in the 153 English councils with adult social care responsibilities – said those savings come in addition to the £806 million in savings which directors across England already committed to make in their budgets this year.
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Senior Oflog officials are pressing ahead with their plans to create an early warning system for councils in trouble despite continuing Local Government Association (LGA) resistance, The MJ understands.
Whitehall sources claimed staff at the new local government watchdog had been ‘reaching out proactively and thoroughly’ to the LGA but suggested Smith Square officers had been initially dismissive of Oflog’s work on the early warning system.
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Council social care leaders are having to find millions of pounds of extra savings this year despite winter pressures approaching, a new survey has revealed.
The findings by the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) and the Local Government Association (LGA) show at least a third of English councils face having to find an extra £84m despite the sector already planning care budget cuts of £806m.
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Social care staff are undertaking activity that would have previously been done by the NHS on an unfunded basis, report 70% of adult social services directors.
The Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (Adass) has published findings from its autumn survey report today outlining its members' views on financial pressures councils are facing to balance their books and maintain care and support services.
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A council’s technical financial sustainability is very different to the true sustainability of the place it serves, writes the local government finance spokesperson for the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives & Senior Managers and chief executive of Sunderland City Council.
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Local Government financial experts have warned against “crying wolf” amid an increase in councils publicly “threatening” to issue section 114 notices.
At the annual summit of the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives & Senior Managers the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy hosted a talk on councils in financial difficulty issuing 114 notices.
Joanne Pitt, principal advisor for local government at Cipfa, told councils not to expect to be “bailed out” if they threaten a section 114 notice.
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New analysis has revealed an increase in the amount of finalised 2021/22 accounts, showing that the audit backlog is being addressed but there is “still a long way to go”.
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A “perfect storm” of service pressures, a “broken” children’s social care market, risky commercial investments, and the need for a “wholescale” long-term financial settlement were all discussed by section 151 officers at the latest evidence session of a parliamentary inquiry into financial distress in local authorities.
The Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee inquiry session was held earlier this week at Portcullis House.
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Allocations of the local highways maintenance funding by authority for the financial years from 2020 to 2034.
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The LGA and the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) have called for further funding and support for adult social care in the Autumn Statement. The ADASS Autumn Survey found that nearly a quarter of a million people in England were waiting to have their care needs assessed by the end of summer. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board called for “immediate investment” in the autumn statement “to address unmet and under-met need and ensure timely access to social care for all who need it”.
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Thousands of people who need support at home face an increased risk of poor care because of low fees, care companies say. The financial pressure councils and trusts are under means they are paying companies less than the work actually costs, according to the Homecare Association which represents UK home care providers.
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New data shows a sharp fall in UK inflation in the year to October, down to 4.6% It's the lowest rate since November 2021 - the fall is mainly down to lower energy prices.
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Prime minister Rishi Sunak said Kirklees MBC is "no longer fit for purpose" during prime minister's question time today.
His assessment came after his Conservative colleague and Dewsbury MP Mark Eastwood shared his concerns that the council is "destroying the high street" and "punishing hard-working families".
Yesterday the council announced that its financial position had improved since the summer but it still faces a £16.1m in-year overspend.
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More than a million homes across England are empty long term, equivalent to over one per cent of all the nation’s properties, a new report from the LGA and the Empty Homes Network published ahead of the Autumn Statement has found. The figure from last year is an increase of nearly 60,000 on four years earlier in 2018 and comes despite the introduction of an empty homes premium in 2013, aimed at encouraging owners to bring such properties back into use. There are more than a million people on council housing waiting lists and 104,000 households living in temporary accommodation. Councils warn that the closure of Afghan bridging hotels and wider asylum and resettlement pressures are driving increases in homelessness. LGA housing spokesperson Cllr Darren Rodwell said: “At a time when we face a chronic housing shortage across the country it is wrong for so many homes to be left empty.”
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Rishi Sunak has reshaped his government ahead of next week's Autumn Statement, with Suella Braverman replaced by James Cleverly as Home Secretary and former prime minister David Cameron unexpectedly being appointed as Foreign Secretary. Steve Barclay has replaced Therese Coffey as Environment Secretary, with Treasury minister Victoria Atkins promoted to replace him as Health and Social Care Secretary.
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Pay growth has outstripped inflation by the most for two years, in a further sign that the pressure on living costs may be starting to ease. Official figures show regular pay rose at an annual rate of 7.7 per cent between July and September, which was higher than average inflation over the same three months, but the number of job vacancies fell for the 16th month in row.
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Ministers have come under further pressure to expand the financial support for Britons struggling with the cost of living crisis, after a committee of MPs found some had “slipped through the safety net”. The cross-party Work and Pensions Committee said that support payments designed to help people cope with soaring household bills had proved insufficient to meet the scale of the problem and offered only a “short-term reprieve” for many.
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Simon Hoare has been appointed local government minister at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities as part of the prime minister’s reshuffle.
Mr Hoare is a former councillor and has previously held roles with the Local Government Association. He replaces Lee Rowley who Rishi Sunak made housing minister after sacking Rachel Maclean from the role yesterday.
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The Welsh Government has launched a consultation on redesigning the country's council tax system.
It said it is looking to address the current ‘unfair’ system, which sees people in the lowest council tax bands paying more in relation to the value of their homes than those living in more expensive properties.
The Valuation Office Agency is also preparing to carry out the first revaluation of Wales' homes for 20 years.
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Becoming a council financial director is “not as desirable as it once was”, a senior audit expert told MPs yesterday.
Giving evidence to the Common's levelling up, housing and communities inquiry into financial distress in local government yesterday, Paul Dossett from Grant Thornton warned of a “gap” in generations moving into senior management.
Mr Dossett, head of public sector assurance for London & south-east at Grant Thornton, shared his concerns that council accountants are not “aspiring” to build their way up the ranks.
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Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is reshuffling his cabinet, with Suella Braverman sacked as home secretary, James Cleverly replacing her and former prime minister David Cameron going into the Foreign Office in an unexpected return to government.
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Homeless people's tents in central London have been destroyed during a Met Police operation.
Refuse workers threw the tents into the back of their lorry on Huntley Street, Camden, at about 15:00 GMT on Friday.
Elodie Berland, who volunteers with outreach organisation Streets Kitchen, recorded the scene after being called there by some of the homeless men.
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It is reported that ministers have drawn up large benefit changes for people who are unable to work due to health conditions. The changes, affecting hundreds of thousands of people from 2025, would save £4 billion from the welfare budget.
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Voluntary sector leaders have warned charities are on the brink of insolvency after subsidising heavily underfunded local authority and NHS contracts. Donations, will legacies and charity shop profits are being used to support thousands of state-funded services in danger of closure, including care homes, homeless shelters, addiction projects and physical rehabilitation support schemes.
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Woking BC can now access nearly £80m in Public Works Loan Board borrowing to “minimise the overall impact on the public purse”, new documents have revealed.
A report, published ahead of the council’s executive meeting on Thursday, revealed that further borrowing has been approved by the government to keep the development firm solvent and to complete construction works in a suburb.
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Prime minister Rishi Sunak has asked Rachel Maclean to step down as housing minister as part of his cabinet reshuffle.
Ms Maclean posted a statement on X formerly known as Twitter confirming her departure.
It read: "I’ve been asked to step down from my role as housing minister. Disappointed and was looking forward to introducing the Renters Reform Bill to committee tomorrow and later the Leasehold and Freehold Bill. It has been a privilege to hold the position and I wish my successor well."
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Places and infrastructure must be adapted to support an ageing population, particularly in rural areas, according to England's chief medical officer.
In his annual report, Professor Chris Whitty focussed on how to maximise the independence of older people and minimise their time in ill health.
The report argues that efforts should focus on ‘more rural, coastal and other peripheral areas’, which have larger elderly populations and ‘relatively sparse services’.
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A council criticised by the Government for failing to demonstrate Best Value has announced projected savings of more than £750,000 from its four-day week trial.
South Cambridgeshire DC became the first UK council to trial a four-day working week in January but the Government has called on local authorities to stop any trials.
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Lee Rowley has been appointed as the new housing minister as part of prime minster Rishi Sunak’s cabinet reshuffle.
He replaces Rachel Maclean who was sacked by Mr Sunak earlier today.
Mr Rowley has been local government minister since last November and was briefly housing minister last autumn.
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Healthy Start payments need to increase by 20 per cent to compensate for increases in the cost of food, councils have said. The LGA said the scheme, which helps pregnant women or families with children under the age of four with the cost of food and milk, does not currently cover the price of any available first infant formula. It is asking for the Government to use the upcoming Autumn Statement to increase Healthy Start payments in line with current inflation and commit to reviewing the value of the scheme every six months. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, said: “Healthy Start is a vitally important programme which has helped families get access to healthy and affordable food since it was established nearly 20 years ago. However, the scheme has not kept pace with rising food inflation and does not fully meet the value of essential items such as baby formula.”
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Jeremy Hunt could extend an investment tax relief for companies and announce planning reforms to boost growth in lieu of any new tax cuts for businesses in the Autumn Statement. It is reported the Chancellor will make announcements on infrastructure and planning, as part of a package of measures to help businesses and drive economic growth.
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Inflation is poised for a “seismic drop” to its lowest level in two years, figures are expected to show next week, which will result in Rishi Sunak hitting his target to halve the rate by the end of the year. The rate of price growth in the UK is expected to have fallen to 4.8 per cent in the year to October from 6.7 per cent in September, which would be the largest decline since 1992.
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Rishi Sunak is reportedly under pressure from ministers to increase housing benefit amid record numbers of people in temporary housing. Housing Secretary Michael Gove and Work and Pensions Secretary Mel Stride are said to have written to the Prime Minister and the Chancellor calling for an increase in Local Housing Allowance rates, with a final announcement likely in the Autumn Statement later this month.
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Plans to reform social care have lost more than £1billion and been hit by delays, according to a watchdog. Publishing its latest report, the National Audit Office said the Government’s “ambitious” blueprint faces “significant risks” and that more than a billion pounds of the £1.7 billion committed to reforming the adult social care system in December 2021 has been diverted to other care priorities. It also said the Government has delayed its plans to cap lifetime care costs that a person pays and scaled back plans for reforming the system, despite progress in some areas. LGA Community Wellbeing Board Chairman Cllr David Fothergill said: “Adult social care remains in a precarious position, with overstretched budgets, significant unmet and under met need, and remaining instability within the provider market.”
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The UK's economy failed to grow between July to September compared to the previous three months, official figures show. Many economists had expected the UK to shrink over the period by around 0.1 per cent, but a stronger September meant the economy showed zero growth, according to the Office for National Statistics.
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The UK faces an ageing crisis and healthcare must step in, England's Chief Medical Officer, Prof Sir Chris Whitty, warns in his annual report. People are living longer but some spend many of their later years in bad health, which he said has to change and that based on projections, the elderly boom will be in rural, largely coastal, areas which are often poorly served when it comes to provision.
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A plan to reform business rates could lead to billions of pounds being redistributed from high land value areas to other parts of the country.
The report by the New Economics Foundation (NEF) think-tank called for the land value amassed in places like London to be exploited.
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The Government is behind even on its revised plans to overhaul adult social care, a National Audit Office (NAO) report has found.
Two years into its ten-year plan to reform the sector, the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC) has not established a long-term funded plan or an overarching programme to coordinate reforms, making it difficult to know if it is on track to achieve its objectives, the NAO said.
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An unaddressed “structural” budget deficit and a lack of usable reserves mean Birmingham City Council must make £200m of cuts in the next two years, casting doubt over its ability to set a lawful budget.
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A “broken” market where private providers make “inexorable” profits is causing financial distress for local government, sector figures told MPs yesterday.
MPs on the Commons’ levelling up, housing and communities committee were told how increasing costs and pressures to meet statutory duties in children’s services, adult social care and housing are to blame for authorities being on the brink of filing section 114 notices.
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The current system of support for struggling local authorities does not address issues early enough, local government leaders told MPs yesterday.
Representatives from the local government bodies gave evidence to the Commons' levelling up, housing and communities inquiry into financial distress in local government.
Vice chair of Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities (Sigoma), Graham Chapman (Lab) shared his experience as a whistleblower for Nottingham City Council-owned energy company Robin Hood.
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Somerset Council has declared it is facing a ‘financial emergency’ and agreed that ‘urgent actions’ are required to tackle a £100m shortfall.
The unitary authority, which came into being in April, said the funding gap for 2024-25 is due in large part to an expected £70m increase in the cost of adult social care next year.
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Signing off the mounting backlog of historical local authority audits could take up to five years as capacity issues restrict progress, an expert has told Public Finance .
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Fresh concerns over funding pressures have been raised following the announcement of new government legislation.
The traditional King’s Speech contained measures that will create extra costs for the public sector.
But there was also criticism from local government and legal sector leaders that problems impacting on local communities have not been addressed.
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Last year's Performance Tracker painted a picture of a sector in crisis, and this year's is no different. Public services that have for years been creaking, are now crumbling. The public is experiencing first-hand the consequences of successive governments’ short-term policy making.
The report demonstrates that the sector has not been able to recover since the pandemic. In fact, eight out of the nine public services featured performed worse in 2023 than on the eve of the pandemic.
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The Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (LUHC) Committee has heard how the issuing of section 114 notices in local government has moved from being ‘idiosyncratic’ to being ‘systemic’.
Two evidence sessions held today (8 November) and attended by Room151 featured representatives from local government discussing the topic of financial distress at local authorities.
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The success rate of applicants for emergency housing payments has declined significantly in some parts of England after the Government reduced funding available for the scheme over the last two years. Cllr Pete Marland, Chair of the LGA’s Resources Board said: “Councils are seeing a rise in requests for financial support and advice from households who are struggling to meet their essential living costs, Government permits councils to top-up their Discretionary Housing Payment funding from elsewhere in their budgets, which has enabled some to offer additional support. But given the deepening financial difficulties faced by local government many councils are finding this increasingly hard to do.
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Around 40 per cent of rail services will run during strikes under planned minimum service rules for train operators in Great Britain, the Government has said. It will also specify minimum service levels for ambulance workers in England and border security staff in England, Wales and Scotland.
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There should be greater accountability over how councils allocate funding to stop further education colleges missing out, writes the senior policy manager, Send, for the Association of Colleges.
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Local authorities could have to vote on whether to appoint staff on salaries of more than £100,000, in a bid to save taxpayers money, according to The Sun.
Levelling Up secretary Michael Gove has reportedly written to cabinet ministers to seek approval to pass new laws which would enable elected councillors to have the final say on all salaries over £100,000, the plans could feature in the King’s Speech later today.
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West Sussex CC is looking for a its own full-time chief after three years of sharing with a neighbouring county.
Following Nathan Elvery's departure from the crisis-stricken council a local leadership partnership was set up with East Sussex CC's chief Becky Shaw overseeing both councils since January 2020.
Ms Shaw has been East Sussex chief since 2010 when she was promoted from its director of policy and communications role.
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Councils have expressed disappointment that the King’s Speech offered no commitment to improving local government finances or furthering devolution.
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A new requirement for local authorities to digitally map their road networks has been outlined in the King's speech today.
This is part of a proposed Automated Vehicles Bill, that the government hopes will "unlock a transport revolution by enabling the safe deployment of self-driving vehicle".
Local highway authorities in England will be required to upload any traffic regulation orders to a central publication platform to create a digital map of the road network.
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The government announced a funding package for local stop smoking services would double to £140m in today’s King’s speech.
The Tobacco and Vapes Bill set out the government's plans to restrict the sale of tobacco so that children currently aged 14 or under will not be able to legally buy cigarettes.
The funding will start from April next year and is set to support a total of around 360,000 people a year to set a quit date.
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The levelling up department is to be hit by real term budget cuts over the next five years despite buoyant tax revenues, a pre-Autumn Statement report from the Resolution Foundation think-tank has warned.
Higher tax revenues due to pay rises gives chancellor Jeremy Hunt fiscal headroom of £13bn but the foundation warned the Government’s current plans have not been changed to reflect recently-agreed public sector pay settlements, which would cost a further £13bn.
Public service spending plans were agreed in cash terms before the recent inflation surge.
Per person spending on unprotected departments, such as the Home Office, transport, justice and levelling up, housing and communities is now due to fall in real terms by 16% or £20bn a year between 2022-23 and 2027-28.
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Ninety-nine per cent of councils in England did not have their 2022/23 financial accounts signed off by the deadline this year. Over 900 sets of accounts for councils and other public bodies going back to 2017 remain unaudited.
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The King’s Speech tomorrow will be the first in 70 years and the last before the next General Election. The Government is expected to announce about 20 bills, with new laws on smoking, football and “zombie knives”.
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The Chancellor is facing renewed calls from Conservative colleagues to cut taxes after figures showed a multi-billion-pound improvement in the public finances since March’s budget.
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The early warning system designed to identify English councils in serious financial difficulty is in crisis, with hundreds of local authorities failing to meet the legal deadline to publish audited accounts covering £100bn of public spending.
The vast majority – 99% – of English councils did not have their 2022-23 financial accounts signed off by the deadline this year, which experts say is increasing the risk of financial irregularities and risky behaviours going undetected..
More than 900 sets of accounts for councils and other public bodies going back to 2017 remain unaudited. Ministers are considering an amnesty whereby incomplete past audits would be cancelled to clear the backlog.
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Clearing the audit backlog is "fundamental" to the health of local government finances , a leading accountancy body has told the chancellor.
Ahead of the Autumn Statement, the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) has highlighted the "urgent need" to address the growing crisis in local authority audits, with 918 opinions outstanding.
Publishing up-to-date financial inspections would strengthen governance in local authorities and mitigate weaknesses that have led to the failure of certain local authorities and potential failures of others, according to ICAEW.
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Allowing places to retain a proportion of the local income tax base would let them plan and deliver more strategically over the long term, writes the chief executive of the Centre for Progressive Policy.
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Labour is planning set out plans to give councils powers to close down undersubscribed academy schools. It comes as the number of children attending state nurseries and primary schools is projected to fall by more than 400,000 in 2028.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is expected to use the Autumn Statement to announce that public spending will not increase by more than 1 per cent a year for much of the next decade. It means that unprotected departments face real terms spending cuts in the coming years.
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Only 13 per cent of people aged 16 to 24 smoke cigarettes, compared to 34 per cent of the age group in the 1990s. It is reported that next week's Kings Speech will set out legislation to bring this rate down to zero. It also expected to include legislation around leasehold reform, criminal justice and motorist measures.
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The leader of South Cambridgeshire DC has accused the government of “overreach” in intervening in the council over its trial of a four-day working week.
The council was issued with a best value notice earlier today, warning that if the trial continues the council would be required to submit weekly data to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities to prove it was still meeting its best value duties.
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Senior figures in local government have hit out at the government's decision to issue a best value notice to South Cambridgeshire DC, with one saying today's letter amounts to “using legislation against its original purpose”.
Earlier today the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities issued the formal warning to South Cambridgeshire and said that if the council continues with the four-day week trial, it will be subject to extra monitoring.
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Parish councils in England increased the amount they raised through council tax precepts by £52.6m in 2023-24.
According to analysis by the National Association of Local Councils, a total of £706m was raised by town and parish councils, which receive payments from their billing authority twice a year in April and September.
Overall this is an 8% increase in income for the lowest-tier local authorities.
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South Cambridgeshire DC has today been issued a best value notice over “its trial of a four-day working week” by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLHUC).
A best value notice is a formal warning about concerns. DLUHC told South Cambridgeshire that if it continues with the trial it will have be subject to extra monitoring.
The district began an initial three-month trial in January, after only being able to fill around eight out of every ten of its vacancies. The trial was subsequently extended until the end of March 2024, with independent analysis finding that the initial pilot had been a success.
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The Bank of England have frozen interest rates at 5.25 per cent for the second time in a row. The Bank of England warned that interest rates would have to remain high for “some time” to bring down inflation with a risk of the UK entering a recession.
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The Department for Education has announced £100 million in extra funding to ensure that childcare is accessible for families of primary school age children between 8am and 6pm and therefore able to cope with an expected surge in demand.
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Following a summit attended by 158 councils, the District Councils’ Network (DCN) has warned chancellor Jeremy Hunt about ‘unprecedented’ numbers of people turning to councils in the face of homelessness.
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The Government should write off Croydon LBC’s £1.3bn of General Fund debt, a senior opposition councillor has urged.
Chair of the council’s scrutiny and overview committee, Rowenna Davis, said that if this was ‘unpalatable’ to Government it should ‘bundle up’ the council’s debt, allowing Croydon to pay it back with a low interest rate over ‘many years’.
She said: ‘The people paying for these mistakes are the Croydon taxpayers who haven’t done anything wrong.’
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Trade unions representing the local government workforce have accepted the 2023 pay offer, seven months after it was made.
Two of the three unions, Unison and GMB, have agreed to the pay deal, while Unite is continuing to take industrial action in some councils.
The pay rise is £1,925 for all staff. This ranges from a 9.42% pay rise for the lowest paid who currently earn £20,411 to 3.88% for those at the top of the pay spine.
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The state of children’s services has been described as ‘absolute carnage’ after years of underfunding.
Children’s services are understood to have been discussed at a recent meeting of the R9 group of council chief executives with senior officials at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, with direct Government funding and caps on pricing believed to have been floated as measures to help deal with the crisis.
Cuts in welfare benefits have led to increasing poverty and more children being referred to councils for care while the largest independent providers of children’s social care bring in profits of more than £300m per year.
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Local government’s new watchdog has revealed the performance data it will be requesting, prompting fresh concerns over how it can help a sector in crisis.
Proposals to expand the scope of the Office for Local Government will help give a “sense of how a local authority operates”, its chief executive said amid sector-wide concerns over the role of the watchdog.
Oflog’s now-confirmed chief executive, Josh Goodman, wrote to councils proposing new draft metrics covering a range of service areas including planning, highways, economic growth, finance and fly-tipping.
He said officials will be using existing datasets because it doesn’t want to “create unnecessary new burdens” for authorities.
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The government was dysfunctional at a time of national crisis, writes the director of LSE London.
Next time there is criticism of local government’s management, competence or capacity to deliver, it might be worth observing revelations from the Covid 19 Inquiry. Or, for that matter, the government’s management of HS2.
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Somerset Council is set to dispose of its £220m commercial investment portfolio amid a £100m budget gap for the next financial year and a section 114 notice warning.
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Interest rates are expected to be left unchanged as the Bank of England looks to balance the impact of higher rates on the UK economy.
Sluggish economic growth and signs that the country's job market is slowing down have led to predictions that rates will be held at 5.25%.
Rates had been hiked previously in a bid to slow the pace of price rises and are at the highest level for 15 years.
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Most public services will remain worse in four years’ time than they were just before Covid-19 – and most of them were already worse than they were in 2010 – CIPFA and the Institute for Government’s annual stocktake has found.
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Cuts to public health budgets following responsibility being transferred to local government restricted the expected benefits, the architect of the policy has said.
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Growing costs of supporting children with special educational needs and disabilities are creating huge deficits in school budgets and could force some councils to issue Section 114 notices, a senior officer has said.
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One in 10 county councils in England is facing effective bankruptcy - putting vital services at risk, local government leaders have warned.
In September Birmingham City Council was forced to slash spending after declaring itself effectively bankrupt. More local authorities fear they could be next, according to a survey by the County Councils Network.
Labour-run Birmingham City Council faces a bill of up to £760m following equal pay claims and a flawed IT system that spiralled over budget, leading to questions about the council's governance. However, local government leaders are warning other, "well-managed" county councils could follow suit.
County councils are forecasting they will overspend their budgets in 2023/24 by £639m this year - an average of £16m per council.
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The chief executive of Woking BC, which has been under government intervention since May, has announced that she is stepping down from the role.
Julie Fisher, who joined the council in April 2021, will remain with the council until February 2024 when the council will agree its budget for 2024-25.
Before joining Woking Ms Fisher served as senior responsible officer for Thames Valley and Surrey Local Health and Care Record Partnership and change consultant from October 2018 to May 2020.
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“Out of control” increases in child protection spending since the outbreak of the Covid pandemic have put one in 10 of England’s biggest councils at risk of effective bankruptcy in the next few months, a survey has revealed.
Many county councils and unitary authorities are “running out of road” to avoid insolvency as they grapple with high inflation, increases in children being taken into care, and massive bills for children’s homes, the County Councils Network (CCN) said.
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Councils are scaling back projects supported by the Levelling Up Fund in the face of inflation and tight deadlines, it is suggested. Data obtained by the PA news agency shows only around 15 per cent of the money awarded in October 2021 has been spent in the two years since, with £1.4 billion left to spend. Freedom of Information Act responses also show many projects are still in the design phase and yet to submit planning applications. The LGA warned that “crucially important projects” were “at risk” without further support from the Treasury. Cllr Martin Tett, Chairman of the LGA’s People and Places Board, said: “Highly skilled council officers are working to mitigate against these increased costs where it is possible to do so. To help them with this work they should also be provided with additional support in the Autumn Statement to ensure all projects supported by the Levelling Up Fund can be delivered successfully.”
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Josh Goodman, who has been the interim Chief Executive of Oflog since its launch on 4 July, has been appointed for the permanent position.
This will see him continue to work alongside Oflog’s interim chair, Lord Morse, to provide authoritative, accessible data and analysis about the performance of the local government sector and support its improvement.
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The National Association of Care Catering (NACC) has called for meals on wheels to become a statutory responsibility for councils after it found provision of the services continued to fall.
The association said the services were 'heading for UK-wide collapse' after its 'damning' report revealed that just 29% of UK local authorities run a service like meals on wheels, down from 48% in 2016.
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Councils ‘desperately need’ more highway maintenance funding to address the deteriorating condition of local roads, the AA has said after its worst September fixing ‘pothole-related’ breakdowns for five years.
The motoring organisation said it attended 47,223 pothole-related breakdowns – for issues such as tyre, wheel, suspension or steering damage – last month, up 10% from September 2021 (42,152).
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Solace president Matt Prosser on the simple reforms the government can make to ease the pressure on budgets and why councils will need to think hard about service reform
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Public services are crumbling and risk getting stuck in a perpetual state of crisis, a leading think tank has said.
In its annual report on the state of public services, the Institute for Government (IfG) said they were performing worse than before the pandemic and much worse than when the Conservatives came to power in 2010.
Funding cuts, a lack of capital investment and disruption caused by strikes have all contributed to the decline, the IfG said. Its report claimed that the government’s refusal to negotiate on public sector pay for months had extended the duration of strikes and brought more disruption.
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England’s housing crisis will push many local authorities into bankruptcy as the increasing cost of emergency accommodation for thousands of homeless families threatens to overwhelm council budgets, leaders have warned.
The worst-hit councils are now spending millions of pounds a year – in some cases between a fifth and half of their total available financial resources – to try to cope with an unprecedented and rapid explosion in homelessness caused by rising rents and a shrinking supply of affordable properties.
The scale of the crisis means smaller councils, often in affluent shire counties, are struggling to supply enough emergency homes to meet their legal duty to support homeless families. Homelessness rates in some districts have more than doubled year on year.
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The UK's Meals on Wheels service is ‘heading for collapse' without Government intervention leaving many thousands of lonely, frail or sick pensioners without a crucial service, a damning report has warned.
n 2014, two thirds of local authorities funded a Meals on Wheels service (MoWs) in their area. That is now down to 29% across the country and just 18% in England, according to the Association for Public Service Excellence (APSE).
The largest declines are in London (-29%), the East of England (-27%) and the East Midlands (-25%).
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South Cambridgeshire DC will continue with its four-day week trial until there is “good reason to rethink”, despite new government guidance demanding a halt. The non-statutory guidance, which was published on 26 October, also stated that councils that were considering the scheme should not pursue.
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Leicester City Council is ‘rapidly running out of options’ to cut costs and faces financial crisis ahead of its 2025-26 budget, its mayor has warned Michael Gove.
In a letter to the levelling up secretary, Mayor Peter Soulsby said: ‘Whilst we can probably avoid receiving a section 114 report in 2024-25, a 114 report is becoming almost inevitable before we set the 2025-26 budget.’
Mayor Soulsby said Leicester was facing huge cost increases for social care, with services set to cost an extra £50m a year by 2025, and added that the costs of housing homeless people were being exacerbated by government policies on asylum seekers.
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The biggest private providers of children’s homes in England made profits of more than £300m last year, as concern mounts over the conditions some children are being placed in and the spiralling costs for councils.
Fee income for the 20 largest operators of independent children’s homes totalled £1.63bn last year, a 6.5% increase on the previous year. And 19% of that – £310m – was recorded as profit, according to an independent analysis. Half of the top 20 providers have some private equity or sovereign wealth fund ownership.
Council spending on privately-run children’s homes in England has more than doubled in six years. In 2021-22, spending on independently-run residential care for vulnerable children increased by 11% on the previous year.
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Cratering consumer confidence and the collapse of major UK retailers like Wilko are causing concern about the future of the UK high street.
Both of the major UK political parties proposed solutions to this challenge at their recent annual conferences. The Conservatives announced a £1.1 billion package to help revitalise high streets and towns that have been “overlooked”, while the Labour conference included a panel discussion on the future of high streets.
This focus should not come as a surprise. High streets have traditionally exemplified the historical, cultural and economic vibrancy of British communities. But today they’re more likely characterised by modest footfall, derelict buildings and boarded-up windows.
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The UK’s official measure of unemployment stood at 4.2 per cent in the three months between June and August this year. The definition is precise. It means that of the population aged 16 or above who are either working or actively seeking employment and ready to start in the next two weeks, 4.2 per cent did not have a job.
A longstanding problem with this official definition is that it does not accord with most people’s view that you are unemployed if you are of working age and do not have a job. That should make us think about how we regard unemployment. But the more immediate crisis is that the official figure is probably nonsense.
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Hundreds of councils are failing to publish their accounts – some for years – at a time when many are teetering on the brink of disaster.
An audit found less than one in ten town halls have published fully audited accounts for 2022/23, leading to what campaigners have called a 'transparency crisis'.
Just 31 of around 380 major (non-parish or village) councils released audited accounts for the last financial year – not one in Labour-run Wales.
And 27 have failed to file any audited accounts for the last four years. Town halls have a statutory duty to publish audited accounts annually.
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Widespread exploitation of carers recruited from abroad is the "the number one priority" for the agency that investigates criminality affecting workers in England and Wales.
The Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority (GLAA) told Sky News the Health and Care Worker visa system is being abused by criminals, leading to "a constant stream of allegations" of fraud and modern slavery.
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The Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill is due to become law later today.
Royal Assent is scheduled to take place later today, when the Bill will officially become an Act of Parliament.
It comes after the House of Lords admitted defeat on the thorny issue of enabling remote council meetings.
Baroness McIntosh told the Lords she was ‘baffled and bewildered’ by the Government’s stance.
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The provisional local government finance settlement will be published just before Christmas, council chiefs have been told.
Speaking at a recent event with around 30 council chief executives from across England, senior Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) officials admitted the provisional settlement would be late due to delays to the Autumn Statement.
A source said: ‘It’s likely a spreadsheet on the settlement will land with local authorities on Christmas Eve.’
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Local authorities’ prudential borrowing decreased by £353m in the last financial year, new government data has revealed.
According to data published by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) capital grants were the largest source of financing of capital expenditure in 2022/23.
The figures revealed that the use of capital grants, which are provided by government departments or organisations, increased to £11.5bn in 2022/23, which is up £599m (5.5%) in real terms compared to 2021/22. However, prudential borrowing decreased to £9.6bn, down £353m (3.7%).
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Councils are increasingly opting to provide "on-demand" bus services to plug some of the gaps left by cuts by commercial operators.
The County Councils Network, which represents rural councils in England, says three in four have rolled them out.
But it warned that many services were making a loss and extra funding was needed to keep them going in future.
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Levelling up should be led by the most deprived ‘left behind neighbourhoods’ if it is to be a success. A report by the All Party Parliamentary Group for Left Behind Neighbourhoods claims that successive governments have not recognised the scale of the challenges in these areas and entrust local decision making to tackle these.
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The Home Office faces accusations in the High Court it misled a council over controversial plans for an asylum centre at a former military base.
Lawyers for West Lindsey DC have obtained Home Office correspondence showing that civil servants and ministers privately planned a multi-year asylum project at the former RAF Scampton base despite publicly using Class Q powers to circumvent local planning permission, which can only be used for up to a year.
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Cheshire East Council is pursuing a compensation deal over the Government’s decision to scrap HS2 north of Birmingham.
HS2 would have been ‘the catalyst to reverse Crewe’s fortunes’; instead the town has come out as the ‘biggest loser’ after the line’s second phase was abandoned and the subsequent ‘Network North’ announcement gave no mention of investing in Crewe, council leader Sam Corcoran said.
[ more...]
The Government has announced £42.6m to fund local innovation projects that improve the quality and accessibility of adult social care.
The Accelerating Reform Fund includes a previous commitment to provide up to £25m to support unpaid carers, the Department for Health and Social Care said.
[ more...]
Three in four large rural councils in England are rolling out demand-responsive transport (DRT) bus services but councils have warned that they are not financially sustainable or a substitute for government bus service subsidies.
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The government intends to direct new funding from dormant accounts towards small towns instead of deprived communities.
A cross-party group of parliamentarians has said it is “dismayed” by the change, which means most deprived neighbourhoods are likely to miss out, and urged the government to change its mind.
In March the government backed the idea of using dormant assets to set up a community wealth fund that would invest at neighbourhood level in deprived areas, but the government now plans to restrict access to small towns in the first instance, prompting a call to revert to the original plan.
[ more...]
The new local government body responsible for identifying financial problems in councils earlier and strengthening accountability aims to base most of its staff outside London, The MJ understands.
A Whitehall source suggested there would be a ‘particular focus’ on Wolverhampton as the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities' (DLUHC) part of a civil service wide reform programme that will move 22,000 roles out of London before 2031.
[ more...]
District councils in England have warned that they could be forced to reduce local services, such as waste collection and park maintenance, in the next two years to cope with dwindling funds. The District Councils Network has predicted funding shortfalls of over half a billion pounds in both of the next two financial years.
[ more...]
Hundreds of thousands of UK workers are due to see a 10 per cent pay rise because their employer is signed up to the voluntary Real Living Wage scheme. The rise would be a "lifeline" for low-paid workers, the Living Wage Foundation said
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Councils have claimed a ‘victory for common sense’ after ministers watered down plans to standardise waste and recycling collections.
Ministers have settled on a standardised approach to what can be recycled across the UK, but councils will retain significant flexibility over how they collect waste.
[ more...]
The lead commissioner for Thurrock and Slough councils has warned fellow chief executives of the ‘devastating’ impact of issuing a section 114 notice.
Gavin Jones, who is also chief executive of Essex CC, told the Solace Summit in Birmingham: ‘You don’t want it to happen to your organisation.’
He said the consequences of having to issue a s114 was that it would take years to pay off a council’s debt and services would not be able to support people as much as they should.
[ more...]
Council chief executives have been told Whitehall spending is unlikely to change quickly regardless of who wins the next General Election.
Chief executive of financial forecasters Oxford Economics, Adrian Cooper, said the need to bring down public debt would constrain the next Government from making a real difference to how much funding public services received.
He said, even with Labour’s commitments to build more housing, change planning processes and invest more in the green economy, it would still be beyond a full election term before the changes started to be felt.
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Over £12bn of local government pensions are invested in the fossil fuel industry, environmental campaigners have revealed.
Friends of the Earth and Platform London have warned that investments in oil and gas by the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) are turning ‘public savings into fossil fuel playthings.’
[ more...]
Bus operators have expressed frustration over the Government’s pledge to allocate nearly £1bn of redirected HS2 cash for bus improvements in the North and Midlands after ministers allocated just £150m of the promised cash.
[ more...]
The forecast funding shortfall is equal to 15% of district authorities’ net spending and will require councils to make cuts of around 9% this year, according to research from the DCN.
The analysis, based on survey responses from 48% of district councils, found temporary accommodation, council tax support and financial advisory services are key pressures this year.
The DCN forecast authorities could face a funding shortfall of £610m in 2024-25 (equal to 16% of net spending), mainly fuelled by inflation in pay, contracts and capital projects.
Elizabeth Dennis, DCN’s finance spokesperson, said: “Any further scaling back of district council services would be disastrous.
[ more...]
A national helpline for victims of modern slavery is reporting a steep rise in calls from overseas workers who came to the UK to help plug staffing gaps in the care sector.
Many said they had paid huge sums to the people who brought them over after visa rules changed last year.
Unseen UK said more than 700 care staff used its helpline in 2022.
[ more...]
Billions in local government pensions have been invested in the fossil fuels industry, according to new analysis.
Environmental campaign groups Friends of the Earth and Platform London analysed data gathered through Freedom of Information requests.
The groups said they were able to analyse data covering 75% of the assets under management for the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) – one of the largest schemes in the country – for the financial year 2021/2022.
[ more...]
The host of issues they raise includes the risks of its metrics being used as ‘league tables’, the challenge of gathering enough ‘soft’ intelligence on councils’ performance without seeing it at first-hand, and the temptation for politicians to use Oflog as a political tool ahead of the General Election.
Leigh Whitehouse said:
"It is not controversial to say something needs to be done to address the pressure and tipping point facing local authorities across the UK.
We’re seeing a growing number of councils issuing section 114 notices and some of the triggers for that are things that could and should have been picked up and addressed some time ago.
Could additional external scrutiny have prevented those issues? In some cases, perhaps, but even having spotted the signs, the actions necessary to shift course may not be easy to achieve. It is also self-evident that as the financial tide falls, the shortcomings of organisations, or the impact of poor choices, are more exposed.
It’s certainly a good thing Oflog will be data-led, hopefully maintaining its objectivity and avoiding too much political influence.
The early metrics seem unavoidably partial, but it’s clear these will evolve over time. We must be careful not to be solely guided by hitting narrow metrics targets across these Oflog areas or see them as a sort of ‘league table’. Each place has its own drivers, demographics and determinants, and while neighbour comparators can be useful, they rarely tell the whole story.
From early engagement from Oflog chairman Lord Morse, and its interim chief executive Josh Goodman, I’m confident (in the short term at least) its focus will be very much on supporting the sector rather than undermining it. But how Oflog and its priorities evolve over time is more uncertain.
Whether Oflog is the answer to the current difficulties facing local authorities, or even part of the solution, is unknown – ultimately it’s too early to tell – but it’s clear there are risks and nervousness in the sector, as well as potential opportunities.
We need to work with Oflog and help it focus on the right things, and it’s important engagement takes place between all partners in our areas – not just local councils – to recognise that sector sustainability requires a whole-place, whole-system approach."
[ more...]
Every pound spent on helping young people access activities and support in the community could save nearly twice as much in dealing with longer-term mental health problems, according to new analysis.
The children’s charity Barnardo’s is urging the government to introduce a national strategy for “social prescribing” for young people in England amid a youth mental health crisis that is placing unprecedented demand on child and adolescent mental health services (Camhs).
Social prescribing refers to non-clinical treatments targeted at children who are experiencing mental health problems such as isolation, anxiety, low mood and low self-esteem, and is aimed at preventing these from deteriorating into more serious conditions.
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The recycling “postcode lottery” will end from 2026 under Government plans to standardise what can be put in household waste bins.
Food waste will have to be collected once a week, and councils will be urged to pick up black bin bags at least every fortnight.
Councils will all have to collect the same glass, metal, plastic, paper and card, food waste and garden waste under Government plans to encourage recycling.
[ more...]
The LGA has warned that councils face a £4 billion budget shortfall over the next two years without increased funding at the Autumn Statement. The LGA said that councils faced an “inflationary storm” and that no council was immune to inflationary pressures as well as rising demand for adult social care. Cllr Pete Marland, Chair of the LGA’s Resources Board said: “Councils remain firmly in the eye of the inflationary storm and severe funding and demand pressures mean that council finances are under pressure like never before. None are immune to the risk of running into financial difficulty and others have already warned of being unable to meet their legal duty to set a balanced budget and are close to also having to issue section 114 notices.”
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The Care Quality Commission’s (CQC) annual report warns that cost of living pressures and NHS backlogs are creating a two-tier health service in England, where people who cannot afford to pay wait longer for care. The CQC say local authority budgets have been unable to keep pace with rising costs and the increase in the number of people needing care. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board said: “As this important report highlights yet again, social care needs a dedicated workforce plan to address the recruitment and retention crisis, especially as we approach winter, including action on staff pay, conditions, skills, training and development. Immediate investment is needed in the Autumn Statement to end the gridlock, address unmet and under-met need and ensure timely access to social care for all who need it, not just those who are able to afford it.”
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According to a survey by the RAC, drivers’ concerns at the condition of local roads has reached an eight-year high, with 49 per cent of respondents saying the condition of local roads was their biggest motoring concern. The LGA has been calling for the Government to award local authority highways departments with five-yearly funding allocations to give more certainty and bring councils on a par with National Highways. Cllr Darren Rodwell, transport spokesperson for the LGA, said: “Councils share the frustration of all road users about the conditions of our local roads. The LGA has long called for longer-term funding to tackle the issues facing our roads.”
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In July, chancellor Jeremy Hunt outlined that he was looking to UK pension funds to help boost the economy in his Mansion House speech.
He set out the ambition to double Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) investments in private equity to 10%, claiming that the shift in asset allocation would “unlock” £25bn of investment by 2025.
Talking at the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association’s (PLSA’s) annual conference in Manchester, Neil Mason, chair of the PLSA’s local authority committee, highlighted that the LGPS has already been investing in private markets for “very many years” and is supportive of this asset class, but warned that the timing of the reforms could be better for the scheme.
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Woking BC's commissioners have described the council’s financial situation as “very difficult” after publishing their first report since intervention began.
Woking’s debt stands at £1.9bn. The council has been under government intervention since May and issued a section 114 notice in June.
The report, which was published today states the council remains in a “serious position” in terms of its outstanding debt, on which it will work closely with the government to find a long-term solution.
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A levelling up Bill amendment that would have enabled virtual council meetings has been stripped out by the Government.
The amendment was one of a host agreed by the House of Lords to be removed as the legislation returned to the Commons.
Despite winning cross-party backing, planning minister Rachel Maclean said of councillors: ‘It is important that they are present, active participants in local democracy.’
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Local government is making “headlines for the wrong reasons” which is not helpful for those making the case for further devolution, the permanent secretary of the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Sarah Healey warned.
Speaking at the Solace Summit this afternoon, Ms Healey explained to councils officers how the interventions into local authorities is affecting the enthusiasm of ministers to hand over further powers.
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High levels of national debt will hurt the UK's ability to fund public services and respond to economic crises, a think tank has said.
Not in the last 300 years has there been as large a peace time increase in the amount of government borrowing, the Resolution Foundation said.
In the last 15 years alone there's been a trebling of the ratio of debt to a measure of economic output, called gross domestic product (GDP), the foundation's Built to Last report said.
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Shops, pubs and restaurants are facing a quadrupling of their tax bills next year, after the latest inflation data suggested business rates would rise by almost £2bn.
Estimates compiled by advisory group Altus showed that retail stores will be struck by a £15,300 business rates bill for an average site from next April.
This is compared to £3,600 for the current year, subject to caps on tax reliefs. For a restaurant, the bill is poised to jump to £21,600 from £5,000, while at pubs, it is expected to hit £16,800, from £3,900.
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Section 114 notices should be a very last resort when all else fails, local government finance experts told a Solace Summit session.
Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) director John O’Halloran said the consequences of a s114 notice were losing control of the authority, bringing commissioners in and potential reorganisation.
CIPFA director Joanne Pitt told the session: ‘It’s incredibly tough to make savings but it’s nowhere near as hard as working under a s114.’
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Senior council officers are split on whether improved assurance measures are needed but broadly agree Oflog will fail to improve performance or warn of failure. A members’ survey by the senior local government officers’ group Solace revealed an even split on the question of whether current assurance arrangements for local government were sufficient.
With the emergence of the Office for Local Government (Oflog) watchdog being hailed by ministers as the solution to council assurance, 45% of respondents agreed or strongly agreed that current arrangements were already sufficient while another 45% disagreed or strongly disagreed.
The survey found just 8% of respondents were confident Oflog - in its current form - would ‘act as an effective early warning system for councils at risk of financial failure’. Some 63% were either unconfident or very unconfident.
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Food prices saw their first monthly fall in two years in September, but fuel prices rose sharply, official figures show.
It came as the overall rate of inflation held steady at 6.7%, ending a run of three consecutive monthly falls.
The price of milk, cheese and eggs all decreased, easing the pressure at supermarket tills, the Office for National Statistics said.
[ more...]
The ONS has published the September 2023 CPI figure - which is a key determining factor in much of the LG Finance Settlement.
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Ukrainians who fled to the UK from war must be given certainty over their futures including around visa extensions and in the face of rising costs and the risk of homelessness, a report has said.
The National Audit Office (NAO) said the generosity of the public in opening their homes to Ukrainian refugees had allowed the Government to work quickly to help tens of thousands come to safety since March 2022.
But decisions will need to be taken by ministers about future funding and visas and consideration given to the “threat of homelessness as sponsorships end”, according to the head of the body which scrutinises public spending for Parliament.
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A complex variety of schemes that should support the economically inactive back into work do not meet the needs of people affected and will fail to boost growth, councils have warned.
Research commissioned by the Local Government Association (LGA) found many risk being left out of the labour market as the 51 national job support programmes identified are not joined up and few address economic inactivity specifically.
Figures published by the Office of National Statistics show about a fifth of adults aged 16 to 64 in the UK, totalling 8.7 million people, were economically inactive between May and September.
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The UK’s infrastructure needs more investment, with public transport, home heating and water networks all in need of renewal, the National Infrastructure Commission has said. The investments would result in savings to the average household of at least £1,000 a year, higher economic productivity, and a better quality of life in the future, the commission said.
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A national “shift away from civility” has led to “deteriorating standards” of behaviour in local government with “devastating” consequences for some council’s finances, England’s leading council chief executive has warned.
In a speech this morning, president of the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives & Senior Managers Matt Prosser hit out at the lack of an effective standards regime for councillors which he said leaves officers with few options for dealing with persistently poor behaviour. Since the abolition of the Standards Board for England in 2012, councils have not had the power to suspend or remove councillors.
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The government won a series of votes on amendments to the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill when MPs considered changes made by the House of Lords yesterday.
MPs also voted to block a Lords amendment that would have allowed council meetings to take place remotely, by 303 votes to 157.
The proposed amendment for “local authorities to be allowed to meet virtually” was agreed upon by Lords in July.
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Local government is planning to collectively come up with some innovative ideas about how the ‘broken’ finance system could be improved, The MJ has been told.
Senior officers’ group Solace, the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy and the Local Government Association (LGA) are said to be ‘in the early stages’ of exploring a number of potential ideas between now and the General Election.
[ more...]
Some £90m for councils to reduce the risk of homelessness for new arrivals to the UK has been reallocated after local authorities rejected the cash.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities had offered £500m to 182 councils and the Greater London Authority based on a formula used to determine the local authorities with the greatest need.
[ more...]
Confidence in the new burdens doctrine has been ‘undermined’ by ministers, council directors have warned.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) has advised that the cost of banning councils from being able to charge households to leave DIY waste at recycling centres will not be subject to new burdens and local authorities will need to meet the additional costs.
[ more...]
The Government has reiterated its commitment to opening another civil service hub in the West Midlands, as the Deputy Prime Minister met with Mayor Andy Street.
Despite the location of the hub not yet being finalised, the Birmingham Hub 3 has been confirmed as going ahead, with hopes being that the hub will become a specialist office. This would see the building housing up to 4,000 officials from the Department for Transport and National Highways, with 27 UK government organisations already being based out of the city.
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Birmingham City Council has agreed to implement a new job evaluation scheme in a major step towards meeting its £750m equal pay liabilities.
The council was forced to issue a second section 114 notice last month after initially failing to secure an agreement, with costs increasing by £5-14m per month.
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Six local authority pension schemes have agreed a multi-million-pound deal to invest in renewables projects in the southwest.
The £330m commitment with Schroders Greencoat, the specialist renewables manager of Schroders Capital, will see the Local Government Pension Schemes (LGPS) – part of the Brunel Pension Partnership – investing in renewable infrastructure and energy.
[ more...]
The way local government is funded is too short-term and has resulted in local authorities such as Birmingham City Council being forced to declare bankruptcy, Sir Keir Starmer has told the BBC.
Speaking to BBC Radio WM, the Labour leader said his party would fix how councils are funded were they to be elected in the next general election.
‘It's almost impossible to plan properly, we've got to fix that,’ he said.
[ more...]
Exclusive polling by Savanta and LGC finds significant support for local government having more powers but less enthusiasm for mayors
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The Mayor of West Yorkshire has announced £51m of unspent transport levy will be returned to five cash-strapped councils.
Tracy Brabin (Lab) told the combined authority board yesterday how this refund will “support our local authorities at a time of extreme financial pressure.”
Councils said the extra funding was welcome but that they still facing funding pressures.
[ more...]
Urban and rural local authorities and of all political colours have warned of the intense financial pressures they face. Councils are facing surging demand for the services they have a statutory duty to provide, such as social care, just as the cost of delivering them has increased sharply as a result of high inflation. Cllr Pete Marland, Chair of the LGA’s Resources Board said he expects councils’ funding gap to increase to meet rising demand and highlighted the lack of options to close it.
[ more...]
Average pay growth rose above inflation for the first time in almost two years, in a sign that the squeeze on living costs may be starting to ease. Wages rose by 7.8 per cent between June and August, according to official figures, which is higher than average inflation over the same three months.
[ more...]
A recession is on the horizon and the Chancellor "is in a terrible bind" as low growth and high-interest payments on debt mean little room for manoeuvre, according to a respected think tank. The UK economy is stuck between the possibility of low growth and persistently high inflation, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said in its green budget report and as a result, it said there is no capacity to cut taxes or increase spending.
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Labour is calling for an independent investigation into the Government’s £370 million funding error over school budgets in England. Shadow Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson, has written to the Cabinet Secretary, Simon Case, to request an investigation by the National Audit Office, to ensure the “extremely concerning” errors in funding for schools in England would not be repeated.
[ more...]
Doubts have been raised over the readiness of local authorities to adopt international accounting standards.
Responding to a consultation on the update to the Code of Practice on Local Authority Accounting for 2024/25, the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) has said that greater understanding is required of the readiness of councils in adopting IFRS 16 on accounting for leases.
[ more...]
The West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) has ratified a ‘deeper devolution deal’ worth an estimated £1.5bn.
The deal, announced in the Spring Budget, includes a ‘Single Settlement’, which will for the first time see a region treated ‘as if it were a government department’, enabling the WMCA to decide how funding is allocated from its next spending review onwards.
[ more...]
A recession is on the horizon and the chancellor "is in a terrible bind" as low growth and high-interest payments on debt mean little room for manoeuvre, according to a respected think tank.
The UK economy is stuck between the possibility of low growth and persistently high inflation, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said in its green budget report.
As a result, there is no capacity to cut taxes or increase spending, it said.
[ more...]
Average pay growth rose above inflation for the first time in almost two years, in a sign that the squeeze on living costs may be starting to ease.
Wages rose at an annual rate of 7.8% between June and August, figures show.
That was higher than average inflation over the same three months, which measures the rate at which prices rise.
Revised figures showed pay overtook inflation in the three months to July, meaning wages are outpacing prices for the first time since October 2021.
[ more...]
Rishi Sunak is being told to take on Sir Keir Starmer on housebuilding by cutting the opportunities for communities to veto new developments and giving a right to build in urban areas.
Senior Tories have backed the call after Labour said it was “reckless” for the government to have ditched mandatory housebuilding targets.
The issue is set to be a key battleground at the next election as Starmer pledged to reform planning laws and build a string of new towns.
[ more...]
Labour is preparing to omit details of how to fund a reformed social care system from its next election manifesto, scale back its plans for House of Lords reform during a first term in office, and recalibrate the way it presents its £28bn-a-year green prosperity plan as it prepares to put a “bombproof” offer to voters before polling day.
After a successful conference in Liverpool last week, which resulted in the party extending its poll lead over the Tories, shadow cabinet ministers are now turning their minds to the precise shape of a manifesto for an election next May or October. Senior figures said the focus would be on producing an offering that was “affordable” in a difficult financial climate, as well as being “credible” and “deliverable”.
[ more...]
The Bank of England has more “work to do” to ensure inflation is brought back under control, Threadneedle Street’s chief economist Huw Pill has said.
Raising the possibility of an increase in borrowing costs from the Bank, Pill said the fact that the headline measure of the cost of living was now falling was not enough to claim victory.
Speaking at an event in London, the Bank official – one of nine members of Threadneedle Street’s interest-rate-setting monetary policy committee – said persistent price pressures had to be met with a persistent response.
[ more...]
A trickle of shoppers wanders past the faded concrete facade of a former House of Fraser and into The Square, a leaky glass-roofed retail complex that squats in Camberley town centre.
“It would be really nice if it was a really good department store, but I think everyone’s shopping online now, aren’t they?” says Kerry Summerley, on the hunt for maternity tights for her daughter.
This empty store, like so many across the UK, is a visible manifestation of the decline of bricks-and-mortar retail and the weak economy.
[ more...]
Annual revenues from council parking operations in England have reached nearly £1 billion, new figures show. Analysis of Government data found that English local authorities made £962 million in the 2022/23 financial year. An LGA spokesperson said: “Income raised through on-street parking charges is spent on running parking services. Any surplus is spent on essential transport projects, including fixing the £14 billion road repairs backlog, reducing congestion, tackling poor air quality and supporting local bus services.”
[ more...]
Spending on temporary accommodation by council homelessness services in England rose to more than £1.7 billion in the year to March, with bed and breakfast costs up by a third, according to government figures. Cllr Darren Rodwell, Housing spokesperson for the LGA, called for local housing allowance rates to be “urgently reviewed“ to make the market more affordable for people, for the Government to develop a cross-departmental homelessness prevention strategy and to give councils powers to build 100,000 social homes a year “to address the national shortage of affordable housing”.
[ more...]
Nineteen bodies, including the LGA, have written to the Chancellor urging him to increase Local Housing Allowance. He has been warned that more people will be forced into homelessness unless a three-year freeze on housing rental benefits is ended.
[ more...]
Birmingham City Council is ‘actively exploring’ possible action against its former director of council management Becky Hellard for her role in the collapse of the council.
It comes amid a growing debate over whether the budget was legal if senior finance officials knew the scale of the equal pay liability and failed to include it.
According to a senior Birmingham source, officials were warned of a potential £800m equal pay liability on 3 February – three weeks before the budget was set.
[ more...]
Local authorities’ reserves are already in a “precarious position” and reducing at an “unsustainable” rate, the financial resilience director at consultancy LG Improve has said.
[ more...]
Continued high demand following more than a decade of funding cuts could put outer-London boroughs at risk of issuing Section 114 notices in the next 12 months, a senior officer has said.
[ more...]
White pupils have fallen behind their classmates since the pandemic, a report has suggested.
The annual report, by the Education Policy Institute think tank, also concluded that the attainment gap between poorer pupils and their wealthier peers had widened in the same 2019-22 period.
Children classed as persistently disadvantaged — eligible for free school meals for at least 80 per cent of their schooling — are more than a year behind their peers by the end of primary school and almost two years behind by the end of secondary school.
[ more...]
The UK economy grew in August following a sharper fall in July as the education sector recovered from strike action, according to official figures.
The Office for National Statistics said the economy expanded by 0.2% in August, in line with forecasts.
Updated figures showed that July performed worse than originally thought.
But despite this, the ONS said overall the economy had grown "modestly" over the past three months.
[ more...]
Almost 400,000 people left their jobs in social care in the year to March, with around of third of these exiting the sector altogether, according to a detailed annual report on the workforce which reveals a “leaky bucket” on staffing.
Skills for Care, which is the strategic workforce development and planning body for adult social care in England, said its projections suggest that in just over a decade from now, a quarter more posts in the sector will be needed.
In its annual State of the Adult Social Care Sector and Workforce in England report, published on Thursday, it said that equates to some 440,000 posts needed to keep in line with the projected number of people aged 65 and over in the population by 2035.
[ more...]
The UK economy returning to growth in August has fuelled expectations that interest rates will be left unchanged again next month.
The economy grew marginally by 0.2% in August following a sharp fall in July.
Analysts described the figures as "lacklustre" and said higher borrowing costs and the higher cost of living was weighing on consumers and businesses.
[ more...]
More than 900 local authority audit opinions are outstanding and the government must take urgent action to clear the swelling backlog, Public Sector Audit Appointments has said.
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The shadow chancellor has set out the potential next government’s spending agenda, and shown off an endorsement from a former Bank of England governor.
[ more...]
Public bodies should prioritise investment in long-term training to “carve new pathways for career progression” to improve recruitment and retention, researchers at Mazars have said, with finance teams the subject of particular concern.
[ more...]
Persistent elevated inflation could see the government bank £40bn from having frozen tax thresholds, the Resolution Foundation has said.
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Hubs dedicated to supporting young people with mental health issues will be created if Labour wins power, the shadow home secretary has pledged.
Yvette Cooper announced a priority will be opening centres similar to the Sure Start hubs created during the Blair era that were cut by David Cameron early in austerity.
The party’s Liverpool conference got an early indication of changes to the way Whitehall funding could be used to boost preventative work.
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A number of schools affected by RAAC have remained closed or partially closed since the material was discovered last month. According to the latest figures, which were released on 14 September, 174 schools in England were confirmed to have RAAC. Figures were originally supposed to be updated once a fortnight.
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Eleven-year-old Elliott was excited about moving up to secondary school this year. He was out meeting another child, who was also due to start at the same Durham school, when the government announced that school buildings constructed with a particular type of concrete had to close immediately.
Elliott has not had much chance to speak to his new friend since then, nor to any of his other classmates - because his school was one of those impacted by the announcement.
St Leonard's Catholic School was told it could not fully open at the start of term, due to the presence of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (Raac) on the school site.
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Only five of 467 local government bodies had audit opinions on their 2022-23 accounts published by the 30 September deadline, PSAA said.
The body, which procures audits on behalf of authorities, found the incomplete opinions from last year has more than doubled the number of outstanding accounts to 918.
Steve Freer, chair of the PSAA, said: “It is now very clear that an extraordinary intervention of some sort is urgently required to put the system back on track.
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Millions of pounds worth of unpaid council tax is set to be written off by Liverpool City Council as ‘irrecoverable’.
A report into the local authority’s finances recommends writing off over £25m in uncollected council tax debt from the period between 1997 and 2017.
The report, which will be considered at a cabinet meeting next week, also advises the council to forgive £14m in business rates and £1.3m in housing benefit overpayments.
‘Whilst it is important that all debt is pursued vigorously, it is not considered good practice to continue pursuance of debts that are clearly irrecoverable,’ the report says.
[ more...]
The prime minister’s initiative faces serious challenges, not least the impact of a 13-year squeeze on council budgets, writes the director of LSE London.
While HS2 dominated the headlines during the recent Conservative party conference in Manchester, yet another ‘levelling up’ initiative was launched. This one is called Our Long-Term Plan for Towns and will provide a £20m ‘endowment’ for 55 towns across England, Wales and Scotland that have been ‘overlooked’.
Each £20m will be spent over 10 years, particularly on regenerating high streets and improving public safety. The use of the resources will be in the hands of a town board which will produce plans which will have to be “put to local people”. There will be a Towns Task Force in Whitehall, reporting to the prime minister and levelling up secretary.
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More than two million motorists could be wrongly identified for fines by Ulez or speed cameras every day, a Government commissioner has warned ministers.
Professor Fraser Sampson, the surveillance camera commissioner, said the ANPR (Automatic Number Plate Recognition) camera network’s three per cent error rate for reading car number plates meant there were “significant risks” of penalty notices being wrongly issued to innocent motorists.
In a letter to Transport Secretary Mark Harper Professor Sampson warned it could also be a breach of data protection laws through the misuse of inaccurate data, a problem that he said he has asked the Information Commissioner John Edwards to investigate.
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A social care recruitment campaign is being launched to help build the “vital workforce” with the hope more men and younger people will consider such roles. With over 150,000 vacancies in social care, the Government is hoping this year’s Made with Care campaign sparks interest to help address staff shortages.
[ more...]
Several councils whose with total debt of more than £100m have argued that their investment strategies are financially sound after their high borrowing was highlighted in a recent report.
The analysis by Moody’s Investors Service is titled ‘More to fail as weak governance amplifies the impact of property and rates cycles’. It names the top 20 local authorities in England that have “high debt levels” by looking at how much councils have borrowed relative to their core spending power, housing revenue account income and total borrowing.
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The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has expressed a "strong view" that council meetings should be held in person in order for citizens to be able interact with local representatives.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) has yet to publish the findings of a consultation on local authority remote meetings it held 2021.
[ more...]
The Department for Transport (DfT) has ended the highways self-assessment process, removing the incentive element of local maintenance capital funding in its current form, Highways understands.
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Manufacturers have urged Jeremy Hunt to do away with the autumn statement, insisting that the constant “flip-flopping” on policy is holding back investment and is making the UK “uncompetitive”.
The chancellor gives two fiscal statements a year, the budget in the spring with a second statement in the autumn, which is an update on how things are going. However, Make UK, which calls itself the “voice of UK manufacturing”, has urged Hunt to return to a single annual fiscal statement.
It blamed “frequent changes to policies”, especially around investment and research and development incentives, for having “significantly hampered businesses’ investment plans”.
[ more...]
Rachel Reeves will promise to speed up planning processes to revive the economy as she branded the Tories the "single biggest obstacle" to the economy.
The shadow chancellor will pledge an overhaul of the UK's "antiquated planning system" in order to "get Britain building again".
Business and the economy is set to dominate the second day of Labour conference in Liverpool and as the party looks to capitalise on the Conservatives' controversial decision to scrap the northern leg of HS2 to Manchester.
[ more...]
Children as young as four are being excluded from schools in England in increasing numbers as they struggle to cope in a classroom setting, with many still in nappies or unable to talk fully.
According to the latest government data, 11,695 children aged five and under were given fixed-term exclusions in England in the 2021-22 academic year, which was 11% higher than 2018-19.
In some schools in deprived areas up to 40% of reception children are also now arriving at school not yet potty-trained, the Observer has been told. Experts say many more children are starting school with undiagnosed language and learning difficulties which can lead to behavioural problems.
[ more...]
Civil servants are battling to explain to ministers that concepts like ’15-minute cities’, said to restrict people’s ability to go shopping, ‘don’t really exist’, a top Department for Transport (DfT) official has revealed.
Ministers have recently announced plans to push back against local authority road safety and traffic reduction measures, including the launch of the DfT’s new Plan for Drivers, billed as ‘a new 30-point plan to support people’s freedom to use their cars and curb over-zealous enforcement measures’.
The DfT described ‘so called 15-minute cities’ as an example of ‘schemes which aggressively restrict where people can drive’ and said the Government aimed to stop councils from implementing them.
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Birmingham City Council has “one last chance” to show commissioners that they understand the gravity of its financial situation, according to its opposition leader.
On Thursday the levelling up secretary confirmed that six new commissioners and two political advisers had been appointed to the Labour-led council.
Last month Birmingham issued a section 114 notice, effectively declaring bankruptcy amid a £760m bill to settle equal pay claims.
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A Labour government would respect local leaders and treat councils as an “equal partner”, the shadow local government minister said yesterday.
Speaking at the local government rally at the Labour party conference in Liverpool yesterday, Sarah Owen said the sector could expect an “end to bidding wars” if Labour forms the next government.
Ms Owen told the auditorium: “We would create longer term funding for councils so that they have that certainty and can plan for the future.”
[ more...]
The high street may be facing a ‘terminal decline’ as more than 420,000 traditional retail jobs have been lost since 2010, the union GMB has warned.
[ more...]
An additional £8.3 billion will be provided to councils to help them maintain local roads, it has been reported. The funding will be delivered over 10 years and is as a result of money that is no longer being used to build the northern leg of HS2. The LGA previously highlighted that annual spending on road maintenance had been reduced from £4 billion in 2006 to £2 billion in 2019.
[ more...]
Schools may have to redraw budgets for the next academic year after the Department for Education miscalculated their funding plan. An original plan of a 2.7 per cent increase per pupil in England for 2024/25 has now been revised to 1.9 per cent due to an underestimation of the increase in pupils.
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I was alarmed by how fragile much of local government is. When I was secretary of state between 2015 and 2016 there was always a handful of councils in difficulty. It was usually down to particular mismanagement. This time, I was shocked by the large number of authorities that were close to the edge. And although some – like Birmingham – had been troubled for years, unlike six years ago many others were councils that have been generally well-run. When I left the department I had become convinced that there are some big changes coming local government’s way.
I will write in future weeks about the funding of statutory services in the face of ever greater demands and costs. But one change I think is coming is a recognition that we cannot go on with 317 councils; especially in a time of combined authorities (now covering more than half of England’s population) the age of doubled-up tiers of local government is about to draw to a close. Without a big injection of cash to sustain it in existence – which I don’t expect from any party – a two-tier structure of councils will be deemed no longer sustainable.
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Council housing will be a key part of Labour’s plan to build 1.5 million new homes over five years and more powers will be devolved if the party wins the next general election, the party's deputy leader has said.
In her speech to the Labour party conference in Liverpool on Sunday Angela Rayner, who is also shadow housing and levelling up secretary, set out a vision for the “biggest boost in affordable and social housing for a generation” which will include building more council housing.
“A council house changed my life,” Ms Rayner said, as she spoke of “salvaging the system the Tories have taken a sledgehammer to”.
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The Government spends more maintaining the Houses of Parliament than on improvements to England’s 20 million privately rented and owner-occupied homes, according to a new report.
An average of £100m is spent annually to maintain the Houses of Parliament while the average yearly spend issued for home improvement grants is £93m, according to the report from the Centre for Ageing Better and the Healthier Housing Partnership.
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Local authority leaders have welcomed the PM’s ambition to eliminate smoking but have also called for ‘clarity’ on how new restrictions on the sale of cigarettes will be enforced.
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The Department for Transport (DfT) has admitted it does not have a timescale for the billions of pounds for road resurfacing that it announced on the back of the decision to curtail HS2, suggesting that the claim may merely be a pre-announcement of future routine funding.
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Leicestershire CC has reluctantly opted to work on a level two devolution deal, with the leader describing the move as "thin gruel" after failing to reach an agreement over having a regional mayor for Leicester, Leicestershire, and Rutland.
The area was among the first batch of councils invited to negotiate a devolution deal and initially, there were proposals for a top-tier agreement with a regional mayor.
However, the elected mayor of Leicester City Council Peter Soulsby (Lab) has openly criticised this idea because his county is already “awash with mayors”.
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Hampshire CC says it is moving towards providing a “bare minimum” of local services as it looks to cut almost 300 jobs to address a financial “cliff edge”.
A report on Hampshire’s medium-term financial strategy and savings proposals to 2025 will be discussed at a cabinet meeting next week.
The document says the council is facing a budget deficit of £86m next year, rising to £132m in 2025-26, which “remains unaddressed”.
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A senior local government figure has called for the expansion of vehicle excise duty (VED) to zero-emission vehicles to be an ‘opportunity to reform’.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt last year announced that electric vehicle owners would be hit by a new tax from April 2025, with an annual charge of up to £165 for cars and £290 for vans estimated to raise an extra £1.6bn by 2027-28.
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The Local Government Association (LGA) is seeking an assessment of how cash saved when police attend fewer mental health callouts could cover fresh social care demand.
It is understood that LGA policy experts and politicians are pushing the Home Office and Department of Health and Social Care to provide detailed evaluations of the Right Care, Right Person (RCRP) approach to policing mental health-related incidents.
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Croydon LBC’s mayor Jason Perry has called for the law to be changed to give councils greater powers to hold officers and councillors to account.
In an exclusive interview with The MJ, Conservative Mayor Perry said it was ‘fundamentally wrong’ for officers and councillors suspected of wrongdoing to be able to resign and walk away.
[ more...]
Local government minister Lee Rowley has announced the next phase of intervention at Thurrock Council by appointing a lead and finance commissioner.
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Rising care demand without additional government funding could put Coventry City Council at risk of a Section 114 notice next year, a senior councillor has warned.
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The government has confirmed its intervention package at Birmingham City Council, which includes the appointment of six commissioners for five years – longer than in previous interventions.
The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Michael Gove required the lengthier period as it “reflects the severity and size of the challenge at Birmingham, in comparison to other intervention areas”.
The commissioners will exercise specific functions of the authority, if necessary, while the intervention also includes directions to the authority. A local inquiry has not been commissioned by Gove, but discussions between government and the council are expected in “due course”.
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More than 1,000 publicly accessible pools have closed since 2010, England’s governing body for swimming has found.
Swim England also said a further 1,500 pools are more than 40 years old and coming towards the end of life.
Financial pressures on local councils, increased costs and ageing pools mean many facilities have an uncertain future, warns the organisation’s report, Value of Swimming.
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Procurement reforms, three to five year budgets for councils and a public sector impact duty form part of a plan Labour council leaders want their party to adopt if it is successful at the next general election.
A coalition of seven Labour council leaders has unveiled a roadmap for overhauling public services and rebuilding trust under a Labour government in a report co-authored with think tank New Local titled, ‘A Labour vision for community power’.
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Nine councils have avoided being stripped of their planning decision-making powers after drastically improving their performance figures.
Local government secretary Michael Gove wrote to the planning authorities in April to inform them he was minded to hand their powers to the Planning Inspectorate.
The councils were deemed to be guilty of ‘poor performance,’ meaning they were routinely missing the target of deciding 70% of applications within eight weeks and 60% of ‘major’ applications within 13 weeks.
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Rising costs faced by state schools in England are growing faster than inflation, a report has found.
School funding and costs are growing at similar rates leaving school budgets to “largely stagnate in real terms” when cost pressures are taken into account, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS).
The analysis has projected that school spending per pupil in England will be around 3% higher in 2024 compared with its past high-point in 2010, after adjusting for economy-wide inflation.
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Thanks to councillors and local authority staff were all the levelling up secretary had to offer the sector as he spoke to the Conservative Party conference.
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Growing care demand and rising costs following a decade of underfunding have created a forecast £132m gap in Hampshire County Council’s finances by 2025-26.
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The Conservative Party “will always protect public services”, the chancellor insisted as he announced his ambition to cut civil service numbers back to their pre-pandemic level.
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Woking BC has launched a consultation on proposals to cut services, in an attempt to tackle its £1.9bn debt which is set to increase by £2.4bn by 2024-25.
The six-week consultation on plans in the council's medium-term financial strategy began this week. The strategy recommends a revised 2024-25 budget that includes £12m of savings.
Proposals include the reduction or removal of discretionary services unless they can become "self-funding", and "internal measures" such as reducing the size and cost of civic offices and management costs.
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Districts can lack the capacity to deliver large levelling up projects quickly enough, the Nottinghamshire CC leader and East Midlands CA mayoral candidate said yesterday.
Speaking at a Conservative party conference fringe event, organised by the Institute for Government, Ben Bradley (Con) said he has concerns about the “capacity to actually deliver these projects” when funding is awarded to districts.
Cllr Bradley is also the MP for Mansfield, which was awarded £20m this week for an endowment style fund to set up a town board.
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A new cabinet has been formed at Oxfordshire CC after its previous coalition fell apart following a damning recent inspection of its children's services.
There have also been changes to the council's management structure after the departure of its director of children's services.
Oxfordshire's Liberal Democrats have now partnered with the Green Party after Labour left the council’s alliance last month.
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The government should end its “obsession” with elected mayors and allow areas more flexibility around devolved governance models, a Conservative MP said yesterday.
Jack Brereton, the MP for Stoke-on-Trent and a member of the Commons transport select committee, was taking part in a panel discussion organised by the Institute for Government at the Conservative party conference. He called for more consideration of alternative arrangements for areas seeking devolution.
“There is an obsession around the perfect fit,” Mr Brereton said.
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Rishi Sunak has confirmed the cancellation of the HS2 north of Birmingham but has said that the high speed rail line will still go to Euston, albeit with the scheme taken away from HS2 Ltd.
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Seven in 10 councils are struggling to support people hit by the cost-of-living crisis, according to new research published today.
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Senior local government figures have been approached to give evidence as MPs consider launching an inquiry into financial distress in the sector, The MJ understands.
In the wake of Birmingham City Council becoming the latest in a slew of councils to issue section 114 notices as a result of financial distress, the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee has written to the Local Government Association and other sector organisations to invite them to talk about any issues they are facing to inform its monitoring of the growing problem.
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One of the UK’s largest Conservative-run councils has warned it faces “financial meltdown” and has called on ministers to fix the “broken” local government funding system to avoid it and many other authorities plunging into effective bankruptcy.
Hampshire county council said without a major overhaul of council finances in England – which it admitted was unlikely to come in time to prevent cuts – it would be forced to push ahead with drastic reductions to local services over the next 18 months, and could face insolvency by 2026.
The council has to find £132m by April 2025 to help fill a widening budget gap but has said it cannot rely on operational cuts and council tax rises alone to balance the books without ditching “safe” levels of core service.
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Rob Whiteman has today announced his plans to retire in June 2024, stepping down from the role of CIPFA CEO that he has held for the past decade.
Under his leadership, the organisation has gone through significant transformation and tackled many initial challenges. It has seen strong growth in its international student numbers and advisory services while continuing to grow and support its UK membership, establishing itself as the leading global voice of sound public financial management.
Most recently, Whiteman announced an exciting new partnership with ICAEW, culminating in both Institutes signing a joint declaration to work closely together including an accelerated route for students to gain CPFA and ACA designations and dual membership.
[ more...]
A report by the think-tank Demos says government spending on preventative policies from vaccines to family hubs should be significantly increased and the Treasury should create an accounting category to monitor it.
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Fierce competition between supermarkets has led to the first monthly drop in food prices for more than two years, an industry body has said.
The British Retail Consortium (BRC) said prices in September were down 0.1% from the previous month.
Prices of dairy goods, margarine, fish and vegetables - which are often own-brand lines - all saw falls, it said.
Grocery inflation - the annual rate at which food prices are rising - remains high but is starting to ease.
The BRC said food prices rose by 9.9% in the year to September, down from a rate of 11.5% in August.
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The local government minister has said that despite the financial challenges facing some councils, there remains a “substantial” amount of money in the funding system overall.
Lee Rowley was speaking at a panel discussion organised by the Local Government Association at the Conservative party conference, where he said part of his role is to offer “gentle challenges to you”.
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A council has been urged by Local Government Association (LGA) peers to take more risks to improve its financial outlook.
LGA peers described East Sussex CC as a ‘financially prudent’ authority but found ‘significant gaps’ in its medium-term financial plan.
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Birmingham City Council has started a wide-ranging programme of job cuts under emergency plans discussed by councillors on Monday.
A report to Birmingham’s full council, which met to sign off the authority’s initial response to its section 114 notice and Government intervention, revealed details of its Mutually Agreed Resignation Scheme (MARS).
The report by Birmingham’s director of strategy Richard Brooks for chief executive Deborah Cadman said the redundancy programme ‘allows staff to express an interest in voluntarily resigning and, if this is agreed, receiving a non-negotiable exit payment’.
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Michael Gove has pledged to stop local authorities from implementing a four-day week and said councils could face budget cuts if they adopt one.
During the interview with The Sun ahead of the Conservative annual conference, the levelling up secretary said he wanted to change the law to stop ‘quiet quitting’ and ‘slacking’ at councils.
Mr Gove said: ‘People who pay council tax work five days a week or longer. They deserve 100% of the service, not 80%. The idea that everyone should be slacking in this way at the expense of hard-working taxpayers is completely wrong.’
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Fifty-five towns across the UK are set to benefit from a £1.1bn levelling up investment, the Prime Minister has announced.
The ‘left-behind’ towns will each be given £20m over a 10-year period to help regenerate high streets and tackle anti-social behaviour, the PM said yesterday on the eve of the Conservative Party conference.
[ more...]
The national living wage is set to increase to at least £11 an hour from next April, the Chancellor is to confirm. In a speech to the Conservative Party conference, Jeremy Hunt is expected to say the move will benefit two million of the lowest-paid workers and will also say he intends to toughen sanctions for people on benefits who do not take steps to find work.
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Church of England and Roman Catholic primary schools take fewer pupils with disabilities or special needs than other local schools in England, according to research which suggests faith-based admissions requirements deter pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds. The findings led the author, Dr Tammy Campbell of the London School of Economics, to conclude that faith schools “serve as hubs of relative advantage” for children from more affluent families who were less likely to have special needs.
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The Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is said to be preparing to invest up to £700 million in bus services as he seeks to soften the blow of the rumoured scaling back of HS2. A package to reverse cuts, deliver new routes and allow councils to set up London-style integrated transport networks is reportedly being worked on in Downing Street.
[ more...]
The Government has confirmed the funding allocations of £80m to support local authorities’ bus service improvement plans (BSIPs) in 2024-25.
The funding will be shared between 64 English councils.
Roads minister Richard Holden said: ‘We are providing a further £80m to help local authorities improve and protect essential services, delivering for local communities across the country by enhancing transport connections, supporting passengers and growing the economy.’
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The government has announced the first levelling up partnerships (LUP) at Hull City Council and Sandwell MBC, with each authority receiving £20m in new funding.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has been working in the areas over the last six months in recognition of challenges which require place-based solutions.
Both areas will be awarded funding in the coming weeks and DLUHC will continue to work as a strategic partner with Hull and Sandwell.
[ more...]
Conservative councillors have called on ministers to remove the council tax cap and start allocating highways budgets on a five-year basis.
The Local Government Association Conservative Group launched their manifesto at the party’s annual conference on Sunday evening.
Colin Noble (Con), a former leader of Suffolk CC, who chaired the manifesto working group, said that the “guiding principle” in the manifesto was to avoid asking for money.
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Councils in England have received hundreds of compensation claims for flash floods amid cuts in funding for maintaining local roads and drainage systems, according to research. Analysis by public sector insurer Zurich Municipal found that between 2020 and 2022 councils received at least 740 claims from property owners for flood damage caused by sudden downpours. LGA transport spokesman, Cllr Darren Rodwell said: “Instead of paying for costly compensation claims, councils much prefer to use their budgets to keep our roads in a good condition, in turn reducing the risk of damage to vehicles and personal injuries. However, this has become increasingly challenging, with an estimated and growing £14 billion backlog of repairs to bring all local roads across the country up to scratch.”
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Rising service demand following a decade of underfunding has put the London Borough of Havering at severe risk of issuing a Section 114 notice in the next 12 months, its finance director has said.
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The continued rise in construction costs and high interest rates have forced some councils to halt their capital projects, and some are unlikely to be restarted, a treasury advisor has told PF.
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The government might lose around £15bn a year by 2032 if it decides to ditch inheritance tax, economists at the Institute for Fiscal Studies have warned.
[ more...]
The UK Infrastructure Bank (UKIB) has reduced its local authority lending rate to gilts + 40bps, which is currently lower than the rate on offer from the Public Works Loan Board (PWLB) for infrastructure projects.
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The number of publicly available electric vehicle (EV) charge points in England’s county and rural areas lags ‘far behind’ major towns and cities, according to a report.
One charge point is available every 10 miles in county locations, compared to one every three quarters of a mile in London, analysis by the County Councils Network (CCN) found.
[ more...]
An improvement board of senior local government experts will support Southampton City Council amid concerns from external auditors who have warned there is a “real” threat of a Section 114 notice.
[ more...]
Businesses and individuals in England should prepare for the upcoming ban on some single-use plastic items, councils have warned. The LGA has said councils are concerned that not enough businesses or individuals are aware of these changes. Cllr Darren Rodwell, environment spokesperson for the LGA said: “Councils are sure that businesses want to comply with these new regulations and keep plastic waste to a minimum. However, we are concerned that some local businesses and consumers are not aware of the impending ban on these materials and would encourage everyone to take a look at the materials impacted by it. This is a valuable policy to reduce waste but there is still more to do. We are keen the Government introduces extended producer responsibility to incentivise producers to reduce waste and increase recyclable packaging, as well as enable councils to work with communities to improve recycling.”
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Research by union Unison has found considerable financial pressures on councils which could lead to cuts to services. Their survey which included councils in England, Scotland and Wales found that councils were facing a £3.6 billion gap in their finances for the coming financial year. They have predicted this could rise to £7 billion by 2025/26.
[ more...]
The board, chaired by Theresa Grant, who oversaw the financial turnaround of Northamptonshire County Council and including CIPFA chief executive Rob Whiteman, will first meet next month to support and challenge the authority’s improvement plan.
The council said it has adopted tight cost controls to manage spending following a critical CIPFA review in July, which found the authority is at a heightened risk of a Section 114 notice over the next two years.
Officers said rising demand for children and adults social care and higher contracting costs and staff pay are significant budget pressures.
[ more...]
Research has uncovered a £3.5bn shortfall facing councils over the next financial year, revealing the ‘true scale of the dire state of local government funding’.
Just 14% of local authorities in England, Scotland and Wales said they were on course for a balanced budget in 2024-25, the analysis by trade union Unison found.
It discovered that 114 councils are at least £10m short of their planned spending requirements – and 15 are £40m short.
[ more...]
The Liberal Democrats will prioritise health spending as a way of improving local communities and the lives of the people who live in them.
Party leader Sir Ed Davy will use his keynote speech at his party’s conference in Bournemouth to set out health and social care spending as a clear dividing line between him and his political rivals.
Ahead of his speech, Sir Ed told PF that the party believes it can achieve significant electoral gains based on recent by-election successes.
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Mental health difficulties should be a valid reason for children to miss school while fines aimed at parents should be kept as a “last resort”, according to MPs on the Commons education committee.
The committee’s report into rising levels of persistent absence among disadvantaged families in England warns that fining parents for absences may be less of a deterrent since the Covid pandemic, and even counterproductive among low-income families with financial struggles.
“We heard that fines do not address the barriers that low-income families face and can be counterproductive by adding to difficult financial circumstances. Families are struggling with high school costs and in some cases, fining is not an appropriate, compassionate, or helpful response,” the MPs reported.
[ more...]
Newcastle City Council’s clean air zone (CAZ) has brought in over £500,000 in the first six months of its operation, new figures from the council reveal.
A total of £311,290 was paid in CAZ charges during this period and a further £214,996 was paid in penalty charge notices (PCNs).
[ more...]
West Sussex County Council has received £5.5m to pay for the installation of up to 1,000 electric vehicle (EV) charge points.
Working with district and borough councils across the county, West Sussex aims for the charge points to be installed at 230 locations on-street and within council car parks by April 2024.
[ more...]
Rob Whiteman is to retire as chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy next summer, after more than ten years in the role.
In a letter to the Cipfa board earlier today Mr Whiteman said he will leave the organisation at the end of June 2024, “very content with the progress made to create a modern and successful organisation that is financially secure with a strong voice”.
[ more...]
Trade unions have agreed to reconvene to discuss their next steps on the ongoing pay dispute within days of GMB’s strike ballots closing, The MJ understands.
The GMB is conducting industrial action ballots targeted at some councils that are due to close on 24 October while Unite, which is currently striking in a small number of local authorities, has called for employers to return to the negotiating table.
Unison has confirmed that it will not be taking industrial action and wishes to settle the pay dispute.
[ more...]
Councils in England have spent millions of pounds in court disputes with parents and carers over disability and educational support for their children, a new report has found. A total of 11,052 tribunals involving special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) were registered in the year 2021/22, according to Pro Bono Economics, which said 96 per cent were won by parents, carers and young people. The legal challenges cost some £59.8 million, the majority of which had to be paid by local authorities, the report said. The LGA said the rise in the number of legal challenges to council decisions “is indicative of a system that is not working” and that while government reforms to SEND “will fix some problems with the current system”, they need to go further “in addressing the fundamental cost and demand issues that result in councils struggling to meet the needs of children with SEND”
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Eight unions representing teachers and school workers, as well the body for governors, have written to the Prime Minister calling for an extra £4.4 billion annually to ensure buildings are safe for children in England. They say the crisis involving reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC), which has been found in 174 schools in England so far, has exposed the chronic underfunding of school buildings in recent years.
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UK workers are taking more sick days than at any point in the last decade, research suggests. The Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development found staff took on average 7.8 sick days in the past year, up from 5.8 before the pandemic, which the trade group said was due to stress, Covid and the cost-of-living crisis.
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Sheffield city council is to become the latest local authority to face a mass equal pay claim from women who have been underpaid by up to £11,000 a year, the GMB union has said.
Thousands of women will launch claims against the council on Monday over a “scandalous” job evaluation scheme that discriminates against female-dominated roles, the union claimed.
It said the council is underpaying those who work in roles such as cleaning, caring or housing allocation and that comparable male-dominated jobs have higher pay grades.
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More than 30 MPs are calling for the government to tackle business rates avoidance in England by banning controversial “box shifting” methods.
The campaign, supported by Fleur Anderson, the Labour MP for Putney, and Siân Berry, a member of the London Assembly and former co-leader of the Green Party, among others, seeks to close a legal loophole that enables landlords to exploit empty property relief.
They do this by putting boxes in an empty commercial property, and then say the space is occupied for six weeks. The boxes are then removed, and the landlord gets three months of empty rates relief.
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New analysis has shown almost a quarter of a million properties in England have been left empty for months, prompting calls for many of them to be used to ease the escalating homelessness crisis. The number of properties considered long-term empty has increased 24 per cent over the past six years
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A new study by the Health Foundation has found social care funding in England will have to rise by more than £8 billion over the next 10 years simply to keep pace with demand, and grow at more than double the rate of the past decade if quality and access are to improve. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, called on the Government to address the issue in the Autumn Statement in November. He said “significant uplifts” in funding for social care were needed in order to meet future demand “let alone address the ever-growing rise in current unmet and under-met need”.
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Downing Street has reportedly asked Michael Gove, the Levelling Up Secretary, to develop a series of polices to help regenerate smaller urban areas, revive high streets and improve local transport networks. Officials are working on plans for a new fund, targeted at towns, which sources say would be worth hundreds of millions of pounds and possibly up to £1 billion.
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Councils have said their plans for collecting recycling are in flux after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak chose not to move forward with a proposal to introduce “seven bins”. A new plan has been announced that allows councils to decide how to collect bins, but local authorities say they need more detail to make decisions about waste collection. Cllr Sam Chapman-Allen, Chairman of the District Councils Network, said: “We look forward to seeing the detail. In particular it is essential that councils are fully funded for the costs of implementing any centrally-driven changes."
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Sir Ed Davey is to pledge a £5 billion a year guarantee of free care packages for everyone in England. Speaking ahead of the Liberal Democrats first in-person conference since 2019, Sir Ed said the savings to the NHS would claw back at least £3 billion of this.
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It is reported Rishi Sunak is considering introducing some of the world’s toughest anti-smoking measures that would effectively ban the next generation from ever being able to buy cigarettes.
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The government’s proposals to speed up progress on its flagship reform of the Local Government Pension Scheme could achieve the opposite effect, the scheme’s advisory board has warned.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities launched its long-delayed consultation on the future of the LGPS – including its pooling reforms – in July.
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It is ‘very likely’ that Medway Council will be forced to issue a section 114, a financial report has warned.
The council’s Medium Term Financial Outlook report estimates the Labour-run administration will face a £38.7m budget gap in 2024/25 on top of £17m it needs to find for this financial year.
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Peers last night approved the amended Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill – leaving ministers seeking a new home for controversial nutrient neutrality rules on developments.
After 16 days in committee, eight days on report and more than 1,000 amendments, the House of Lords finally approved a watered-down version of the Bill.
Ministers will seek Royal Assent for the Bill after the Parliamentary recess.
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With the latest figures showing that there has been a 26% increase in rough sleeping around the country, as well as record numbers of people living in temporary accommodation, the report has called for the current and next administrations to take urgent action to address the current crisis. According to the reports, the ongoing rise in homelessness and rough sleeping rates is stemming from affordable housing shortages, a lack of statutory support services, and the cost-of-living crisis.
With the Local Government Association representing councils all around the country, it has responded to the report. LGA Chair Cllr Shaun Davies said:
“Councils want to turn the tide of rising homelessness and ensure no one has to sleep rough on our streets, an ambition which Lord Kerslake admirably strived for.
“As this report recommends, we need to prevent people from reaching crisis point in the first place, alongside providing tailored support for those who are already homeless.
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Council figures warn that delays in clarification over a nationwide recycling strategy could halt local plans to improve services for residents across England.
A series of government announcements last week has left local authorities confused about the future of waste collection and cautious to make decisions about their own local strategy.
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Frontline services will be cut to meet the next wave of savings demand from the government, councils have warned.
The first party conference fringe meeting by the Localis think-tank was told officers are working on scenarios that include cuts of up to 15% that will only be met by cutting services.
The event at the Liberal Democrat conference, which Public Finance took part in, heard the combination of rising service demand, inflation and shortfalls in central government funding have left local government on the brink.
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Almost a quarter of a million properties in England have been left empty for months, according to new analysis seen by the Observer, prompting calls for many of them to be used to ease the escalating homelessness crisis.
The number of properties deemed as long-term empty has increased by 24% over the past six years. Housing experts said tens of thousands could be repurposed as affordable homes if politicians took stronger action. There is now a record number of households trapped in temporary accommodation, while social housing waiting lists top 1.2 million. Properties are generally deemed to be long-term empty after being unoccupied and unfurnished for at least six months, while the owners continue to owe council tax.
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Councils have called for new London style bus franchising powers to end a ‘spiral decline’ seen in local services. In a report published today by the LGA and the Urban Transport Group, it has found that new powers would allow councils greater control over routes, fares set and the integration of bus services with other forms of transport. Speaking to BBC Radio Four’s Farming Today, Cllr Darren Rodwell, Transport spokesperson for the LGA said: “Councils aren’t looking to make a profit but to benefit the community. We want to see a good standardised level of bus service no matter where you are in the country, urban or rural.”
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A new Section 114 warning has been issued by Birmingham City Council. The warning is linked to rising liabilities because of the settlement of an equal pay claim against the authority.
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CIPFA’s chief executive has issued urgent guidance regarding protocol around issuing a section 114 notice, “given the many complex local discussions taking place”.
In a written statement on LinkedIn, Rob Whiteman reiterated previous guidance that it is “reasonable” to not issue a notice whilst an authority is having ongoing discussions with the government “to remedy the proximity to an unbalanced budget by additional support, for example, a capitalisation direction”.
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Four in every five vehicles sold must be electric by the end of the decade, reports suggested. The Government have told the car industry that they require 22 per cent of cars sold by manufacturers to be electric from next year. By 2030, the quota will gradually rise to 80 per cent.
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The cost of delivering HS2 was “getting totally out of control”, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has said yesterday. The project had been delayed, with the eastern section to Leeds being scrapped in 2021.
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Government borrowing was higher than economists had expected in August, new official figures show.
Borrowing - the difference between spending and tax income - rose to £11.6bn last month, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
That was £3.5bn more than a year earlier and the fourth highest August borrowing since monthly records began in 1993.
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About 75,000 public assets, worth about £15bn, have been sold by English councils since 2010, in part to plug holes in their budgets, research by IPPR has found.
An average of 6,000 council assets – such as playing fields, community centres, libraries, youth clubs and swimming pools – worth £1.2bn have been sold each year in the past 13 years, the thinktank estimated, through analysis of government data and statistics from a freedom of information request.
By contrast, the research estimated just 2,500 assets came newly into community ownership during the same time.
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As we're just hearing, UK interest rates have been left unchanged at 5.25% by the Bank of England.
The decision comes a day after figures revealed an unexpected slowdown in UK price rises in August.
The Bank had previously raised rates 14 times in a row to tame inflation, leading to increases in mortgage payments but also higher savings rates.
However, the latest move raises the prospect that this cycle of rate increases may have peaked.
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New emergency finance warnings have been issued by Birmingham City Council officials over a delay to deal with its equal pay liabilities.
The government announced on Tuesday it will intervene in the running of the local authority owing to its financial crisis.
Commissioners will start work on 26 September, the council's leader said.
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Prime minister Rishi Sunak has declared households will never be forced to have seven bins each as part of his major reversal of the government’s green policies, LGC’s sister title MRW reports.
Describing a “range of worrying proposals” as part of previous net zero policies, Mr Sunak described such plans a “diktat” that “will never happen under this government.”
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Durham County Council will spend £6m as part of plans to regenerate the village of Horden, where homes are on the market for just £5,000.
Durham said it had ambitious plans to redevelop the former mining village, but an unsuccessful levelling up bid in 2022 left it without adequate funding.
Proposals had included two new housing sites, improvements to community facilities and better connections to Peterlee rail station and the Heritage Coast.
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UK economic growth is weak and government must plan for future needs like older population.
An economic outlook report warned of weakness in the euro area and the United Kingdom.
Output has stagnated and the gradual recovery in consumer confidence over the past year has stalled.
There was also a bleak assessment on UK house price falls: “These declines are comparable in percentage terms to those seen at the time of the global financial crisis.”
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Hundreds of children with special educational needs (SEND) are being denied a school place because of a lack of appropriate provision, research by ITV News has revealed.
Thousands more vulnerable children are being home-schooled - either by choice or because it is the only option left for parents battling against the SEND system.
The investigation by ITV News highlights serious failings in the education of young people who are being left behind as councils fight to balance budgets and provide specialist education to those who need it most.
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Liz Truss has criticised the role of institutions and blamed the “anti-growth coalition” for failing to implement her tax-cutting agenda during her short stint as prime minister last year.
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Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove has outlined plans to appoint commissioners to exercise control over certain functions at Birmingham City Council and to launch an inquiry into the circumstances that have led to the issuing of a Section 114 notice. Mr Gove said the council would prepare and agree an improvement plan within six months. He added: “I acknowledge the council is working with the LGA on its own proposals on improvement and I’ve met with the leader of the council to hear his plans.” The LGA has warned that many more councils are in a precarious financial situation. LGA Chair Cllr Shaun Davies said: “Councils in England face a funding gap of almost £3 billion over the next two years, at the very least. None are immune to the risk of running into financial difficulty and others have already warned of being close to also having to issue Section 114 notices themselves.”
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In August, core inflation was 6.2 per cent in the 12 months to August 2023, down from 6.9 per cent in July. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development said UK inflation would average 7.2 per cent in 2023. It said this would be the highest rate in the G7 group of major economies.
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The Government suffered a flurry of last-minute defeats as the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill completed its journey through the House of Lords.
Chief among them was the Government’s attempt to scrap nutrient neutrality rules, under which developers have to prove new buildings will have a neutral impact on protected waterways.
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New research has claimed mental health and stress is the most common reason for social care staff sickness and absence in more than 77% of councils.
The data obtained from 114 councils by the British Psychological Society (BPS) also revealed 1.6 million days of sickness absence were taken by adult and children’s social care staff at the councils surveyed.
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Westminster City Council has urged the Government to enable local authorities to tax tourists on stays.
The London borough called for primary legislation allowing councils to implement and set the rates for an overnight levy.
Westminster council leader Adam Hug said in a speech yesterday that the authority was ‘exploring with business partners what an overnight stay levy could look like in practice’.
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Six areas across the UK have been awarded funding to test smart streetlamps that can charge electric vehicles (EVs) and boost wireless coverage.
The £1.3m pilots of the multi-purpose street columns will also be supported with a further £2.7m from the local authorities selected, which include Cambridgeshire and Oxfordshire.
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The financial pressures facing Birmingham City Council have thrust local government finance back into the national spotlight.
But we know that funding, cost, and demand pressures are growing for all councils and the evidence of the risk to the financial sustainability of the sector has been there for all to see for some time.
The Section 114 issued by Birmingham was the sixth issued by councils since 2010 – whereas just two were issued in the decade before.
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Low usable reserves and a projected overspend have put Middlesbrough Council at risk of issuing a Section 114 notice this year, its external auditors have said.
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Rising service demand and years of underfunding are pushing Medway Council closer to a Section 114 notice, officers have said.
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The reliance on reserves to balance budgets and an “ambitious” medium-term savings strategy are significant risks to Brighton and Hove City Council’s financial viability, its external auditors have warned.
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The potential for an auditor intervention over the accounting for a £70m loan has forced Plymouth City Council to apply for exceptional government support.
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Essex CC, Southend-on-Sea City Council and Thurrock Council will seek a level two devolution deal for the area.
Research for LGC's devolution map in June found the three councils were holding talks about both a level two deal and a level three mayoral deal, with Southend previously indicating that it was reluctant to opt for a directly elected leader option.
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Care home bosses are recommending the next government funds a £15-per-hour minimum wage for frontline staff to stabilise the crisis-hit sector and boost a system that is “in an extremely precarious state”. There are currently over 152,000 vacant posts, 430,000 people are on care waiting lists and scores of facilities are rated inadequate in the care system.
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The Government has given Kent CC £10m for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children (UASC) amid concerns other councils have been slow to support the National Transfer Scheme.
Home Office lawyers told the High Court last week that Kent CC would receive an additional £9.75m to accommodate more asylum-seeking children.
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The Conservative Government must level up England’s struggling coastal communities or risk losing 113 seaside seats to Labour, a conservative think tank has warned.
A new report from Onward shows that these coastal communities are poorer, sicker, more crime-ridden and poorly housed than the rest of the country.
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The Commons' levelling up, housing and communities committee has expressed concern and disappointment at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) for its repeatedly late responses to the committee’s reports.
A special report published by the committee today says DLUHC has not responded to any of the its seven reports for the 2022-23 session within the two-month deadline.
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In Michael Gove’s otherwise sombre speech to parliament on Tuesday announcing a team of commissioners to run the cash-strapped Labour-run Birmingham council, the communities secretary could not resist a swipe at his political opponents.
“I think it important for us to recognise that the intervention in Birmingham, and our [previous] interventions in Sandwell and Liverpool, have all been interventions in Labour-led local authorities in which comprehensive mismanagement extended back over years,” he said.
But while Gove may have relished the chance to embarrass Labour, experts say his stance may come back to bite him given how many other councils, including those run by Conservatives, are likely to follow suit.
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Brutal Tory cuts have driven councils to the brink of bankruptcy, MPs heard after the Government said it was stepping in to run cash-strapped Birmingham City Council.
Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner said the authority had been "pushed over the edge" and blamed ministers after the city's authority effectively declared itself bankrupt. It is feared the city now faces a fire sale of its assets, including its library and museum.
Michael Gove, the Tory Communities Secretary, said a local inquiry would be set up to investigate what went wrong, while Government-appointed commissioners would now run the authority. He told the Commons he was satisfied the council was "failing to comply with its best value duty".
But the Local Government Association (LGA) has warned that many more are in a precarious situation. It said local authorities in England are facing a funding gap of almost £3billion over the next two years as it called on the Government to act.
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Almost every council in England could increase council tax by the maximum amount from next April as many local authorities face unprecedented funding gaps, local government sources are reported as saying. An increase of nearly 5 per cent across England would add £103 to the average council tax bill with the Band D charge increasing to around £2,168 a year. The LGA said councils have had a 60 per cent reduction in funding from government since 2010. Cllr Shaun Davies, Chair of the LGA, said: “While council tax is an important funding stream, it has never been the solution to the long-term pressures facing our local services, raising different amounts in different parts of the country, which is not related to need.”
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Trade unions are warning there could be thousands of job cuts at councils as they attempt to manage growing funding pressures. As well as funding reductions for local services, it is reported councils are now looking to redundancies and a pause on filling vacancies to make up millions more. The LGA has said councils are facing a £3 billion funding gap over the next two years.
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Social care and health services should be properly merged to avoid arguments about which organisation pays for an individual’s care, former Swindon chief executive Susie Kemp has said.
Speaking to LGC, Ms Kemp, who was chief executive of Swindon BC until the end of August, said “arguments at the local level” about whether health or social care should fund an individual’s care were “ridiculous”.
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Stealthy national taxes face little scrutiny compared with council tax, yet local politicians are more trusted, writes the director of LSE London.
Of the many differences between central and local government, one of the starkest is the direct accountability to which council leaders and mayors are subject. Ministers, by comparison, rarely accept they make mistakes and even more rarely resign as a direct result of policy failure. Kwasi Kwarteng and Liz Truss were rare recent examples of direct accountability for the damage they inflicted on the economy.
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Dehenna Davison has stood down as levelling up minister, saying chronic migraines have made it “difficult, if not impossible” to do the job.
Ms Davison, the MP for Bishop Aukland, had already said she will stand down from parliament at the next election. She became levelling up minister last September and is responsible for progressing devolution deals and overseeing the levelling up fund.
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Councils would be able to vary fees for planning applications under amendments to the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill.
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Jacob Young, the Conservative MP for Redcar, has been appointed as a parliamentary under-secretary of state in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC).
He replaces Dehenna Davison, who stood down from the ministerial role today, saying chronic migraines had made it “difficult, if not impossible” to do the job.
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Many parents are struggling to find suitable childcare, with some forced to give up work or change their careers due to a shortfall of nursery spaces and others spending hundreds of pounds on waiting lists, only to be declined at the final hour. There were 4,800 fewer childcare providers at the end of March compared with the same time last year, according to Ofsted. In March, the Government announced plans to increase provision of free childcare, but the LGA warned that 88 per cent of councils are concerned that nursery closures this year will undermine these expansions.
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Derbyshire County Council could stop all non-essential spending and implement a recruitment freeze due to a £46 million budget black hole. It said a growing overspend had prompted "very painful" budget decisions. Despite making £300 million in savings in the past 13 years, the council said its reserves have dropped to a "minimum level". The authority said this was due to rising costs, including general inflation, and greater demand on services.
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Dozens of local authorities could be subject to equal pay claims after failing to end discriminatory practices against women, according to the GMB union. The growing number of equal pay claims against councils comes as some warn of dire financial circumstances due to soaring demand for their services, rising costs and funding shortfalls. The LGA has warned that English and Welsh councils faced a collective budget shortfall this financial year of up to £3 billion. LGA Chair Cllr Shaun Davies was also interviewed on ITV News about this issue.
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Councils in England are in a “worsening doom-spiral of unsustainable spending” when it comes to children’s social care, according to a new report.
Millions more has been spent on children’s services in recent years but much is going on costly late-stage intervention, new analysis commissioned by leading charities suggested.
This means vulnerable children are being helped mainly in emergency situations rather than having a focus on earlier preventative work, the report by Pro Bono Economics said.
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Many councils use reserves to fund capital spending to avoid the need for additional borrowing.
However, Michael Hudson, executive director of finance and resources at Cambridgeshire County Council, said the use of reserves to meet revenue budget pressures has restricted many authorities from doing this.
He told PF that as a result, authorities will be forced to borrow externally, which puts further pressure on finances, given interest rates are at their highest level in more than a decade.
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Almost 100 local authorities in England have a higher debt burden than Birmingham City Council, which last week issued a Section 114 notice, according to the latest budget data. A total of 192 local authorities in England have debts that are more than twice the size of their spending power. Cllr Pete Marland, Chair of the LGA’s Economy and Resources Board, said councils have faced a choice of either accepting funding reductions and cutting services, or making investments to try and protect them. He said: “This was an approach that was encouraged by government. While some councils have made investment decisions to help them replace funding shortfalls, the majority of council borrowing is focused on investing in projects that contribute to their local economies or help them provide core functions, such as housing and transport schemes.”
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The NHS will receive an extra £200 million from the Government ahead of winter, aimed at supporting the health service so it can attend to patients as quickly as possible amid record waiting lists. Alongside the winter fund, the Government announced a £40 million investment in social care, with local authorities being urged to bid for a share of the funding.
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Rising housing pressures will force some councils to effectively declare bankruptcy, a local authority chief executive with more than 40 years of experience in the sector has warned.
The warning comes after the national cost of temporary accommodation reached more than £1bn a year - up 71% over the past five years – with Hastings BC naming it as the ‘main risk to the council being able to balance its budget’.
Writing for The MJ, Chelmsford City Council chief executive officer, Nick Eveleigh, who leads on housing for Essex districts, wrote: ‘Many authorities across the country with hitherto strong financial management may face bankruptcy over the coming years.’
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Two ideas would be much cheaper than reforming the charging system more generally and would be far less bureaucratic, writes a former director of adult social care.
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Hampshire County Council has warned that it is “close to breaking point” as it faces a budget gap of at least £132m by April 2025.
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Kent County Council is at a “tipping point” and unless the authority improves its financial position it will have “no other option but to publish a section 114 notice”, external auditors have warned.
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The director of finance at East Riding of Yorkshire Council has stressed that local government finances are “stretched beyond capacity”, with the “once scarce s114 notice” becoming a more regular occurrence.
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Durham County Council is looking at a maximum council tax increase and ways to make savings as it tackles an “extremely challenging” financial outlook.
The authority’s cabinet was told in a meeting yesterday (13 September) that £12.1m in budget savings for 2024/25 were needed, even if council tax is increased.
A budget gap of £56m over the next four years is also being forecast.
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The local government funding system is “fundamentally broken”, according to Leeds City Council – which must save nearly £60m in its 2024/25 budget.
A financial reporting update authored by section 151 officer Victoria Bradshaw has projected an overspend of £33.9m for financial year 2023/24, as at July (month four). This represents a 19% adverse movement from the authority’s Q1 position, Bradshaw’s report said.
And an update of the authority’s Medium Term Financial Strategy for 2024/25 to 2028/29 identifies an estimated General Fund budget gap of £251.0m for the five-year period, of which £59.2m relates to 2024/25.
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Surrey Heath Borough Council has warned that it faces “effective bankruptcy” in the next two to three years as a result of costly commercial investments, which have left the authority in “huge debt”.
In 2016, the authority purchased the shopping centre complex The Square and the House of Fraser department store in Camberley for a combined total of £113m using short-term loans. However, according to the council’s latest valuations, these investments are now valued at £33m – a loss of £79m.
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The government recently proposed auditors provide as much assurance as possible on previous accounts, some of which date back to 2015-16, but limit their opinions in certain circumstances to clear the current backlog of 520 accounts in time for new statutory deadlines.
Sarah Healey, permanent secretary at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, said the intervention is necessary to allow for a “system reset”.
Writing to Public Accounts Committee chair Meg Hillier, she said proposals could lead to more qualified opinions and disclaimers of opinions on accounts, indicating auditors lack confidence in a particular aspect of the accounts or are unable to give an opinion at all due to insufficient information.
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Taxpayers face forking out nearly £5million a week to subsidise council planning fees, town hall chiefs warned today.
Costs for processing applications are due to rise - but until new measures are approved by the Government, the burden falls on all cash-strapped local residents. Ministers have pledged to hike fees by 35% for big applications and 25% for minor works.
But regulations for the rises to come into force need to be voted on by the Commons and Lords, the Local Government Association warned. It called on the Tories to “urgently make parliamentary time to introduce the fee uplift”.
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The challenges being faced by Birmingham City Council are extreme, its leader has conceded to members in the wake of a deep financial crisis.
Last week, the authority announced it was essentially bankrupt and all new spending would cease save for delivering essential services.
For the first time since, John Cotton on Tuesday formally addressed councillors at a cabinet meeting.
He told them "tough decisions" were needed to "rebuild Birmingham".
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Voter ID could cause "serious disruption" to the next general election, the Local Government Information Unit think-tank has warned, with councils not having enough staff to implement the new rules without more funding. In a separate report, the Electoral Commission called on the Government to expand the list of accepted ID documents to "remove barriers" to voting. Cllr Shaun Davies, LGA Chair, said: “Councils will need support from government to recruit additional staff so they can manage increased demand. As well as this there needs to be a centrally funded campaign to ensure as many voters as possible are aware of voter ID requirements ahead of a general election.”
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Qualified opinions on historical council accounts are likely if the government waives some reporting requirements as it strives for a “system reset”, which it currently plans to do, a senior civil servant has said.
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The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for better roads has issued a report calling for the Government to restore ringfencing and multi-year settlements for local road maintenance.
The APPG’s chairman, Sir Christopher Chope MP, said: ‘Both the Prime Minister and the chancellor have pledged to tackle the “plague of potholes” on our local roads.
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The number of miles of road in England resurfaced or given life-extending treatment is at its lowest point in five years, according to an analysis of government data by the RAC.
The motoring organisation said figures show that 1,123 miles of all types of road were resurfaced in 2021-2022, compared to 1,588 in 2017-2018 – a 29% reduction.
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Only half of the required number of trainee secondary school teachers in England have been recruited as the academic year gets under way, analysis shows.
The figures, obtained by the National Education Union (NEU) and the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT), show ministers are on course to miss their recruitment targets by 48%.
Numbers in all subjects except for history, PE and classics are below the government recruitment target, the National Foundation for Educational Research has said. “Without an urgent policy response to make teaching more attractive, schools will face increasingly intense shortages over the next few years, which are likely to impact negatively on the quality of pupils’ education,” said Jack Worth, the NFER’s school workforce lead.
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"Several hundred" surveys are now being carried out every week to find schools containing collapse-prone concrete in England, according to the Department for Education (DfE).
Officials told the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that 98% of schools have returned questionnaires about the presence of the material.
"A few hundred" are still outstanding.
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More English councils are expected to fail owing billions of pounds in debts, a leading credit rating agency has warned, amid an escalating crisis for local government after years of budget cuts and mismanagement.
In a report in the wake of the financial meltdown at Birmingham city council, Moody’s said several other local authorities across the country were close to issuing pre-insolvency warnings and listed the 20 most indebted in England relative to size.
The country’s largest local authority in effect declared itself bankrupt last week, having issued a section 114 notice – signalling that it does not have the resources to balance its budget. It followed similar recent failures at cash-strapped councils, including Woking, Croydon, Thurrock and Slough.
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The NHS is starting to give booster shots of Covid and flu vaccine to older people living in care homes in England over concerns about a highly-mutated new Covid variant that is spreading. Starting with adult care homes and people who are housebound, other eligible groups will begin to be invited for their vaccines soon afterwards.
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In an opinion piece, the Observer says the Section 114 notice issued by Birmingham City Council last week has occurred against a backdrop of deep cuts to local government funding since 2010 and follows several other councils which have issued such notices. It quotes the Institute for Fiscal Studies as characterising the system of local government funding as “broken down” and said England urgently needs a sustainable system of local government finance, that involves a much stronger element of redistribution from richer to poorer areas.
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The Government has quietly signed a contract targeting 20 per cent cuts to the number of new education plans for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) to bring down costs, it is reported. The cuts target has emerged as councils across England grapple with huge financial deficits on SEND budgets caused by a combination of rising demand and longstanding underfunding.
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At least £2.1bn was spent on agency staff by councils across the UK last year, according to analysis by the 4 Day Week Campaign.
Researcher Nic Murray called the spending on agency staff a ‘colossal waste of taxpayers’ money’.
Freedom of Information Act requests made by the national campaign group found that for the 2022-23 financial year, councils’ spending on agency staff amounted to 6% of their total spend on staff.
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Following Birmingham’s Section 114 announcement recently, the conversation in the news quickly moved to the situation facing the whole sector, and the need for the Government to look at council funding.
Funding formulas don’t normally grab the headlines, but despite this they play an important role. They underpin vital services and therefore it is absolutely essential that we get them right so that funding is distributed in a fair and equitable way.
There’s much debate about what should go into the funding formula for council funding. Anyone involved in the Fair Funding review will know there are numerous competing voices, as everyone tries to secure a bigger piece of the pie.
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Birmingham City Council’s monitoring officer has said it is “extraordinarily difficult” to define the services that the council has a legal responsibility to maintain under its new section 114 arrangements.
The situation prompted one opposition councillor to comment that “we don't really know what a statutory service is at the moment”.
Birmingham’s effective bankruptcy notice, issued last week, means the council must stop all spending on non-statutory services.
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If action is not taken soon social care will be everyone’s problem, writes the social care policy adviser at the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy.
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The impact on services of the financial pressure councils are under will be severe, even in councils not warning they are about to go bust, writes LGC editor Sarah Calkin
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A North-South divide in education funding is perpetuating inequality, MPs have warned.
Fresh evidence has been published showing outcomes for poor children in the North of England are not improving – and education funding is a critical factor.
A report by the University of York for the Child of the North All Party Parliamentary Group concluded northern schools are losing out on hundreds of pounds of funding per pupil compared with those in London.
It argued that over the past 10 years, pupils have received less money from the National Funding Formula on average than their southern counterparts.
Schools in London received an average of £6,610 per pupil compared with £6,225, £5,956, and £5,938 in the North East, North West, and Yorkshire and the Humber, respectively.
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The Local Government Association (LGA) has released a report it buried three years ago covering the financial impact of the Government's Street Manager software.
Only released this summer following a Freedom of Information (FOI) request from Highways, the report details survey results on the cost of the Government's national road and street works management software made mandatory from July 2020.
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There was a “complete breakdown in communication” between councillors and senior officers at Birmingham City Council over the process of issuing the effective bankruptcy notice, according to a Labour councillor.
An opposition member at has accused its former leadership of telling “total lies” that led to the authority setting an “illegal budget”.
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Local government needs a “full and frank conversation” with ministers about funding because the “system is broken”, according to the chair of the Local Government Association.
On Tuesday Birmingham City Council became the latest local authority to issue a section 114 notice amid a £760m bill to settle equal pay claims.
Last month a survey by the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities which represents 47 urban authorities revealed that 10% of its members were considering issuing a section 114 notice this year, whilst 20% said that it could be possible in the next year as a result of not being able to balance their annual budget in 2023-24.
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Unlinking benefits rise from September inflation rate could save Treasury billions, though similar idea led to backlash for Liz Truss.
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A minister told Woking Borough Council it should review its mammoth capital programme in 2021 while rejecting the authority’s request for financial support.
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CIPFA and ICAEW have announced a new fast-track route for newly qualified accountants and an ‘ever-closer’ strategic alignment.
A joint announcement confirmed the latest recruits will be able to gain designation of both institutes and qualify for dual membership.
Launching in early 2024, this new offer will add to the already existing pathways for members of both institutes.
The aim is to create greater flexibility for CPFA and ACA chartered accountants to work across the public and private sectors.
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Sir Keir Starmer has completed Labour's reshuffle, with the confirmation of four new shadow ministers in the levelling up team.
Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner became the new shadow levelling up secretary earlier this week and has brought three of her previous team with her.
Sarah Owen is continuing as local government shadow minister and Matthew Pennycook was previously confirmed as staying on as housing and planning shadow.
Jessica Studdert, deputy chief executive of the think tank New Local, told LGC: “Beefing up the team under Angela Rayner as deputy leader shows that this department will be core to the party’s future agenda. With former councillors comprising most of the team, the institutional understanding of local government is strong.”
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Councils face a fresh wave of potential equal pay claims after a legal ruling exposed problems with the application of the national pay scheme, a high-profile lawyer has warned.
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Birmingham City Council has issued a section 114 notice, confirming that all new spending, with the exception of protecting vulnerable people and statutory services, must stop immediately. Cllr Shaun Davies, Chair of the LGA, was interviewed about the pressure on local government finances on LBC Radio’s Tonight with Andrew Marr. Cllr Davies told LBC: “We want to work with the Government to find a long-term financially sustainable funding model for local government so that local services can be protected, but also so we can get on with the Prime Minister’s priorities, things like local economic growth will not be delivered without local authorities, things like fixing the NHS backlog will not be fixed if adult social care is not being delivered. Kids won’t get to school if school transport is being reduced.” Cllr Pete Marland, Chair of the LGA’s Resources Board, also discussed the issue on BBC Newsnight. The LGA’s lines and warning that councils in England face a funding gap of almost £3 billion over the next two years just to keep services standing still was reported
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Reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) – a lightweight building material used from the 1950s up to the mid-1990s – is now assessed as being at risk of collapse. It comes as the Government ordered the full or partial closure of more than 100 schools just before the start of term amid concerns about RAAC. A timeline of events references how in December 2018, the Department for Education and the LGA made building owners aware of a recent building component failure in a property constructed using RAAC
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The BBC has found that at least 13 schools confirmed to have reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) had funding to rebuild withdrawn in 2010. Meanwhile the Guardian reports that the cost of fixing the school buildings crisis in England is approaching £150 million and could rise much further.
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Education Secretary Gillian Keegan has reportedly come under fire from colleagues for her “unilateral” decision to determine which school buildings need to close as part of the concrete crisis. Ministers elsewhere are understood to fear she has opened a “Pandora’s box” by setting a more cautious than necessary standard that could affect other public buildings.
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An article looks at what Angela Rayner’s appointment as the shadow levelling up secretary means for housing. It references her comments at the LGA’s Annual Conference in July where she said England needed to “roll its sleeves up and build things” such as windfarms and homes and supported giving councils more power.
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Electric vehicles’ bulky high-tech components and battery are on average twice as heavy as standard vehicles, impacting on the condition of local roads, it is reported. A study led by the University of Leeds found the average electric car puts 2.24 times more stress on roads than a similar petrol vehicle and 1.95 more than a diesel. The stress on roads causes greater movement of asphalt, which can lead to small cracks and eventually potholes. The LGA estimates it would take £12 billion and nine years to repair the local roads pothole backlog.
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The number of complaints upheld by the Local Government Ombudsman over special needs education has increased by more than 60 per cent since last year. Between the start of 2023 and mid-July the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman partly or fully upheld 380 complaints, compared with 234 upheld complaints in the same period in 2022 and 167 until mid-July in 2021.
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Council public health teams have warned on growing pressures on local sexual health services. A rise in the number of sexually transmitted infections as well as growing number of visitors to clinics has come at the same time as a reduction in funding to services. In an interview with ITV News, Cllr Marianne Overton, Vice-Chair of the LGA said: “We have seen a rise in appointments as clinics but at the same time, we have seen a £1 billion cut to local public health services. This is putting our services at breaking point.”
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Birmingham City Council has technically been unable to balance its books for the past three years, a section 114 notice has revealed.
Earlier today Birmingham issued a section 114 notice, effectively declaring itself bankrupt, in relation to its equal pay liability of £760m. The notice, which means the council must stop all non-essential spending, reveals it was issued after auditors said they could not finalise its accounts for the last three years because its equal pay liability is likely to result in a negative general fund balance.
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Local government minister Lee Rowley sought reassurances from Birmingham City Council last week, shortly before authority issued a section 114 notice, council papers reveal.
Yesterday Birmingham issued a section 114 notice, effectively declaring bankruptcy. This means it must stop non-essential spending and take urgent action to deal with its financial problems, which stem from equal pay claims.
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The UK economy made a stronger recovery during Covid at the end of 2021 than previously estimated, according to sharply revised official figures.
Data has now revealed that the economy was 0.6% bigger in the final three months of 2021 compared to pre-pandemic levels. The previous figures said that the UK economy was 1.2% smaller.
The Office for National Statistics said changes were mainly because it had "richer data" from its annual survey.
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Somerset Council is the latest authority to raise the prospect of a possible section 114 notice.
Officers at the new unitary council have estimated its budget shortfall will reach £100m by 2025-26, while its dedicated schools grant deficit is expected to total £70m by the time the statutory override currently in place is due to end in 2026.
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Guildford Borough Council has stopped hiring until at least October as it attempts to cover a multi-million pound financial shortfall.
The Surrey authority is facing an in year-deficit of £1.7m and a budget gap of £18.3m in the period to 2026-27.
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Ministers will reportedly force hundreds of local government bodies in England to publish overdue accounts within months, under proposals designed to clear an “unacceptable” backlog going back seven years. The planned intervention, which is expected to be implemented before the end of the year, would require public bodies such as councils and fire services to finalise more than 500 sets of overdue accounts by September 2024, even if external auditors are unable to give them a clean bill of health.
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Teachers have been told to be ready to evacuate pupils from schools at risk of collapse from crumbling concrete.
Documents seen by The Guardian show that staff have been told by the Department for Education to contact school and academy leaders to make sure they have evacuation plans if their buildings are made from reinforced, autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC), which has become weaker than traditional concrete and is at risk of collapse.
In 2018 a school roof made from RAAC collapsed in Gravesend, Kent, damaging the staff room and administrative areas.
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Only around a quarter of councils’ usable reserves can be used to shore up services and meet demand, despite government figures suggesting larger sums might be available, experts have said.
Latest figures from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities showed total council reserves increased by 9% to £34bn at the end of 2021-22, but councils have pointed out that these cannot be relied upon to meet their overspends – and the sector is at risk.
The figure was distorted by grants given to councils towards the end of the financial year that were earmarked for later use, largely relating to Covid-19.
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The percentage of Afghans presenting to councils as homeless has risen in the past month, figures from councils have suggested on the deadline day for people to leave hotel accommodation.
More than a fifth (22%) of Afghans who had previously been in so-called bridging hotels in England and Wales since being resettled to the UK after the Taliban takeover in August 2021 were in this situation, the Local Government Association (LGA) said.
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Ciaran Jenkins spoke to Kevin Bentley, who’s leader of the Conservative group at the Local Government Association.
He asked him if the Government should have let local authorities know sooner.
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Staff leaders have told councils they will continue to battle for improved wages despite a rebuff from employers.
Unison, the biggest union representing local authority staff, said its local organisers would not be backing down despite a warning from employers that it wouldn’t improve its offer.
The staff side had wanted a 12.7% increase for 2023-24.
[ more...]
All council workers received a letter informing them of a mutually agreed resignation scheme, allowing them to end their employment for a fixed severance package.
These schemes have been used in public bodies, including local government and the NHS, to cut spending and avoid redundancies.
The authority employed more than 10,300 workers at the time of a 2021-22 count, of which a large proportion (nearly 6,000) were aged over 50.
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If Somerset Council spending on care continues at the same level, the viability of the authority could be at risk within two years, it has warned.
It needs to raid its reserves for the second successive year to fund the rising cost of adult and children’s social care.
Papers published ahead the council’s executive next Wednesday (September 6) label the council’s financial position “stark and challenging”.
The papers reveal the council drew £18million from reserves last year to fund spending beyond the 2022/23 budgets in adult and children’s care services.
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Data showing the finance resilience of councils is to be beefed up in the face of financial failures, finance experts have said.
Following the collapse of local authorities like Thurrock Council and Woking BC, the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy’s (CIPFA) financial resilience index will be boosted to identify councils that are over-stretched on their borrowing.
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Ministers have announced they will ease divisive development rules on water pollution blamed for low housebuilding rates in rural areas.
Local government secretary Michael Gove today confirmed the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) will amend the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill and ease the requirement that the impact of housing developments on waterways must be ‘nutrient neutral’.
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‘Ever-escalating’ arrivals of asylum seekers and a ‘wholly inadequate’ National Transfer Scheme (NTS) have left Kent unable to meet its statutory duties in caring for children, the county council has warned.
Last month, the High Court ruled that Kent County Council had acted unlawfully by failing to accommodate and look after all unaccompanied children seeking asylum.
The local authority said it is caring for 661 unaccompanied asylum-seeking (UAS) children and 1,030 UAS care leavers.
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Over 3,000 local government staff are set to take part in strikes next month - and more could join them after Unite re-ballots some councils.
Last week Unite announced strike action would take place at 23 councils during September. It will involve just over 3,000 members; the Local Government Association says there are 1.4 million people working the sector, while the Welsh LGC puts the number at 140,000.
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Nine councils within the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities (Sigoma) have warned they could issue a section 114 notice by 2025.
Research by Sigoma, which represents 47 urban authorities across England, found that one in five unnamed members believe they may have to issue a s114 notice by the end of 2024-25.
One in 10 or five councils could issue s114 notices during the current financial year.
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Three schools in England built by the same contractors have been advised not to reopen their buildings ahead of the new school year because of ‘structural irregularities’.
Haygrove Secondary School in Bridgwater, Somerset; Buckton Fields Primary School in Northampton and Sir Frederick Gibberd College in Harlow, Essex were all built by Caledonian Modular.
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Seven new special free schools are set to open amid a critical shortage of places for pupils with special educational needs, the Government has announced.
The Department for Education said in March that 33 special free schools would be created across the country to help local authorities with over-stretched SEND budgets. A free school in Bury was also approved in May.
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Over four in five councils across England have seen an increase in people becoming homeless (85%) in the past 12 months, according to new research by the charity Crisis.
The report, published yesterday (23 August), also shows 88% of councils have reported an increase in requests for support from those who have been evicted from privately rented flats. Over 90% said they anticipate a further increase over the coming year. The research was conducted between October 2022 and January 2023 when 155 of 309 local authorities responded when invited to take part.
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Local government employers have knocked back a bid from the unions for an improved pay offer, insisting it remains ‘full and final’.
In a letter seen by The MJ, the trade union side secretaries urged the employers to return to the negotiating table amid ‘extremely high’ food inflation and energy prices that they said were ‘increasingly unsustainable for workers in councils’.
The letter read: ‘The cost of living crisis continues unabated and this cannot continue.
'The unions remain committed to reaching a negotiated settlement and call on the employers’ side to reconsider its position and return to the table with an improved offer.’
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Think-tank calls on government to increase the efficiency of the tax system in order to tackle the country’s major challenges
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Staff leaders have told councils they will continue to battle for improved wages despite a rebuff from employers.
Unison, the biggest union representing local authority staff, said its local organisers would not be backing down despite a warning from employers that it wouldn’t improve its offer.
The staff side had wanted a 12.7% increase for 2023-24.
Council leaders said the tabled increase of £1,925 for those earning up to £49,950, and 3.88% for higher earners, was their “full and final offer”.
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The government has been told it is “living in cuckoo land” if it thinks that clamping down on empty property relief for business rates is a sensible idea, especially against the current economic backdrop.
Landlords and occupiers reacted with disbelief after the Treasury and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities launched a consultation about business rates avoidance last month.
Officials are concerned that the empty property relief, which grants landlords or occupiers a three-month rates holiday when their shop, warehouse or office is not being used, is “not working as intended”.
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The UK economy is on course to shrink between July and September and could tip into recession, a closely-watched survey suggests.
The S&P Global/CIPS UK Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) found that rising interest rates and weaker household spending led to a sharp drop in demand for goods and services in August.
The index looks at key economic measures such as orders and employment.
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Unite members in more than 23 councils across Engalnd and Wales will begin taking strike action from next week after rejecting the National Employers' pay offer, the union has announced.
In February the National Employers offered a £1,925 pay increase from 1 April, which equated to a 9.42% pay rise for the lowest paid who currently earn £20,411. Those on pay points above the top of the pay spine were offered 3.88%.
However, Unite members “voted overwhelmingly” to reject the pay offer, GMB and Unison members also rejected the offer earlier this year.
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Local government is facing multiple cost pressures and needs billions of extra funding, the LGA has warned.
Its leader warned the huge spikes in inflation and energy costs, plus wage costs and extra demand for social services have left the majority of councils on the brink.
“Inflation, the National Living Wage, energy costs and increasing demand for services are adding billions of extra costs just to keep services standing still,” said LGA chair, Cllr Saun Davies.
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This year is looking to be one of the worst on record for damage caused by potholes, according to the AA, after a wet July saw pothole-related breakdowns up by a fifth.
More than 50,000 drivers had journeys brought to a halt because of pothole-related damage this July, compared to 41,790 the July before, according to the AA Pothole Index.
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Local authorities are facing a £5.2bn deficit by April 2026 even after they have made £2.5bn of planned cuts, new research has revealed.
A survey of 190 upper-tier authorities in the UK by the BBC's Shared Data Unit has found that the average council now faces a £33m predicted deficit by 2025-26.
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The statistics collected by the Office for Local Government “do not add value” beyond the current level of information gathered by councils, local leaders have said.
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Much of the cost likely to be passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices, prompting calls for the scheme to be delayed or scrapped
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London Councils is preparing to call for the social care precept to be replaced with an ‘appropriate and sufficient mechanism’ for funding delivery.
Officers pointed out in a report to the latest meeting of London Councils’ leaders’ committee that the ability of boroughs to raise council tax did not ‘reflect social care need’.
The Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities, a cross-party group representing 47 urban local authorities in England, has already called for the social care precept to be replaced by needs-based grant funding in the long-term.
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Middlesbrough Council has projected an overspend of £11.5m against this year’s budget and said it is taking “stringent” action cut costs and avoid a section 114 notice.
It is the latest authority to warn of financial pressures in recent weeks with Kent CC, Medway Council and Guilford BC all signalling challenges ahead.
The unitary’s budget for this financial year was set at £126m and the forecast overspend represents 9.2% of its budget and would almost exhaust the council’s reserves.
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An increasing number of councils have warned that high service demand and inflated costs have forced authorities to use reserves putting levels close to exhaustion, and financial viability at risk.
Paul Dossett, head of local government at Grant Thornton, told PF reserves have been a “long-held and challenging political issue” because many other areas of the government, including central government departments, do not hold or use reserves in the same way councils do.
This feeds into funding decisions, and as such councils were hit hard by austerity in the past 13 years or so.
Dossett said: “Some politicians, and possibly civil servants, look at local government reserves and say: why aren’t you spending them instead of moaning about cuts?
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Spending controls are needed to help Kent County Council meet a forecast £44m budget gap this year, as it works to cut overspends in adult social care and children’s services in the long term, officers have said.
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The UK’s annual inflation rate fell sharply to 6.8 per cent in July, down from 7.9 per cent in June, the Office for National Statistics has announced. The fall is being linked to a drop in energy prices.
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Councils are frequently failing to use their powers to crack down on anti-social behaviour, a watchdog has found.
The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman criticised the failure of local authorities to act, saying incidents are too often left unchecked despite officers having "compelling evidence to justify taking enforcement action".
Cases include a person complaining about a neighbour's house party which lasted more than 13 hours.
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The Institute for Fiscal Studies has said the Government’s levelling-up plans for England are being hampered by a funding system that is “not fit for purpose” and deprives the poorest areas of the financial support to match their needs.
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New figures from the Office for National Statistics show wages grew at a record annual pace between April and June. Regular pay increased by 7.8 per cent, the highest annual growth rate since comparable records began in 2001.
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The funding system for local government has ‘broken down’ and what councils currently receive from Whitehall and council tax barely reflects need, a think-tank has warned.
A report on public spending, published by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) today, effectively casts doubt on the success of the levelling up agenda, which dominated the 2019 General Election campaign.
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County council leaders have praised virtual schools as ‘education’s hidden asset’ but called on the Government to provide the overstretched services with additional resources.
Virtual schools were set up in 2014 as teams based in councils tasked with supporting the education of children in care. In recent years, they have expanded to look after all young people with a social worker.
A new report by the County Councils Network (CCN) has found that these services are seen by those working in education as a valuable asset to both councils and schools.
[ more...]
The LGA, which represents councils across England and Wales, said it wants to work with Government on a devolved, long term plan for our local roads, which needs to include greater and more consistent funding to get our investment in roads back up to the levels of other leading countries.
The Government currently spends 31 times more per mile on maintaining motorways than local roads. Ahead of the next General Election, the LGA is calling on all political parties to pledge to a 10 year programme where current funding for local roads and local transport infrastructure is boosted by devolving the equivalent of 2p of existing fuel duty. This would help councils to reverse the current decline in road conditions, so residents aren’t paying for far more expensive pothole repairs, and work can continue on reducing air pollution and supporting the move to a low carbon economy.
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Responding to a May report from Parliament’s levelling up committee, the government said the 2023-24 local government settlement gave the sector a 9.4% cash increase.
The committee report criticised the significant reductions in council funding since 2010, which have restricted authorities’ ability to invest in services and economic development.
The government however insisted it is still supporting councils.
“This boost in funding demonstrates how the government stands behind councils up and down the country,” the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities said in response.
[ more...]
Bailiffs making record profits collecting debt for councils in cost of living crisis
Charities call for an end to the outsourcing of public debt as firms’ turnover rises nearly 50% in a year
Shanti Das
Sat 12 Aug 2023 14.23 BST
Bailiffs hired by councils to recover unpaid debts have seen their profits rise to record levels during the cost of living crisis, company filings show.
Newlyn Group, which is hired by councils to recover unpaid traffic fines and council tax, saw its turnover from debt collection increase by 43.8% to £25.8m in the year to December 2022, while its gross profit rose to £15.5m. Company documents describe the figures as Newlyn’s “best ever results”.
Another company, Marston Holdings, made £23.1m operating profit in the year to May 2022, after the number of the cases it was dealing with rose by 50% to 1.72m, according to company documents filed last week.
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Taxpayers are being left to pick up the bill to provide football clubs with the safety certificates they need to operate on matchdays.
Councils are responsible for safety certification at all 92 football grounds in England’s four professional leagues, as well as at other sports clubs.
But the current laws, introduced in 1975, limit how much they can charge, leaving taxpayers footing the bill for any extra costs.
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The number of properties started or acquired using receipts from right to buy sales has dropped by 33% in the past year, government data shows.
Annual data published by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities on right to buy sales reveals that in 2022-23, 3,447 properties in total were started or acquired using the proceeds of right to buy receipts.
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The areas with the highest levels of social mobility receive 50% more in Whitehall grants than the least socially mobile areas, new research from the think tank Onward has found.
Government grants to local authorities that are calculated on the basis of deprivation lead to a ‘social mobility penalty’, according to the centre-right think tank.
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Councils all over the country are facing hundreds of fresh equal pay claims from female workers that could leave them facing crippling bills running into tens of millions of pounds, ITV News can reveal.
Glasgow council has already paid out £770 million and Birmingham has admitted liabilities of between £650 and £760 million.
But now the GMB union is launching cases all over the country as they claim to find "discrimination" against women council workers "under every rock".
[ more...]
The local government pay dispute is destined to stretch into the autumn as trade union Unite warned ‘coordinated industrial action’ was ‘inevitable’.
Two of the three local government unions need to agree the pay offer for it to be implemented, but Unite and GMB are expected to continue the dispute for the rest of the summer and autumn.
Senior Unite representatives from councils across England and Wales decided at a meeting last week to pursue their pay dispute with the national employers.
[ more...]
The Government has admitted a lack of data is holding back improvements to social care.
Its acknowledgment was made in the Government’s formal response to a report by the House of Lords’ Adult Social Care Committee, which found ‘good policy and practice have been conspicuously inhibited by a lack of data’.
[ more...]
Whitehall’s attempt to identify long-term challenges facing councils has received mixed reviews, The MJ can reveal.
Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) officials recently briefed senior local government personnel on their new initiative – dubbed DLUHC 2040, which is designed to help improve Whitehall’s long-term planning.
[ more...]
Striking refuse workers in Cumberland held a demonstration outside council offices this morning over plans to recruit temporary drivers and loaders on short-term contracts.
The workers, who are employed by Allerdale Waste Services, a company owned by Cumberland Council have been on strike since 16 May in a dispute over low pay.
[ more...]
Local authorities lent Woking BC £40m since it said it was in “section 114 territory” - with two loans taking place after the notice was issued, LGC can reveal
Data obtained via a freedom of information request and shared exclusively with LGC shows Woking has borrowed more than a quarter of a billion bounds in just over 18 months, with a third of this amount still outstanding.
[ more...]
Data sharing initiatives run by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities have been perceived as “burdensome” by “smaller local councils”, according to a new report.
The report, which was commissioned by DLUHC, was produced by Softwire Ltd a digital software development company and looked at data sharing between the department and local authorities.
[ more...]
The average total contribution rate employers make to the Local Government Pension Scheme has fallen by almost two percentage points following its latest three-yearly valuation.
The analysis of the 2022 valuation, published by the LGPS Advisory Board, also confirms a “significant improvement” in the scheme’s funding level between 2019 and 2022.
The report includes data from 85 of the 87 funds in England and Wales, and excludes the open and closed Environment Agency funds.
[ more...]
Approximately 6,000 shops have closed across Britain over the past five years as vacancy rates reach “critical levels”, industry data shows.
In the second quarter of this year the overall vacancy rate increased to 13.9 per cent after rising by 0.1 percentage point, according to the latest British Retail Consortium-Local Data Company (BRC-LDC) vacancy monitor. The number of outlets lying vacant in shopping centres was worse at 17.8 per cent.
The data does not take account of any store closures arising from Wilko going into administration.
[ more...]
Councils all over the country are facing hundreds of fresh equal pay claims from female workers that could leave them facing crippling bills running into tens of millions of pounds, ITV News can reveal.
Glasgow council has already paid out £770 million and Birmingham has admitted liabilities of between £650 and £760 million.
But now the GMB union is launching cases all over the country as they claim to find "discrimination" against women council workers "under every rock".
[ more...]
The UK risks losing a vital part of its heritage unless planning laws are changed to protect historic pub buildings, campaigners have said.
Greg Mulholland, the director of Campaign for Pubs, said the growing anger over the fire and demolition of the Crooked House pub in Staffordshire must act as a “catalyst for change” in the approach to protecting historic pubs.
“The reality is that up and down the country, communities are seeing pubs converted and demolished when the pub was perfectly viable in many cases,” he said. “The government will say it’s down to local councils and communities to act, which is a complete cop-out.
[ more...]
The council has forecast a £20.3m overspend this year (equivalent to 5.3% of its revised revenue budget), with several directorates affected but children and families seeing the biggest discrepancy (£7.4m), a financial monitoring report said.
The failure to deliver the £19.8m savings agreed in the budget will lead to a further use of unallocated reserves, the report said.
The council already planned to use £24.6m of these reserves to balance the budget, and the current forecast overspend would leave the balance almost exhausted at £2.1m.
Officers stated that the “seriousness of the council’s financial position cannot be understated”.
[ more...]
The UK is set for five years of "lost economic growth", with the poorest hit hardest, a think tank has warned. The National Institute for Economic and Social Research said a combination of Brexit, Covid and Russia's invasion of Ukraine had badly affected the economy, adding that the spending power of workers in many parts of the UK will remain below pre-pandemic levels until the end of 2024.
[ more...]
Business support and economic growth could be at risk if councils struggle to manage the functions of Local Enterprise Partnerships, an expert has warned.
[ more...]
All staff at Woking BC are undergoing redundancy consultations in order to reduce the size of the council’s workforce to make it a “smaller organisation focused on essential services”.
A report forming part of the council’s improvement and recovery plan, which has been prepared for a meeting of Woking’s overview and scrutiny committee on 14 August, was published earlier this week.
[ more...]
The District Councils’ Network (DCN) has rejected a call by former local government secretary Greg Clark for planning to shift to upper-tier authorities.
With the Government’s revised version of the National Planning Policy Framework expected imminently, Mr Clark said planning should be moved to upper-tier authorities ‘where a more strategic perspective can be taken’.
[ more...]
A West Yorkshire council said it was close to going bust unless a £47m funding gap could be closed, as a growing number of local authorities warned that they were almost running out of funds.
Kirklees council, which counts Huddersfield as its main town, said it could face a section 114 notice – signalling that it cannot balance its budget – in the 2024/25 financial year if the authority did not deliver required savings and minimise its expenditure this financial year.
It is understood several authorities are on the brink of issuing section 114 notices this year if the government does not release additional funding to stabilise the sector.
[ more...]
The spending power of workers in some parts of the UK will still be below the level it was before the pandemic by the end of 2024, a think tank has warned.
Pay, after accounting for rising prices, is set to fall between 2019 and 2024 in regions like the West Midlands and East of England, said Niesr.
By contrast, it said London and parts of the South were "steaming ahead".
[ more...]
Analysis by the Labour Party found that the number of bus services in the UK has halved since 2011. The figures, which are based on annual reports by traffic commissioners, show there were 8,781 bus services in the year to March 2023, compared to 17,394 in 2011.
[ more...]
The Centre for Policy Studies (CPS) is urging ministers to scrap the energy price cap, arguing that it prevents people from accessing cheaper deals and is keeping bills artificially high and fuelling inflation. The CPS said the cap had in practice become a state-mandated price, with limited incentives for providers to offer better deals.
[ more...]
In July, after much anticipation, levelling up secretary Michael Gove launched the shiny new Office for Local Government, accompanied by a new local authority data explorer.
The explorer has been set up to allow residents, councillors and government officials to assess the performance of local authorities in four key areas: adult skills, waste collection, finance and adult social care.
Users can browse the dashboard to see how their council matches up to other local authorities on key performance metrics outlined under each of the four headings.
Given the amount of local authority spending on adult social care it may not be surprising that it was included in Oflog’s remit, but it also raises questions about the wider dynamic of social care regulation.
[ more...]
A number of councils have ignored a Government threat to suspend their access to Whitehall data by refusing to sign a memorandum of understanding (MOU), The MJ understands.
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) had extended the deadline for returning a fully-signed MOU after the sector reacted with anger and disappointment to the proposed document.
[ more...]
The Treasury has warned the cost of living crisis is not over despite signs that average earnings are about to rise faster than inflation for the first time in more than a year.
Official figures published next week are expected to show average pay has risen by just over 7 per cent, which, if predictions by the Bank of England and economists are correct, would be higher than July’s inflation figure at around 6.8 per cent.
The data – a potential turning point in the country’s battle with the cost of living crisis – is likely to trigger calls by some pro-growth Conservative MPs for Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt to pledge tax cuts before the next election, to ease pressure on household budgets.
[ more...]
Playgrounds around England are falling to pieces, missing large pieces of play equipment, or simply being locked up, as councils facing huge budget cuts struggle to maintain them. In some of the poorest parts of the country, family groups are warning that children face a summer spent indoors because of a lack of safe and free spaces to play.
The head of Play England has said that children’s mental health will suffer as a result, and has called for radical change from what he called a “shameful” lack of protection for children and play in planning.
A Guardian analysis of the collective annual park budget around England – which includes local authority play provision – has found that it has fallen by more than £350m, adjusted for inflation, since 2011.
[ more...]
Afghan families given refuge by the UK are facing homelessness after being told by the government to move out of hotels, councils have told the BBC.
The families, many of whom worked for the British government, came to the UK after the Taliban takeover in 2021.
Thousands are still living in temporary government-funded hotel accommodation - but are now starting to be moved out.
[ more...]
More local authorities will be on the brink of issuing Section 114 notices this year if the government does not release additional funding to stabilise the sector, a chief executive has warned.
[ more...]
The Welsh Government is facing criticism over its scheme to charge second-home owners a council tax premium of up to 300 per cent, with some warning it could turn tourist hotspots into "ghost towns". In April 2023 the amount councils in Wales could charge second-home owners rose to 300 per cent, in a bid to free up housing stock for locals and in addition, the number of nights holiday let owners must fill their properties to avoid the second home tax and be eligible for business rates rose from 70 to 182.
[ more...]
The appointment of a new chief executive, finance director or political leader could provoke an independent review of finances under plans mooted by Rob Whiteman.
Following a spate of council collapses, the Charted Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) chief executive claimed the recruitment – or election – of new personnel could provoke a resilience review in a bid to catch failures before they happen.
[ more...]
The Government has today confirmed it will transfer many of the functions undertaken by Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) to upper-tier councils and combined authorities.
The announcement by the Department for Business & Trade and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities confirms that by March 2024, county councils, unitary authorities and combined authorities will take on the economic growth and business representation functions of LEPS.
[ more...]
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has announced that the ultra low emission zone (ULEZ) scrappage scheme will be expanded, with grants of £2,000 being made available to all Londoners who own a non ULEZ-compliant car or motorbike.
Small businesses and charities will also now be able to receive payments of £7,000 – up from £5,000 – to scrap a non-compliant van, and the grants for wheelchair accessible vehicles will increase from £5,000 to £10,000.
[ more...]
Council-maintained schools in England continue to outperform academies in Ofsted ratings, according to research, prompting renewed calls for councils to be able to open their own schools.
Research conducted on behalf of the Local Government Association (LGA) found 93% of council-maintained schools were ranked “outstanding” or “good” by Ofsted as of 31 January 2023, compared with 87% of academies that have been graded since they were converted.
In 2022, council-maintained schools also outranked academies, with 92% rated “outstanding” or “good” by Ofsted in January and 85% of academies graded the same since they converted.
[ more...]
Staff at a hotel for asylum seekers obstructed a police investigation into a report that a man masturbated in front of a seven-year-old child, the BBC has been told.
Officers were blocked from entering the east London hotel and staff delayed providing CCTV - which was later automatically deleted, it is claimed.
The provider - Clearsprings - says it has robust safeguarding processes.
[ more...]
The Bank of England has signalled that interest rates could remain above 5pc until 2026 in a move that will sharply raise costs for more than four million mortgage holders.
Policymakers voted 6-3 to raise interest rates by 0.25 percentage points to a 15-year high of 5.25pc as it admitted that higher wages and prices are becoming embedded in the economy.
Andrew Bailey, the Governor of the Bank of England, said it was vital that officials “make absolutely sure” that inflation fell “all the way back to the 2pc target”.
[ more...]
Schools that are still maintained by local authorities receive better Ofsted outcomes than schools that have become academies, according to new research commissioned by the Local Government Association (LGA).
As of January 2023, 93% of council-maintained schools were rated outstanding or good, compared to 87% of schools that were inspected after becoming academies, the report found.
[ more...]
Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council’s Medium Term Financial Plan (MTFP) and budget is “unrealistic” and based on “the delivery of an overly ambitious transformation programme both in terms of levels of savings and timescales for delivery”.
[ more...]
Medway Council is warning of a potential overspend of £17.3m for 2023-24, largely due to social care pressures.
A report to next week's cabinet meeting warns this level of overspend would not be affordable because the council, whose overall revenue budget is £390.8m, has general reserves of £10.1m.
[ more...]
The social care sector is in a “precarious position” after new research found it is facing a £1.5bn funding gap.
Care England, a representative body for independent care providers, analysed figures provided through the government's fair cost of care exercise.
It found that at March 2023 the average difference between what councils pay for residential care fees and the fee calculated by the fair cost of care exercise was £196 per week, while the gap for nursing care was £178 per week.
[ more...]
The sector is to step up its lobbying for the Government to use its King’s Speech to end its fixation on elected leaders, The MJ understands.
Council leaders have been told that only those asking for level three deals, which require the adoption of a mayor, will get priority in devolution talks with Whitehall.
The Government has insisted the ‘additional layer of accountability and leadership’ provided by directly-elected leaders would be ‘necessary to secure the highest level of powers and responsibilities’.
[ more...]
Elements of the Local Government Association (LGA) are privately moving towards accepting that corporate peer challenges (CPC) should be put on a statutory footing, The MJ understands.
The LGA had previously resisted making CPCs mandatory over fears councils would just quit the membership organisation.
However, there is now increased confidence in the LGA, with just two English councils currently outside core membership and the number of local authorities that have refused to have a CPC described as ‘fairly small’.
[ more...]
The number of people missing payments on essential household bills such as energy, phone and water is as high as it was over the winter, according to consumer group Which?. Even though prices have fallen back slightly, about 2.4 million households missed at least one bill payment in the month to mid-July and 770,000 failed to make mortgage or rent payments, according to its monthly online poll.
[ more...]
DLUHC released guidance on the simplification scheme today, with details of the 10 local authorities who have been selected for the pilot. They are:
Bolton MBC
Calderdale MBC
Wolverhampton City Council
Lewes DC
Nuneaton and Bedworth BC
Rotherham MBC
Sheffield City Council
Stockton-on-Tees BC
Thanet DC
Wirral MBC
[ more...]
There have been a growing number of delays in discharge from hospitals into the social care system, according to BBC figures. Figures found 23 per cent of councils in the UK who provided data had average delays of over a month for care assessments. The data also found that 74 per cent of care contracts that were handed back to councils were due to lack of staff. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board said: "These figures show in the most concerning terms the human impact of the level of pressures facing our adult social care system. Additional funding falls well short of what is needed to allow councils to fully deliver against their Care Act duties.”
[ more...]
Changes to parking charges and debt recovery fees could soon be introduced as the Government looks at ways to better regulate the private parking industry.
The Government has launched an eight-week call for evidence on the Private Parking Code of Practice, which sets out the requirements that private parking operators must follow when enforcing restrictions.
[ more...]
Former Treasury minister David Gauke has called for a new Office for Spending Evaluation to prioritise ‘productive’ spending on public services.
[ more...]
Local authorities across the UK have been invited to bid for shares of a £40m fund to support their adoption of 5G and other advanced wireless technology.
From today (31 July), councils can apply for funding designed to speed up innovation in sectors such as advanced manufacturing, transport, agriculture and public services.
[ more...]
Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council’s external debt hit £836.631m at the end of the 2022/23 financial year.
This – along with the council’s calculated maximum level of external borrowing on a gross basis of £870.398m – is close to, but compliant with, the statutory authorised limit of just over £1.1bn set under the Local Government Act 2003.
The council noted that, against the CIPFA Financial Resilience Index, it had some indices related to borrowing levels and reserves currently indicating ‘high risk’.
[ more...]
Ministers have allowed England’s creaking social care system to become too heavily reliant on low-paid foreign workers who are vulnerable to exploitation, the government’s migration adviser has warned.
In a strongly worded intervention, Prof Brian Bell, who has just been reappointed by the home secretary, Suella Braverman, as chair of the migration advisory committee (MAC), called the government’s tacit acceptance of exploitation in the sector “appalling”.
He said the failure to tackle chronically low wages suggested the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) had “no interest” in improving the lives of care workers.
[ more...]
Ministers are considering restrictions on councils’ ability to impose 20mph speed limits as part of a new shift against green policies and traffic schemes, a stance condemned by safety and travel groups as shortsighted and divisive.
The Guardian has been told the push against what Rishi Sunak has termed “anti-motorist” policies could be extended to find ways to stop local authorities taking other measures, such as installing bus gates, that have been used routinely for decades.
[ more...]
Funding for addiction treatment services has been halved in a decade in real terms, according to analysis by UK Addiction Treatment Centres, while the number of drug deaths have doubled. In 2013, 31 per cent of the public health grant (£828 million) was spent on drug and alcohol addiction services but that’s fallen to 16 per cent (£608 million). The LGA acknowledged “the enormous funding pressures that vital addiction services are under” but it said this is “due to cuts in funding by central government”. The LGA’s lines are also running across Sky News TV bulletins.
[ more...]
The government launched the UK’s second investment zone in Liverpool on Wednesday, to potentially unlock up to £320m of private investment.
Ministers estimate that the investment in Liverpool’s existing Speke Pharma cluster, home to one of the UK’s leading regions for bioprocessing; will help secure funding from a range of investors in the life sciences sector, helping to deliver over 4,000 jobs across Liverpool, Runcorn, St. Helens, Maghull and Prescot over the next five years.
[ more...]
Ministers have rejected a devolution bid by three south coast unitaries after the trio turned down the chance to join neighbouring Hampshire’s offer.
Southampton, Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight rejected joining a deal agreed between the Government and Hampshire’s county and districts, and instead submitted proposals for a deal of their own.
[ more...]
Warwickshire CC has shelved plans to join the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) due to a tight timescale.
The council has now said there is not enough time for a credible public consultation.
Earlier this month, The MJ reported that senior Government ministers were in talks with the county and Telford & Wrekin Council for the two to join the combined authority.
[ more...]
Woking BC’s former Conservative leader remains on the board of two companies linked to the council’s debt crisis, it has emerged.
John Kingsbury resigned as leader in 2017 and as a councillor in 2018 but remains on the board of Victoria Square Woking and Victoria Square Residential.
[ more...]
Shropshire Council is confident it can resolve its “long-term financial gap”, but the authority will need to reduce spend by £51m this year, according to its cabinet member for finance and corporate resources.
Gwilym Butler told Room151 that while “like many other councils of all political colours” the authority is facing financial challenges, “unlike many other councils in similar situations we are robustly prepared with a clear understanding of the challenge and a detailed plan to tackle this”.
[ more...]
Regulators acted “too late, too weakly and did not enforce the rules enough” in failing to prevent a rise in local authorities being issued with section 114 notices, according to treasury advisor Arlingclose.
With Woking, Thurrock, Slough and Croydon all issuing s114 notices within the last two years and more likely to come, these councils “represent a failure of regulatory bodies” such as the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) and the Department for Levelling Up Housing and Communities (DLUHC) “to stop [financial] problems occurring in the first place, or at least stop them getting as bad as they did”, Arlingclose said.
[ more...]
The government will invest the remaining £600m from the Next Steps to Put People at the Heart of Care plan in social care workforce recruitment and retention.
The people at the heart of care white paper, published in December 2021, promised the allocation of £1.7bn in funding for social care reform over three years.
[ more...]
The Government’s pledge to deliver 30 hours a week of childcare to children under five by September 2025 will not work without help for nurseries left “straining to survive”, MPs have warned. The Commons Education Committee said that "structural problems" with funding and staffing in early years must be urgently addressed to ensure families can access quality childcare. It comes after an LGA survey found 88 per cent of councils are worried that looming nursery closures will undermine capacity.
[ more...]
The Government has delayed its flagship recycling reforms for a year as part of a reported wider re-examination of every net zero policy. Plans to force manufacturers to cover the costs of collecting and recycling packaging, under what is known as the Extended Producers Responsibility (EPR) scheme, were due to come into effect next year and will now be pushed back until 2025. The Government said the decision will provide industry, local authorities and waste management companies with more time to prepare to ensure the success of the scheme. The District Councils Network said: “Councils need clarity on waste policy and we need it urgently. This latest delay adds to the uncertainty which is hampering us from improving services so that recycling rates increase, we provide even greater value to local taxpayers and we move towards net zero.”
[ more...]
Wolverhampton, Dorset and Lincolnshire have been chosen to trial new ways of working within children's social care. The Government said it wanted to offer struggling families more early support and better communication between agencies, following a major child care review in 2022 and reports into the murders of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and Star Hobson in 2020, with the £45 million model aiming to keep more children in stable family homes.
[ more...]
The “negative operating culture” across Northumberland County Council led to a high turnover of senior officers which was a factor in years of unlawful spending, an independent report has said.
From 2017 onwards, the council lost a succession of statutory officers, including eight section 151 officers, creating holes in the authority’s governance framework, according to an investigation by John Gilbert, former chief executive of Swindon Borough Council.
[ more...]
Local authority leaders have called for ‘clear, realistic timelines’ on waste policy after the Government announced a further delay to extended producer responsibility (EPR) for packaging.
[ more...]
Birmingham City Council revealed earlier this month it was facing a bill of up to £760m to settle outstanding equal pay claims
That is despite paying out £1.1bn since a court case in 2012
The claims were brought by council workers in traditionally female-dominated jobs
The court found hundreds of teaching assistants, cleaners and catering staff missed out on bonuses given to those in male-dominated roles
[ more...]
More evidence of workforce concerns in the children's social care sector has been brought to light in a new survey, in which around 20% of council-employed social workers said they planned to work for an agency in future.
[ more...]
Six severance payments totalling more than £1m made by Northumberland Council to senior officers were unlawful, the council’s section 151 officer has concluded.
Jan Willis has been examining eight exit packages dating back to 2017, having already issued a section 114 notice in May last year after finding expenditure was likely to be unlawful.
[ more...]
The Government has refused to commit to issuing fresh guidance to strengthen the role of the three statutory officers.
In a Best Value report on Thurrock Council, former Lincolnshire CC chief Tony McArdle made recommendations for the wider sector, asking local government secretary Michael Gove for guidance to strengthen the role of the three statutory officers, including requirements for them to work together and legislation to clarify the monitoring officer and head of paid service roles.
[ more...]
The Government received higher tax receipts last month as high wage inflation pushed workers into paying more income tax and national insurance. Official figures released yesterday showed that government borrowing rose by less than forecast last month at £18.5 billion as the Treasury profited from higher tax revenues.
[ more...]
Vehicle breakdowns caused by potholes have reached a five-year high, new figures suggest.
The RAC said it received 8,170 callouts to breakdowns due to poor road surfaces in the UK between April and June.
That was 40% more than during the same period last year, and the most for those three months since the so-called Beast from the East cold snap plunged much of the country into a deep freeze in 2018.
[ more...]
The majority of local authorities have failed to build a single council home in the past five years, according to shocking analysis that lays bare the scale of the social housing paralysis.
There are now more than 1.2 million families on the waiting list for properties, but figures show that in 2021/22 only a third of England’s local authorities completed any new build homes.
Further investigation by The Independent also revealed that, during the annual year of 2022, more than half of councils did not build a single house.
[ more...]
The Care Support Alliance (CSA), which represents more than 60 charities in England, has urged Rishi Sunak to fulfil the Government’s 2019 pledge to ‘fix the crisis in social care once and for all’.
[ more...]
Over the past four years councils have paid out more than £11m to drivers who successfully claimed their vehicles had been damaged by potholes, new research has revealed.
[ more...]
None of the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities' large scale projects are on track, according to an official report.
The Infrastructure and Projects Authority’s annual report, which outlines progress on large-scale projects across government up to March 2023, was published last week. Two DLUHC projects - the housing infrastructure fund and the UK Holocaust memorial and learning centre - were given a red rating.
[ more...]
Proposals are being explored to end the strategic partnership for children’s services between Hampshire CC and Isle of Wight Council.
The two local authorities entered into the partnership in 2013 after Ofsted judged the Isle of Wight's children’s services to be inadequate.
This led to Hampshire CC running the Isle of Wight’s children’s services on the council’s behalf, delivering functions such as social care, child protection and safeguarding services, school place planning, school admission and support for children with special educational needs.
[ more...]
The Local Government Association (LGA) is to press ahead with plans for a sector White Paper.
A meeting of the LGA’s executive advisory board gave the green light to consult on the contents of the document, which is expected to be published before the next General Election.
[ more...]
The government will not meet targets to build more homes in urban areas without additional funding for local authorities, council leaders have said.
The battle over housing returned just days after Whitehall clawed back funding for site building that will effectively kill housing developments.
After handing back £1.9bn of unspent funding to the Treasury, levelling up secretary Michael Gove unveiled proposals for a “new inner city renaissance” aimed at promoting urban regeneration rather than rural suburban developments.
[ more...]
A witness to one of the biggest collapses of a local authority in recent history has called on ministers to get answers as to why it happened.
The drive for commercialisation during austerity to offset reduced government funding “inevitably lead to councils going rogue”, John Kent, opposition leader at Thurrock Council said.
Kent said that while the council had an “absolute regime of secrecy and insularity” it is unlikely this would have happened if the government had better oversight of the sector.
[ more...]
Levelling up secretary Michael Gove said that while the authority has made “significant steps”, the depth of historical challenges and the level of reforms needed necessitated a stronger intervention.
This will mean the council has to follow the panel’s recommendations, if its members are not satisfied with progress being made.
The secretary of state also confirmed the appointment of two new panel members: Brian Roberts, chair of the CIPFA Financial Management and Governance Panel, who will lead on finances, and governance and housing expert Pamela Leonce to lead on housing.
[ more...]
Results have been declared in three parliamentary by-elections overnight. Labour gained the North Yorkshire seat of Selby and Ainsty from the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats gained the Conservative seat of Somerton and Frome in Somerset. However, the Conservatives held their London seat of Uxbridge and South Ruislip.
[ more...]
Concerns about the local government minister have been given the joint-highest risk rating in the Local Government Pension Scheme advisory board’s risk register.
The document, introduced last year, is designed to allow consideration of “some of the broader, systemic risks to both the scheme and the operation of the board”.
In the most recent version, dated 15 May 2023, the risk of “failure of ministers to effectively discharge functions” is one of five risks given a rating of 12. The remaining 13 risks have lower ratings of between five and nine.
[ more...]
The government borrowed less than expected in June, helped by higher tax receipts and a big drop in debt interest payments.
Borrowing - the difference between spending and tax income - fell to £18.5bn, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
It is £400m lower than last June and below predictions by the government's independent forecaster.
[ more...]
Councils have urged ministers to extend a deadline for Afghan nationals who worked with the UK military and embassy to be evicted from hotels, saying the plan is chaotic and full of gaps and risks leaving many people homeless and traumatised.
A series of senior councillors told the Guardian that Johnny Mercer, the veterans’ minister, was met with near-unanimous opposition when he outlined the plan to local authorities in a conference call on Thursday.
A feed of text messages from those on the call, seen by the Guardian, shows people stress repeatedly the lack of available housing for Afghan nationals, who have been told they must leave hotels next month.
[ more...]
The cost of new regulations for teenagers in care could be nine times more than Government funding and result in providers withdrawing thousands of beds, according to a new report.
By October, all semi-independent living homes for 16 and 17-year-old teenagers in care need to have submitted applications to register with Ofsted.
Ofsted will regulate the homes against new national standards, which are in line with those for other accommodation for children in care.
[ more...]
New housing, roads, public transport, green spaces, schools and jobs have been plunged into doubt after the Government’s housing agency pulled funding for two schemes.
It comes as a new report by the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (LUHC) Committee last week found dropping local housing targets was endangering the Government’s commitment to build 300,000 homes per year.
An inquiry by the committee heard evidence from planning consultants that annual housebuilding will go down to around 150,000 a year under the Government’s proposed policy reforms, which include changing mandatory local housing targets to an ‘advisory starting point’ and removing the requirement for a five-year supply.
[ more...]
A range of proposals and actions to address the backlog of local audits in England has been set out by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC).
[ more...]
The government’s supposed flagship policy of levelling up will fail if councils do not receive additional funding and powers, experts have said after one of the policy’s original architects said progress has been too slow.
[ more...]
The costs of a new Ofsted inspection regime could be nine times higher the funding being provided by government, prompting a warning that this is something councils "cannot afford".
Ofsted will begin regulating semi-independent living homes for 16 and 17-year-old teenagers in care against new national standards, from October of this year.
[ more...]
Voters in England are going to the polls in three constituencies in London, North Yorkshire and Somerset to elect new MPs.
The three seats in Uxbridge and South Ruislip, Selby and Ainsty, and Somerton and Frome were won by the Conservatives at the last general election in 2019.
Polling stations opened at 07:00 BST and will close at 22:00, with results expected from early on Friday morning.
[ more...]
A record number of on-the-spot fines were issued by councils for what have been dubbed “busybody offences”, with many cracking down on activities such as feeding birds, swearing and napping in public.
The seemingly bizarre nature of some of the fines issued under Public Spaces Protection Order legislation has seen them increase to 13,433 in 2022, up from 10,412 in 2019. More than 150 councils issued at least one penalty in 2022, according to a report.
[ more...]
Evidence given to the UK Covid-19 Inquiry by Matt Hancock has been called into question by local councils, which insisted his former department had “far more levers” to oversee social care provision than he suggested.
A barrister representing the Local Government Association and Welsh Local Government Association said his clients “simply do not understand” the evidence the ex-health secretary gave to the inquiry.
[ more...]
Interest rates are predicted to rise less sharply after the UK saw a surprise drop in inflation in June.
The Bank of England has put up rates 13 times since December 2021 to try to cool soaring price rises, driving up borrowing costs for millions.
But experts say it is now under less pressure to do so after inflation fell sharply to 7.9% in June, down from 8.7% the previous month.
[ more...]
Endangered rural bus services have dwindled to a new low after losing out on funding after the pandemic, analysis for councils has shown.
More than a quarter of routes in county and rural areas of England have been lost in the past decade, with passenger numbers falling sharply.
Local authority leaders have urged the government to revisit the funding it made available after Covid, claiming that the bulk of the £1.1bn eventually awarded under the National Bus Strategy went to cities and urban areas.
[ more...]
The prime minister’s council is 'no clearer' over the use of a military barracks in his constituency to house asylum seekers than when the plans were first announced.
[ more...]
Auditors will still be expected to value assets such as roads, bridges, and schools under the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities’ plans to clear the audit backlog, the local government minister has told LGC.
Speaking to LGC at the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Local Government summer reception, Lee Rowley said: “We want to talk to the sector over the coming weeks ahead, to try and find a way which balances the need to make sure that we are auditing councils to the extent that is necessary and proportionate and reasonable.
[ more...]
A central body with powers to oversee local authorities could help prevent disasters similar to the recent collapses in the sector, experts have told PF.
[ more...]
Increasing pay for public sector workers by 10% would not add much to inflation, according to a new report by the think tank IPPR.
[ more...]
Shivering on the floor under a bunk bed in a men’s hostel, Yulia remembered the Russian bombs falling on Kyiv and tried to convince herself that coming to London was a good idea.
She had arrived four months earlier when a friend of a friend, a man in his thirties, had offered to become her sponsor under the government’s Homes for Ukraine scheme. But their relationship had broken down.
“He would dump wet clothes from the washing machine on my bed, eat my food and turn off the hot water if I spent too long in the bathroom,” she told The Times, requesting not to use her last name. “I asked the council what I should do. They told me they would relocate me to social housing.”
[ more...]
Children in the North East need to be protected from a "ticking time bomb" and stop using vapes, councillors have said.
Newcastle City Council echoed calls on the government to impose new restrictions on vapes.
Plain packaging and a ban on free samples were among the measures suggested.
Freeman Hospital consultant Wendy Taylor said vapes were advertised by using "cartoons".
[ more...]
Giving county councils funding and power to encourage business growth and regional development could see rural areas close the gap with their city counterparts, leaders have said.
[ more...]
Failing to deliver £86m of cuts and effectively manage spending would put Kent County Council in a “perilous financial position” on the brink of issuing a section 114 notice, its external auditors have warned.
[ more...]
Concerns over how the rise promised to teachers in England will be funded, and dismay at the lack of a long-term agreement on pay, has stirred opposition to the government’s offer among union members.
The deal announced between the government and England’s four school teaching and leadership unions would mean an across-the-board 6.5% pay rise from September, with a slightly higher increase for new teachers to bring their starting salary up to £30,000 a year. Mid-career teachers would get a rise of between £2,500 and £3,000 in their annual pay.
[ more...]
Nearly 70% of people would like their community to have more control over how local services are delivered, a new poll has revealed.
[ more...]
South Yorkshire was named by the Government on Friday as the site of the first UK investment zone.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said the Advanced Manufacturing Investment Zone would help leverage more than £1.2bn of private funding.
[ more...]
The footage is akin to a scene in the film Titanic. A torrent of water cascades down the stairwell.
But this is not a sinking cruise liner. It's a block of social housing in Mitcham, south London, and it offers a depressing insight into the UK's housing crisis.
"I think the materials just simply aren't good enough," campaigner Kwajo Tweneboa told Sky News.
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A flagship pledge by Boris Johnson to turn Britain’s bus services “green” is facing fresh problems after the Government admitted a scheme to reduce emissions that cost millions is not working.
Local councils have spent at least £45m since 2016 retroffitting older, diesel buses with Selective Catalytic Reduction (SCR) exhausts which were supposed to reduce the amount of nitrous oxides they emit.
But the Department for Transport has quietly been writing to local authorities in recent months to tell them it has paused funding for retrofitting as a result of ‘poor performance’.
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British families could be paid to house Afghan refugees under plans being drawn up by Michael Gove to reduce the use of hotels for asylum seekers.
The Levelling Up and Housing Secretary is considering replicating the Homes for Ukraine scheme for up to 2,000 Afghans who worked for the British and have been granted the right to come to the UK in gratitude for their service but have yet to come to the UK.
The Afghans and their families are currently living in limbo in hotels in third countries such as Pakistan and Iran because there is no housing available for them in the UK.
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A record half a million pupils now have an Education, Health and Care Plan but analysis shows half of all applications are not being resolved within 20 weeks of being applied for as legally required. The Government has set out a plan to improve special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) provision - including a pledge to spend more than £2.6 billion building more special schools. But the measures will not be rolled out until at least 2025. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People Board, said: "Councils share the Government's ambition of making sure every child with SEND gets the high-quality support that meets their needs. However, while the measures announced will help to fix some of the problems with the current system, they do not go far enough in addressing the fundamental cost and demand issues that result in councils struggling to meet the needs of children with SEND."
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Education Secretary Gillian Keegan said levels of absence in schools was now "a crisis" with recent figures revealing that 125,000 pupils spent more time out of class than in. In a wide-ranging interview with Sky News, held after Ms Keegan’s speech to the LGA’s annual conference, the Secretary of State said the Government does intend to act on LGA and council calls for a national register of children missing school and will roll out a pilot programme of attendance hubs and mentors to work with families in the worst-affected areas.
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More than one million public sector workers, including teachers, police and doctors, have been offered pay rises of between 5 per cent and 7 per cent. Four education unions said the deal would allow them to end their dispute and will be recommending their members to accept the offer.
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Employers can no longer use agency staff to cover striking workers during walkouts, the High Court has ruled following a judicial review brought by 13 unions.
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Rural and county economies in England are recovering far more slowly from the pandemic than urban and city areas, according to research published by the County Councils Network (CCN). It is calling for government to reform the way economic development is marshalled at a regional level.
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Rising service demand and debt costs have led two borough councils to warn they risk issuing section 114 notices, with one perhaps coming as soon as October.
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Thousands of children with special educational needs or disabilities are missing out on the education they are entitled to because of huge delays in the system designed to support them.
A record half a million pupils now have an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) - a legal document setting out a child or young person's special educational needs, the support they require, and the outcomes they would like to achieve.
The plans must be issued within 20 weeks of being applied for, but analysis of government data by Sky News reveals this deadline is missed in a staggering half of all cases, meaning thousands of children are having to wait.
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The Government has suffered more defeats as the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill makes its way through the House of Lords.
Conservative peer Baroness McIntosh received cross-party approval for her proposed amendment to enable councils to hold virtual meetings.
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A string of councils have revealed the growing financial perils they are facing.
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Councils could become the target of judicial review bids under new legislation to prevent ‘municipal foreign policies,’ the body that oversees the Local Government Pension Scheme has warned.
The Economic Activity of Public Bodies (Overseas Matters) Bill would stop council pension funds boycotting investments in foreign countries based on “political or moral disapproval of foreign state conduct,” unless certain exemptions apply.
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A vote in the House of Lords yesterday on an amendment to the levelling up bill leaves a path open to bringing back virtual council meetings.
But ministers could still seek to quash the possibility when the bill returns to the House of Commons.
A proposed amendment to the bill – for “local authorities to be allowed to meet virtually” – from Baroness McIntosh (Con) was agreed yesterday, with 169 peers supporting it and 156 against.
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The government has begun the search for a permanent chair of the Office for Local Government who will be offered a salary of between £125,000 and £149,000.
Oflog launched last week and is currently being run by Josh Goodman as interim chief and Lord Amyas Morse as interim chair.
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Lichfield DC has approved a new pay and benefits policy that includes provision for private health insurance and annual performance-related bonuses.
The Conservative-led council argues the policy will help it recruit and retain staff while minimising their time off work. But a trade union said that workforce retention was best ensured by “properly funded public services and decent, guaranteed wages”.
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Millions of public sector workers will be given a pay rise of at least 6%, but government departments have been told to fund the rise from within existing budgets.
Police officers, junior doctors and teachers in England are among those who would benefit after Rishi Sunak accepted all the recommendations of the independent pay review bodies.
The Treasury has ordered a range of measures for Whitehall departments to “reprioritise” their budgets.
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Dozens of home care companies in England fear collapse because invoices are going unpaid by councils and the NHS.
Hundreds of millions of pounds in unpaid bills are threatening parts of a care industry already stretched by a recruitment crisis and rising wages, according to research by the Institute of Health and Social Care Management (IHSCM).
One company, which has 60 care workers, said it had stopped working with the council or people funded by the NHS because “there is a high risk of financial failure because you can’t pay the payroll”.
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Hundreds of vulnerable children languished in “inadequate” children’s homes costing taxpayers £2m a week.
Some are targeted for recruitment by drugs gangs and exposed to “even greater harm” after being taken into care, former Children Commissioner has warned.
The Mirror investigation into what she calls Britain’s “crumbing” care system for children has found that more than £100m of taxpayers money could have been spent on places at children’s homes given the lowest possible rating given by Ofsted inspectors last year.
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Hundreds of thousands of public sector workers will get a pay rise now the government has accepted pay review body recommendations, but not funding that pay rise with extra money will mean services need to be cut, experts have said.
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The launch of the Office for Local Government last week was hotly anticipated by the local government sector. And it was when delegates and the LGC news team were gathered in Bournemouth that the government announced the new oversight body was officially launched and its tool letting anyone analyse data released publicly.
Oflog’s launch is of great importance to the sector, there’s no denying that. The new body has been set up – according to the local government minister, Lee Rowley – to become a “protective ring around councils” and to help to improve local government’s case on Whitehall.
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Local authorities’ borrowing has been flagged as a "risk" for public finances, according to a report for the Treasury.
The Office for Budget Responsibility’s (OBR) fiscal risks and sustainability report published today said that the substantial rise in debt was largely due to the financial acquisition of retail and commercial property sites as investment assets until the government tightened PWLB lending guidance in 2020.
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The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) is said to be handing back £1.9 billion to the Treasury originally meant to tackle England’s housing crisis and improve building safety. DLUHC officials said it was unable to spend the money, which accounts for about a third of its entire housing budget, thanks to rising interest rates and uncertainty in the housing market after the pandemic.
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The adult social care workforce in England has begun to grow again, according to new research by Skills for Care, which found vacancies are down slightly while the number of filled roles has risen. It has called on the Government to bring forward a social care workforce plan, similar to that unveiled for the NHS last week.
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Government departments will have to make cuts to fund higher pay rises for public sector workers, Rishi Sunak has suggested. The Prime Minister is due to make a decision on whether to accept the recommendations of the independent pay review bodies this week.
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More than 70 councils have been forced to block developments of up to 120,000 new homes because of concerns about the potential additional pollution of local rivers. It is reported that the Government will amend the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill to allow developments to go ahead in advance of sewage treatment works being upgraded.
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The long term viability of Slough Borough Council is still at risk despite continued improvements, government-appointed commissioners have said.
Their latest report, published ahead of a cabinet meeting next week, said the council still needs “a strong medium term financial strategy and a firm financial footing”.
Despite work including reducing its deficit to £357m, the authority is still not projected to achieve a sustainable position until 2028/29, according to the council.
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Scores of councils have been left in the lurch after failing to find an auditor to carry out their housing benefit assurance process.
Following the abolition of the Audit Commission, the statutory functions for the certification of Department for Work and Pensions housing benefit subsidy claims were delegated to Public Sector Audit Appointments (PSAA), but these transitional arrangements expired in March 2018, leaving local authorities to appoint their own external accountant to provide assurance.
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Southampton City Council has been warned it risks having to issue a section 114 notice this financial year as it battles to save £20m from its budget.
The Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) said the authority only delivered 39% of its planned savings last year and if that continued in 2023-24 it would achieve just £7.8m of the £20m target.
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Hastings BC may be forced to issue a section 114 notice this financial year unless it makes massive financial cuts, the Local Government Association (LGA) has warned in a leaked report.
An LGA presentation summarising the findings of an unpublished finance peer review, seen by The MJ, said the council had ‘relied on the use of reserves to balance its budget’ and would exhaust them by the end of 2024-25 ‘unless drastic action is taken’.
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A government decision to withdraw £170m allocated to Medway Council through the Housing Infrastructure Fund (HIF) is “deeply regrettable and deeply disappointing”, its leader has said.
The decision, taken by Homes England and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC), has removed public funding for new roads, sustainable transport, and a programme of environmental improvements, including new community public spaces, designed to support new communities on the Hoo Peninsula.
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Devolution to metro mayors with combined authorities does not work for all areas and a future Labour government should look at a model more akin to London, the mayor of the West of England has said.
Speaking at an event in parliament on how Labour could level up, Dan Norris (Lab) complained he was unable to spend devolved funding due to “stalemate” between the councils on the combined authority. He said the way in which the combined authority was set up “inevitably leads to… rows”.
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The government was defeated in five times in the House of Lords yesterday over changes to the levelling up bill.
The report stage of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill began yesterday in the House of Lords. The government was also criticised over increasing the scope of the bill.
Baroness Pinnock (Lib Dem) who is also councillor on Kirklees Council in West Yorkshire and a vice-president of the Local Government Association, complained about the large number of amendments that were tabled last week alongside “a whole new schedule on childminding has been added and is so out of scope that the bill’s long title has had to be altered”.
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The chancellor’s plans to force local government pension schemes to back private equity investments have been given a lukewarm reception from the sector.
Jeremy Hunt has outlined plans aimed at increasing UK investment including funds having to earmark 5% of investments in levelling up.
He used the annual Mansion House speech to also outline plans to compel pools to raise their investment level to at least 10% of funding to private equity in a bid to support high-growth, innovative technology companies.
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Southampton City Council has commenced “informal discussions” with the government over its challenging financial situation.
Some £11.38m was required to be drawn down from reserves to balance the authority’s year-end deficit for 2022/23, according to a newly published report which will be presented to a full council meeting on 19 July.
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Forcing funds to take on higher risk could lead to poorer outcomes, expert warns
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The Scottish government has published its proposals to increase council tax for those living in the highest value properties.
The rises would affect those living in houses with council tax bands E, F, G and H.
The Scottish government said that around three quarters of properties – those with a lower council tax band – would be unaffected by the changes.
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Almost a third of parents say that their child’s school travel has been affected by funding cuts, new research has revealed.
A survey of 1,000 parents with school age children, commissioned by transport specialist Kura, found that 22% of children now have to use an alternative transport method due to transport funding cuts, adding to concerns about safeguarding on the school run.
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Lessons from a Whitehall-run pandemic simulation exercise in 2016 were kept secret from local government, the UK Covid-19 Inquiry has heard.
The final report on the findings of Exercise Cygnus – a three-day dry run for a mass outbreak of killer flu – found the UK’s preparedness and response was ‘not currently sufficient to cope with the extreme demands of a severe pandemic of the type that would have a nationwide impact across all sectors’.
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Woking Borough Council has launched a consultation on its discretionary services after it halted all non-essential spending due to unsustainable debts.
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UK wages have increased at a record annual pace fuelling fears that inflation will remain higher for longer. Regular pay rose by 7.3 per cent in the March to May period from a year earlier, official figures showed, equalling the highest growth rate last month.
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The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has warned public sector workers that he is ready to continue their pay squeeze for “as long as necessary” to bring down inflation. Rishi Sunak and Mr Hunt are expected to decide later this week whether to accept recommendations of independent pay review bodies to give workers such as teachers, doctors, police and the armed forces rises of 6 per cent or more.
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The maximum amount local authorities will be able to fine people who are caught littering, fly-tipping or graffitiing has increased.
As of today, those caught fly-tipping could receive a fixed penalty notice (FPN) of as much as £1,000. This is more than double the £400 limit that councils could previously fine residents.
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Better care at the local level could have prevented more than 850,000 hospital admissions a year among the over-65s, a new study has found.
The charity Age UK has called for a ‘big shift’ towards joined up home- and community-based health and social care services for older people.
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MPs have called on ministers to turn empty buildings into affordable housing after a report found repurposing properties could create thousands of new homes.
The report, which was published following an inquiry by the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Housing Market and Delivery and the APPG for Ending Homelessness, found that 20,000 homes could be created from empty local authority buildings alone.
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Bradford Council’s reserves are “close to exhaustion” after £30m was required to balance the budget in financial year 2022/23.
And the council is forecast to overspend its £453m net revenue budget for 2023-24 by £13.8m, according to early estimates.
Director of finance Christopher Kinsella noted that if the council did overspend this year, reserves would again have to be used but reliance on them is “unsustainable”.
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An Observer investigation has found that new children’s care homes are being disproportionately placed in cheaper and more deprived parts of England. Over the past five years the number of children’s care homes located in areas with the cheapest house sale prices has risen almost three times faster than in the most expensive places. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People Board, said there had been complaints for years of “many children’s homes being concentrated in areas where property is cheaper”. “Many councils are now developing their own children’s homes to tackle this problem,” she said. “However, in a context of significant pressure on council finances, this is a challenge.”
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Nearly 40 councils are set to be given new legal powers next month which will allow them to impose fines on drivers who commit offences like entering yellow box junctions or driving through ‘no entry signs’. The RAC has called on drivers to be on their guard to avoid the fines. An LGA spokesperson said: “Councils have been calling for powers to make our roads safer and less congested for all road users. Powers to enforce against moving traffic offences, such as banned turns, weight restricted roads and yellow box junctions will help to keep local roads moving and make our air cleaner.”
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Care providers say that hundreds of vulnerable children will be in illegal accommodation this winter because there are no places for them in children's homes. In March, the Government extended a ban on unregulated homes to children in care aged 16 and 17. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People Board, said: "We have long raised concerns over the availability of homes for children in care and it is vital government works with us to address these. The need for children's home accommodation currently outstrips supply, and this is undoubtedly driving the increasing use of unregulated and unregistered accommodation."
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A £204 million fund underestimates what early-years providers need to keep their doors open, representatives of the sector have said. The increase comes as the Government also announced a “wraparound” childcare plan for England.
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Parents across the UK are forming partnerships with local councils to build pioneering supported-living homes for their severely autistic children. With growing numbers of parents increasingly unable to find suitable, safe and secure residential accommodation for their young adult children – and financially-stretched councils having to pay exorbitant costs when already expensive placements break down – the two are coming together to forge a solution, based on the success story of Linden Farm, built by the Simon Trust and Surrey County Council.
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Treasury minister Victoria Atkins has refused to say if the Government will follow its pay review bodies' advice on salary increases for public sector workers. She said other ministers were considering the recommendations by the review bodies, which provide advice on workers' salaries including doctors, teachers and the police and that a decision would be made in "due course".
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An under-resourced planning system is stopping homes from being built and is deterring investment in Britain from overseas, developers have claimed.
Nine in ten builders surveyed by CMS, the law firm, said the planning system was slowing down development. An even greater proportion of the 270 questioned said the delays were the result of a lack of planning officers around the country. Martin Evans, a partner in the CMS planning team, said Britain’s planning process was “increasingly raised as an issue when inward investors are looking at the UK”.
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New children’s care homes are being disproportionately placed in cheaper and more deprived parts of England, according to an Observer investigation. .
Over the past five years the number of children’s care homes located in areas with the cheapest house sale prices has risen almost three times faster than in the most expensive places. Among the regions with big increases in homes was the north-west, including in parts of Blackpool and Burnley and other northern cities such as Bradford. Children’s services directors warned that the trends were driven by the “blatant profiteering” of private care providers, targeting cheap housing and local labour.
The findings suggest private companies are locating homes where it is cheapest for them to do so, rather than where they are needed. The practice helps them increase profits. However, it also means vulnerable children can end up being moved hundreds of miles for a care place, splitting them from family and support networks that they rely on. It comes after the Observer revealed that some children were being moved to care homes more than 300 miles away from their neighbourhoods.
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Britain’s planning system is grinding to a halt, with four out of five big applications now being delayed by up to two years.
Official figures show that more than half a million new developments have been delayed during the past five years as threadbare planning departments struggle to cope with even routine cases.
Industry experts said the delays were exacerbating the housing crisis, with developments now taking up to three years to get started. Councils are supposed to give developers a decision on big projects within 13 weeks but the latest official data shows that only 19 per cent of applications were processed in this time over the past year, down from 57 per cent ten years ago.
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The Department of Transport's (DfT) guidance on the new regime for local authority road condition surveys is delayed until next summer at the earliest, a DfT official has said.
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The funding allocations for the 11 local authorities, including 4 SCT members, taking part in a £13.9m walking and cycling prescription trial have been announced.
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England’s public libraries generate at least £3.4bn each year, a landmark new analysis has revealed.
Carried out by economists from the University of East Anglia (UEA), the researchers estimated that a branch library typically provides £1m in value annually.
The researchers then extrapolated the findings to all of England’s 3,000 libraries, giving a national total of £3.4bn.
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Social care is the biggest risk to the NHS, the Liberal Democrats’ leader has claimed.
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Due to its construction in the early 1900s, the site needs significant investment including in new windows, roofs, electrical wiring and machinery, a report published ahead of a cabinet meeting revealed.
Officers said the recent discovery of asbestos pushed the expected minimum cost of the work to between £150m and £200m (more than 10 times the council’s £13.1m revenue budget) and “has brought matters to a head”.
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Local government is struggling to make its case to political parties ahead of the general election, writes the chief executive of Leicestershire CC...
At such a time many within local government will look automatically to the Local Government Association; some will do their own lobbying directly of national parties, and others will doubtless look to exploit personal influence.
Not for the first time, the self-interest of a group of councils may prevail over support across the sector for demonstrably fairer funding. Lower tier councils may press again for social care to be removed from the upper tier; urban and rural areas will compete for attention and in some parts a regional perspective may dominate the local.
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The authority announced the immediate spending restrictions alongside plans to appoint three advisors to improve financial resilience, oversee governance and culture reforms and improve its risk management.
The announcement came shortly after the council revealed it will need to spend between £650m and £760m more (on top of the £1.1bn it has already paid out) to compensate female workers at the centre of a pay discrimination case.
This comes in addition to a forecast £100m hit from the flawed adoption of a new Oracle IT system.
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Announcing the formal launch of the Office for Local Government, the secretary of state promised to “establish the best indicators of performance”, as well as identify councils at risk of failure much quicker than the system has so far managed to do.
There was a sense among Local Government Association conference attendees that it has felt like a long time since Gove announced the body at the same conference last year, but there is too little flesh on the bones.
High profile council failures – particularly those with finance so clearly at the heart of their problems – show oversight is important, but time is of the essence if it is to be meaningful, and the question of timing remains very much open.
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Parents struggling with the cost of living will soon face steep summer holidays childcare bills, on top of rising housing and food prices.
Family budgets straining under the weight of rent and mortgage hikes, on top of their bills will also be shouldering term-break childcare costs within weeks.
The average cost of a week’s worth of holiday club childcare across the UK is £148 - jumping by 5% since 2021 - according to the most recent available figures, from the Coram Holiday Childcare Survey 2022.
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A Labour government would not force elected mayors on areas in return for devolution, but councils would need to demonstrate that the “community has been in the driving seat”, the shadow levelling up secretary said in an exclusive interview with LGC.
Speaking at the Local Government Association annual conference, Lisa Nandy said Labour’s “flagship” piece of legislation the Take Back Control Bill will “flip the presumption of power from Whitehall to communities”.
LGC’s latest devolution map, published earlier this week, highlighted that many areas are still reluctant to adopt an elected leader model, but are still keen more devolved powers.
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Four out of five council pension schemes have collected more than half the data needed to implement the McCloud reforms designed to tackle age discrimination, Smith Square has claimed.
A recent survey of administering authorities undertaken by the Local Government Association’s (LGA) pensions team showed about 20% have collected all the data they need for McCloud and 60% have collected between 51% and 99%.
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Four in five of England’s largest councils overspent on their children’s services budget last year because of more young people requiring care since the pandemic.
Analysis by the County Councils' Network (CCN) found that 30 out of 36 county councils overspent on their children’s services budgets between 2021 and 2022.
The combined overspending was £317m.
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Kent County Council has a backlog of 170 unanswered children’s services and education complaints, an investigation has revealed.
The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman was asked to investigate after the council failed to respond to a mother’s complaint that her son had not been provided with the Speech and Language Therapy (SALT).
During the investigation, the council confirmed it had 141 overdue Special Educational Needs (SEND) stage one complaints. It also had a further 29 overdue SEND stage two complaints.
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Kent County Council (KCC) has issued a claim for judicial review against the home secretary, asking her to direct other local authorities to ‘receive their fair share’ of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children (UASC).
The council said the number of UASC in its care was putting a ‘wholly disproportionate’ strain on its children’s services.
The national transfer scheme (NTS), set up in 2016, means that statutory responsibility for supporting UASC can be transferred from an entry local authority to another UK local authority with children’s services.
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The ‘extreme pressure’ on social care is now ‘turning into an avalanche, and it’s going to bury the NHS’, Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey has told the LGA annual conference.
In his speech on the last day of the conference, Sir Ed said the social care system was ‘not fit for purpose’ due to the ‘multi-billion-pound black hole in local authority budgets.’
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C
ouncils will get an extra £204 million to help them deliver a major expansion of free childcare announced in the March budget, the Education Secretary has said.
Gillian Keegan told a conference for town hall chiefs the money, which local authorities will get from September, will allow them to increase the hourly rates they pay providers.
Funding allocations for each local authority will be confirmed later this week but the amount will rise each year, she added.
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The education secretary, Gillian Keegan, has accused striking teachers of undermining children’s recovery from the Covid pandemic, saying she did “pretty well” at winning extra funding for schools from the Treasury.
Keegan told a conference in Bournemouth: “Let me be clear, we should not be having these strikes in general, but certainly not now. Children have been through so much in the pandemic and I can’t think of a worse time to be willingly keeping them out of school.”
The strike over pay by National Education Union members in England is said to have affected around half of the country’s 23,000 state schools, with many closed or restricting attendance for the seventh day of industrial action this year. An eighth strike day is scheduled to take place on Friday.
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The NHS is in danger of being buried under a social care “avalanche” as patients struggle to find adequate care to allow them to leave hospital, according to the Liberal Democrats leader.
Sir Ed Davey is to say in a speech that two in five patients are unable to leave hospital when they are well enough as a result of a lack of available social care.
House of Commons Library data commissioned by the Lib Dems suggests that the NHS, which marked its 75th anniversary on Wednesday, lost close to 129,000 bed days in England to delayed discharges from hospital in May — up almost a third on the same period last year, according to the party.
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Issuing a section 114 notice “isn’t a badge of shame” for local authorities according to Woking BC’s interim director of finance.
Speaking at Local Government Association (LGA) annual conference in Bournemouth on Wednesday, Brendan Arnold said that the notice can be a step in the right direction for councils in financial trouble.
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No one from the Public Works Loan Board queried the scale of Woking BC’s borrowing until last year, its interim finance director revealed this morning.
Brendan Arnold, who has held the role since March, was speaking on a panel at the Local Government Association’s annual conference about lessons from section 114 notices, organised by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy.
Woking issued its notice earlier this year and is subject to government intervention after its debts reached £1.8bn, with a revenue budget of £16m.
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Nearly nine in 10 councils fear nursery closures this year will undermine capacity ahead of the Government’s extension of the 30 hours free childcare scheme, new research by the Local Government Association (LGA) has revealed.
Councils, which are responsible for directing the majority of childcare spending, warned of a risk the scheme will not be delivered universally when it begins to be implemented next year because improved funding rates ‘will not be enough’.
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The government’s growing debt burden and high interest costs are a key risk to public finances and must be managed carefully, the National Audit Office has said.
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The failure to pay benefit claimants the correct level of support was a contributing factor in the National Audit Office giving a qualified opinion on the Department for Work and Pensions’ accounts.
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New LGA chair Shaun Davies talks to LGC about influencing general election manifestos, fiscal devolution and his plans for a ‘deep freeze purdah’
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Local government “should not be scared of greater accountability”, the incoming chair of the Local Government Association has said.
Speaking to LGC before formally taking on the role at the LGA annual conference in Bournemouth today (4 July), Shaun Davies (Lab) also claimed it was “unfair” to expect sector-led improvement to “spot every issue in every council”.
The new Office for Local Government is due to launch soon and is to be used to assess local government performance across England.
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The Office for Local Government (Oflog) is a new local government performance body in England. Oflog will provide authoritative and accessible data and analysis about the performance of local government and support its improvement.
The Oflog policy document sets out the context, rationale and approach to setting up Oflog, including its scope and future functions.
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This plan sets out how Government will reform the local funding landscape to deliver a simpler, fairer, more transparent and accountable funding system for local authorities.
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The Levelling-Up Secretary says council staff should not be working four-day weeks.
Michael Gove said council tax payers "deserve" for local staff to work a "full five-day week" after ministers advised South Cambridgeshire District Council to end its experiment of offering employees a three-day weekend in exchange for longer shifts.
But the Liberal Democrat-run council defended the trial and has not yet ended its four-day week experiment.
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Councils have warned that up to eight thousand Afghans who came to the UK seeking asylum after the Taliban seized power are at risk of becoming homeless.
The Local Government Association says people currently staying in temporary hotels around the country have been told they’ll have to leave by the end of next month.
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More councils could be at risk of insolvency over the coming months as local authorities in England struggle to fill a £3bn funding black hole caused by inflationary costs and soaring demand for services, town hall leaders have said.
According to the Local Government Association (LGA), several councils are in “an endgame” where, without an increase in funding, they face the prospect of taking increasingly drastic action to meet their legal duty to balance the books.
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The Government’s expansion of free childcare for working parents in England may not be delivered universally due to capacity issues, councils have warned.
Analysis by the Local Government Association (LGA) suggests the majority of councils (88%) are concerned that nursery closures this year will be significant and will undermine sufficiency.
It comes as the Government prepares to begin its new phased childcare policy from April next year, which will see more working parents of young children eligible for funded hours in early years settings.
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Councils in England face a funding gap of almost £3bn over the next two years just to maintain services at their current level, a new analysis by the Local Government Association (LGA) has revealed.
The LGA said the cost to councils of delivering their services will exceed their core funding by £2bn this year and £900m in 2024-25.
If inflation followed the latest projections from the Bank of England, local authorities would face an extra £740m in cost pressures this year and an extra £1.5bn in 2024-25.
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The government has launched a new programme to simplify local government funding, the levelling up secretary has announced.
Speaking at the Local Government Association’s annual conference today, Michael Gove announced 10 local authorities will be chosen as simplification pathfinder pilots to test the streamlined delivery of capital funding. Mr Gove did not identify the councils.
He said the government was today publishing plans for a “new, simper landscape for local authorities”.
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The government will not allow areas access to ‘level three’ powers without having a directly elected leader in place, the levelling up secretary told LGC.
As LGC’s latest devolution map, published yesterday, showed a number of areas are hoping to negotiate bespoke deals that incorporate parts of the ‘level three’ devolution framework, without having to switch to a mayoral model. Some areas have referred to this as a "level two plus deal".
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The government has not ruled out a hefty financial bailout for troubled Woking BC, but the levelling up secretary has told LGC that the case “prompts us to look at access” to government loans.
Woking faces a debt of £1.8bn – largely from loans to the Public Works Loan Board – and is subject to government intervention.
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Lord Bob Kerslake, former LGA President, Council Chief Executive and Civil Service head, has died at the age of 68. Lord Kerslake, who had been diagnosed with cancer, died on Saturday, his sister and daughter announced on Twitter.
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Energy prices could increase this winter forcing governments to step in and subsidise bills again. If the Chinese economy strengthens quickly and there is a harsh winter, gas prices could rise, putting pressure on consumers, the head of the International Energy Agency has said.
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The local government minister has written to South Cambridgeshire DC formally requesting that the council end its four-day week pilot “immediately”.
South Cambridgeshire has asked to meet ministers and the Local Government Association issued a statement saying councils should be free to pilot initiatives such as the four-day week.
The council began a three-month trial in January and subsequently extended the trial until the end of March 2024, with independent analysis had finding the initial pilot had been a success.
However, in a letter to Bridget Smith (Lib Dem), South Cambridgeshire leader, Mr Rowley warned that the trial could impact the council’s best value duty and that it could breach its legal duties under the Local Government Act.
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LGC’s latest devolution map finds opposition to mayors and the prospect of a general election is sapping momentum
When Boris Johnson promised to “rewrite the rulebook” on devolution in 2021, with a “more flexible approach” and “new deals for the counties”, the announcement was hailed [by the County Councils Network] as a potential “game-changer”.
Two years on, the results of the new approach appear somewhat more modest.
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Integrated care systems will play a “critical role” in delivering the long-term NHS workforce plan, according to details published on Friday.
ICSs bring together the NHS, local authorities, and other local stakeholders in a partnership to deliver joined up health and care services.
According to the plan, they will be charged with playing a critical role in delivering the government's ambition to dramatically increase the recruitment of staff into the NHS over the next 15 years.
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Kent County Council has reported a £44.4m deficit in its budget for the last financial year, which it plans to bridge using wholly reserves.
A report by Zena Cooke, Kent’s corporate director of finance, outlined that due to increased spending pressures – associated with latent demand, increased complexity post-Covid-19 and rising inflation – the council has overspent its 2022/23 budget by £44.4m.
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A Labour government would give £2,400 to teachers in the very early stages of their career in England to try to stop them leaving the profession.
The party says it would also make it compulsory for new teachers to have a formal teaching qualification or be working towards one - a requirement scrapped by the coalition in 2012.
Nearly one in five teachers who qualified in 2020 have since quit, according to government figures.
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English councils are being hit by a “completely unsustainable” annual bill of more than £450 million to prop up the free bus pass scheme, according to new analysis.
The Local Government Association (LGA), which calculated the figure, warned that the cost is putting services at risk.
Councils in England are legally required to reimburse bus operators for journeys made by older and disabled people who use a pass entitling them to free off-peak travel.
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Heads of schools are likely to join teachers in striking in the new academic year, according to the union that represents them – a move that is likely to lead to far more school closures on strike days in England from September.
The National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) has told the Observer that although its strike ballot does not close until the end of July, it is “confident” that it will get past the threshold required for action, based on internal polling.
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Healthcare leaders have called for an urgent plan to tackle the social care crisis, warning Rishi Sunak there is “clear concern” over an ongoing failure to tackle staff shortages.
The warning from Matthew Taylor, chief executive of NHS Confederation which represents hospitals and community services, comes after the publication of the long-awaited £2.4bn NHS workforce plan, which committed to 300,000 extra nurses and doctors in the coming years.
Mr Taylor said any benefits to improve NHS staffing will be “limited” without an equivalent strategy for the social care sector, which currently has 165,000 vacant posts.
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Birmingham City Council has revealed it will have to pay up to £760m to settle equal pay claims.
To date, the local authority has paid a total of £1.1bn settling equal pay claims after a 2012 Supreme Court ruling found hundreds of mostly female employees had not received the same bonuses offered to their male counterparts.
However, analysis following the implementation of a new IT system, Oracle, found the council has an equal pay liability in the region of £650m and £760m, which is growing by between £5m and £14m a month.
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The government should recognise that shifting resources to prevention will be good for people's health and public finances, writes the spokesperson for health and social care at the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives & Senior Managers, and chief executive of Sefton MBC.
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There will be some “very difficult messages" for local government on what needs to be done to clear the local audit backlog, the director of local audit at the Financial Reporting Council has said.
Speaking at the Public Finance Live conference in central London on Tuesday, Neil Harris said there would need to be some “uncomfortable” conversations in order to work out how to tackle the issue.
"I'm under no illusions that there will be some very difficult messages on what needs to be done, because you've got to do something bold to be able to reset this system," Mr Harris told delegates.
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The Local Government Association is to introduce two new kinds of peer challenges, but is being forced to rethink other parts of its offer after ministers pulled funding.
Under its contract with government to deliver sector led support, the LGA will now offer finance and governance peer challenges alongside its regular corporate peer challenges in a bid to provide greater assurance on struggling councils.
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The Financial Reporting Council (FRC) is “very close” to proposing “a broad policy direction” to the government, aimed at helping solve the local authority accounts backlog, Neil Harris has said.
At CIPFA’s Public Finance Live conference in London, the director of local audit at the FRC told delegates that he expects to present proposals to “reset the system of local authority audit” to the local government minister Lee Rowley very soon.
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Parents of children with Special Educational Needs (SEND) have faced considerable financial challenges, a report by ITV has suggested. A survey found that almost half (49 per cent) of parents had given up work or reduced their hours to negotiate the system, with parents with more than one child with SEND spent an average of more than £8000. The LGA had warned that additional investment in SEND provision was not enough to cope with demand.
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Ministers have been urged to amend a “barmy” health and safety regulation that is reducing the size of upper-storey windows on new build developments, creating “ugly, gloomy” homes.
The Centre for Policy Studies and the Create Streets think tanks want the government to reconsider a policy introduced last year that requires windows on upper storeys to be minimum of 1.1 metres above the floor level.
The rule, which will only apply to new homes, was introduced over fears that global warming would cause people to open their windows more, thereby increasing the risk that they would accidentally fall out.
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Forcing councillors in England to attend meetings in person is leading to some quitting, councils have warned.
A legal requirement to hold full council meetings in person was temporarily dropped during the pandemic but reintroduced in May 2021.
A survey by the Local Government Association (LGA) found one in 10 councils had seen members stand down since then due to the change.
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Pupils across England are being taught in church and village halls, temporary classrooms and remotely at home, as crumbling school buildings are ordered to shut because of to safety concerns, an investigation has revealed.
In some cases, where an entire school has been forced to close, hundreds of pupils are split across neighbouring schools to take their lessons, while others are sent home to resume online learning, as they did during the pandemic.
After the immediate crisis of finding alternative accommodation, pupils and teachers can find themselves in temporary classrooms for months, if not years, while school and local authorities try to come up with a long-term solution.
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A public spending watchdog has criticised the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs amid concerns about a lack of long-term planning to tackle waste and boost recycling.
A 56-page report, published by the National Audit Office (NAO), found that household recycling rates in England had stalled over the last decade.
A government target to recycle 50% of household waste by 2020 was missed, an objective derived from a 2008 EU directive. Instead, rates settled around 43-44% between 2011 and 2018-19.
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The authority estimated it will need to spend between £650m and £760m, on top of the £1.1bn it has already paid out, on compensating female workers, who in a 2012 Supreme Court ruling were found to have been denied bonuses given to male colleagues.
The authority said this liability is rising by between £5m and £14m each month, and represents “one of the biggest challenges this council has ever faced”, but it does not believe a Section 114 notice will be required.
A council spokesperson said: “The council will avoid the issue of a Section 114 notice if it takes all necessary steps to reduce its spending and limit its ongoing liability with regard to equal pay.
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Thousands of children are at risk of injury or death as a result of their school being structurally unsafe, according to the Department for Education. A report by the National Audit Office found that up to 600 schools are at risk of “building collapse or failure”, with the use of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) confirmed in 65 schools so far. The LGA said that there was a shortage of structural engineers with experience of identifying RAAC and that the Government needed to provide schools with access to the specialist knowledge to identify the concrete.
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Adult social care “was in nowhere near good-enough shape” to handle the pandemic, according to the former Health Secretary Matt Hancock. Talking to the COVID-19 Inquiry, Mr Hancock said the Government were unaware of how many care homes were in the UK at the time and did not have a plan in place to identify how many people were in the care sector. The LGA said it would comment on the issues when called to give evidence in the coming weeks
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Children in the UK are experiencing worsening levels of tooth decay, anxiety and stunted growth as a result of the soaring cost of food, according to a survey of over 300 school nurses. The survey, carried out by the School and Public Health Nurses Association and the British Dental Association, found that two-thirds of school nurses have seen health issues facing children worsening over the past year, with parents struggling to afford nutritious meals.
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Jeremy Hunt asked Public Health England to cut its budget by 50 per cent while he was health secretary, the agency’s former CEO has claimed.
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The UK risks becoming highly reliant on overseas care workers after almost 58,000 visas were issued for the sector last year, according to a report. Analysis by the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford found the demand for foreign staff had left the NHS and care homes open to “vulnerabilities” including “exposure to international competition for health workers and risks of exploitation”.
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Local authorities have warned they will need more staff and funding to enforce the ban on no-fault evictions in England effectively. The LGA supports the changes, which would ban tenants from being evicted without justification, but said councils would struggle to police them properly. Cllr Darren Rodwell, LGA housing spokesperson, said “every council I'm aware of” had a shortage of environmental health officers and tenancy relations officers, who investigate potential offences related to private rented housing. Cllr Rodwell said: “New regulation is important, and we welcome it, but we need to make sure we have the right financial package to be able to enforce and deliver it.”
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The funding provided through the Government’s Affordable Homes Programme 2021-26 can now be used to fund replacement homes alongside new affordable homes, Homes England has announced.
The change has been agreed with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, and Homes England described the move as part of the effort to bolster the affordable housing sector.
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The proportion of newly listed private rental properties on Zoopla affordable to recipients of housing support has dropped from 23% to 5%, according to the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS).
The think tank says this is the result of the freeze since April 2020 in the local housing allowance rates and the rising rents for new lets, which have gone up by more than a fifth on average.
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Why does local public audit matter? Why should citizens care about this dry and dusty corner of our system of governance? What has local public audit ever done for us?
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Kent CC councillors will vote this week on whether to kick-start talks with the Government on a devolution deal with a directly-elected mayor or leader.
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A plea has been made to MPs to ‘give the sector a break’ to allow it to get on top of its audit ‘crisis’.
Tudor Evans, a Local Government Association’s (LGA) deputy chair, called for audits to focus on the latest accounts before tackling the backlog of previous years as he appeared before the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee.
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The scale of councils’ borrowing, inadequate public information and the reduction in audit fees have conspired to create opportunities for failure, writes the director of LSE London.
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The Office for Local Government would not have prevented financial problems such as those seen in Woking BC or Thurrock Council, experts have told LGC.
The new body, was announced almost a year ago and is expected to launch in the coming days. Earlier this month LGC exclusively revealed that Josh Goodman had been appointed as its interim chief executive. Mr Goodman was previously director of social housing at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities.
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Whitehall oversight of adult social care before Covid-19 was ‘terrible’ and officials had no understanding of whether councils could cope, former health secretary Matt Hancock admitted today.
Appearing at the independent UK Covid-19 Inquiry, Mr Hancock acknowledged major problems with the Department of Health and Social Care’s (DHSC) oversight of the sector.
Asked whether there was a lack of ‘policy levers enabling the department to ensure pandemic preparedness’ across devolved services, Mr Hancock told the inquiry: ‘It was terrible.’
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Council chiefs have called for a single, locally controlled funding pot to pay for the upkeep of school buildings after auditors warned 700,000 pupils are studying in schools requiring major rebuilding.
A new report by the National Audit Office (NAO) has revealed that around 700,000 children are learning in a school that needs ‘major rebuilding or refurbishment.’
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Croydon Council has warned that rising interest rates are a major concern for the authority as most of its borrowing, taken out between 2017/20 and valued at £545m, will need to be refinanced from this year.
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Approximately 14,000 people were not able to vote on 4 May, research commissioned by the Electoral Commission has found.
The local elections were the first time voters in England were required to show a valid photo ID or voter authority certificate to be issued a ballot paper and 0.25% of people who tried to vote were unable to do so due to new ID requirements.
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There should be financial sanctions for those authorities that do not publish their accounts on time, according to an MP on an influential parliamentary committee.
The Commons’ public accounts committee (PAC) published a report, Timeliness of local auditor reporting, today, which highlights problems caused by the delays to local audit.
Just 12% of local government bodies received their audit opinions in time to publish their 2021-22 accounts by the extended deadline. The committee warned that the problem is likely to get worse before it gets better.
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Rishi Sunak has said he would make the "responsible" decision on pay increases for public sector workers, in order to control inflation.
Junior doctors in England will hold a five-day strike, over a below-inflation offer of a 5% pay increase this year. The prime minister called planned walkouts by junior doctors "very disappointing" and claimed this would "make it harder" to bring down NHS waiting lists - one of his key priorities for government.
"I think people should recognise the economic context we're in and I'm going to make the decisions that are the right ones for the country," he said.
Speaking during a trip to Nottinghamshire, he said: "I think everyone can see the economic context that we're in with inflation higher than we'd like it and it's important that in that context the government makes the right and responsible decisions on things like public sector pay.
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The amount of unpaid council tax has reached a ‘new historic high’ of £5.5bn, according to official figures released by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing, and Communities.
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Prince William is launching a five-year campaign with the aim of ending long-term homelessness in the UK, which he says should not exist in a ‘modern and progressive society’.
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An estimated 100 care homes are lying empty despite 40,000 people waiting for care, according to research by the Liberal Democrats.
A freedom of information requests to all local authorities by the political party found that 94 care homes are not being used for their original purpose.
Thirty-seven of the unused care homes were found to be not fit for purpose, while 15 are lying empty, the FOI request, which had 46 responses, revealed.
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The UK’s most vulnerable families are facing shortfalls of up to £5,600 this year due to the cost-of-living crisis, new research has revealed.
A new report from the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) found that a single parent with one child would on average need to spend an additional £3,100 in 2023/24 to get the same goods and services than they would have bought in 2019/20.
Commissioned by the charity Save the Children, the research also revealed that for a couple with three children, this rises to almost £5,600, or over £100 per week.
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Three councils piloting the reforms talk to LGC about their experiences
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Unions are reportedly unhappy over reports that some public sector pay rises may be blocked by the Government due to fears around inflation being pushed up further. Despite recommendations from the independent pay review bodies, it has been reported that rises could be overruled if they are considered unaffordable due to concerns of a “wage-price spiral”.
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Thousands of staff at Surrey County Council are to be balloted for strike action in a dispute over pay, their union has announced.
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MPs have called for urgent action over an 'unacceptably high' backlog of auditing of local government accounts.
A report by the House of Commons public accounts committee says only 12% of local government bodies received audits on their finances in time to publish accounts for 2021-22.
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Any hope of sustainably clearing the huge backlog in local government audit will fail unless the underlying issue of audit resources is fixed, a committee of MPs has said.
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Not resolving workforce issues and planning within social care was one of Jeremy Hunt’s regrets during his time as health and social care secretary.
Mr Hunt, who was speaking at the UK Covid Inquiry yesterday referenced his regret in his witness statement.
Hugo Keith KC, counsel to the inquiry questioned Mr Hunt who served as secretary of state for health and social care from 2012-18 about the NHS’s capacity to deal with a pandemic.
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Usable reserves held by English councils dropped by 11% in 2022-23, according to analysis of 116 published accounts.
Research by consultancy LG improve showed mets, outer London boroughs and unitary councils used disproportionately large amounts of reserves.
It also found those with the least reserves used them at a higher rate.
Writing for The MJ, LG improve director Dan Bates wrote: ‘Extraordinary economic conditions have resulted in unplanned reserves usage that looks set to continue as many authorities face staggering savings targets.
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Sector splits on regulation remain just days before the expected launch of the Office for Local Government (Oflog) as the fallout from council financial failures continues.
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Audit delays are hindering the accountability for £100bn in local government spending and increasing the risk of financial issues at councils, a report by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has revealed.
Only 12% of local government bodies received audit opinions on their finances in time to publish accounts for 2021/22, which was within the extended deadline for publication, the report – published today (23 June) – outlined.
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Delays to patient discharges have played a key role in overwhelming hospitals, according to a report by the National Audit Office (NAO)
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Most English councils are not confident they can offer the legal minimum social care support, according to research from the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services. The survey found that more than three-quarters of directors said they were concerned that they will not be able to fully meet their duties around the availability of the right care in the right place at the right time in the next financial year. Cllr David Baines, Vice-Chair of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board said: “It is deeply concerning to see that most councils are not confident they can meet all of their statutory duties required by law. This, partnered with the increase in the number of unpaid carers reporting burnout, could have serious impacts for many people who draw on care and support.”
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The Government has announced an end to councils charging to take DIY waste at recycling centres. Responding to the announcement, Cllr Darren Rodwell, environment spokesman for the LGA, said: “Where councils are no longer able to charge for DIY waste at recycling centres the cost will be passed to all householders, including households that do not have a car and those with no possibility of carrying out building works, for example people living in rented accommodation. Evidence from councils and WRAP does not show a link between charges and fly-tipping. We support a crackdown on fly-tipping and that is why we are calling for a review of sentencing guidelines to magistrates to ensure that penalties reflect the seriousness of the offence.”
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The UK’s annual inflation rate remained unchanged in May at 8.7 per cent, adding to the pressure on the Bank of England to increase the cost of borrowing. Figures from the Office for National Statistics showed annual inflation as measured by the consumer prices index held steady from the same level in April, reversing two months of gains.
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Secrecy and concealment of information on failed commercial investments meant Thurrock Council’s recent collapse was a surprise to many officers and councillors, the lead of an independent report said.
Speaking to PF, Tony McArdle, lead for the council’s Best Value Inspection (BVI), said unlike other collapses in Croydon and Northamptonshire, there was a relative shock when Thurrock’s issues came to light.
“The difference with Thurrock is that nobody actually saw this coming,” he said.
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The lack of internal scrutiny ahead of Thurrock Council’s collapse proves the importance of councillor training and financial understanding, experts have said.
[ more...]
A Woking resident raised concerns about a potential breach of the Public Works Loan Board's (PWLB) lending rules in September 2021, almost two years before the council issued a section 114 notice.
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Woking BC’s request for Government financial support two years ago was rejected, allowing the embattled council’s deficit to balloon by a further £1bn, a council meeting has heard.
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Adult social care is on a ‘slide into unsustainability,’ with a growing proportion of directors reporting overspends and funding gaps being filled using one-off reserves, a new report has warned.
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Total UK debt has broken the 100% ceiling as a share of the economy for the first time in 62 years after borrowing doubled.
Latest public finance figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed borrowing in May hit £20bn - £10.7bn more than in May 2022 and the second highest May borrowing since 1993.
The main causes for the rise were the extra costs of the energy support scheme, increases in benefit payments and NHS pay, and high debt interest.
[ more...]
Kent County Council has temporarily closed four schools in following safety concerns over concrete used in their construction.
The council said they had to be shut after it being informed of new guidelines on reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) by the Department for Education and acknowledged it would be 'extremely disruptive'.
A DfE spokesperson said the safety of pupils and staff was paramount.
[ more...]
New housing developments would be given Ofsted-style ratings under further proposals to reform the planning system, which are being backed by Housing Secretary Michael Gove. The initiative would lead to councils assessing developments on a checklist of over 50 attributes, giving them a score out of 100. Plans would be rated “outstanding, good, average or poor” and become a determining factor in whether schemes should receive planning permission.
[ more...]
A record number of new education, health and care (EHC) plans were made last year, latest figures have shown.
The 66,400 new plans in 2022 was the highest number in a year.
There were 114,500 initial requests made for assessment for an EHC plan during the year – up from 93,300 in 2021 and the highest number since the data was first collected in 2016.
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The Government is preparing to delay a new tax on packaging after opposition from MPs and retailers over the costs it would add to household shopping bills, it is reported. Ministers are understood to be holding talks about pushing back the planned rollout of the scheme to charge retailers and manufacturers for the cost of councils recycling their packaging. It was previously reported that the separate packaging tax – formally called the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) – would “most likely” increase household bills by £40 a year, or up to £48, according to an official assessment produced in February 2022, before soaring inflation that will have increased those figures even further. The LGA says the scheme is necessary to cut packaging waste and protect the environment. LGA environment spokesperson Cllr Linda Taylor said: “EPR is a transformative policy widely supported by partners in helping cut packaging waste, boosting recyclability, saving money, and protecting the environment. We cannot afford further delays.”
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People across the UK will receive cost of living discounts – such as reductions on their council tax – if their cities, towns and villages sign up to new “clean energy” projects, under plans to be announced by Labour tomorrow. Sir Keir Starmer will spell out how a proposed new public body, GB Energy, will work with local government, communities and the private sector on projects such as solar panels being put on public land or the roofs of housing estates, with the aim of creating hundreds of thousands of jobs and bringing down household energy bills.
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Scores of councils will struggle to meet their ¬budgets this year, a survey of its members by the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities (Sigoma) has revealed. It said 47 authorities in the North, Midlands and South Coast said they will have to make savings totalling £700 million on spending plans, with 55 percent of councils saying they have doubts over covering costs in 2023/24.
[ more...]
The Prime Minister has declined to back extra support for mortgage holders despite higher interest rates making payments more expensive, with a further rise in rates expected. Asked if the Government will introduce financial support for mortgage bills, similar to those introduced to help with energy bills, Rishi Sunak said he understood the public concern but his priority is to bring inflation down.
[ more...]
British nationals will be prioritised for council housing under plans being considered by ministers to address concerns over migration, it is reported. The Government is said to be discussing legislation for inclusion in the King’s Speech this autumn which will require councils to push British citizens and permanent residents higher up waiting lists and stop others “jumping the queue”.
[ more...]
Plans to ban two-for-one junk food deals have been delayed for another two years, after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said it would be unfair to restrict options when food prices remain high. The anti-obesity policy, which would have meant shops being unable to sell food and drink high in fat, salt or sugar using multibuy deals, has now been delayed until 2025 while a review takes place.
[ more...]
Some councils have spent less than 5% of their 2022-23 UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) allocations by the end of March, Freedom of Information Act requests have shown.
[ more...]
Council officers and members were among those to be named on the King’s Birthday Honours list this year.
Former chief executive of Windsor and Maidenhead LBC Duncan Sharkey was awarded an OBE, having played a critical role in ensuring the Queen’s funeral ran smoothly.
He said: ‘This was a real surprise but I am genuinely honoured.’
[ more...]
Inflation is forcing councils to make extra cuts in their budgets set earlier this year, according to new research.
A survey by the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities found more than half doubted they would be able to cover their costs in the current financial year.
It found 60% would be forced to take cost-cutting measures to reduce capital budgets for key regeneration and infrastructure projects.
[ more...]
A reset is needed to clear the current backlog but underlying issues must be addressed to stop it happening again, writes the director of public financial management at the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy.
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When national political commentators start tweeting about a council it can mean one of two things – either their bins haven’t been collected or something big has gone wrong.
The only good news for councils from him tweeting, ‘there has never been a financial calamity by a local council on this scale,’ was that his bins had probably been collected…
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Government plans to make developers provide more houses and GP surgeries will actually result in fewer being built, councils, charities and business have warned.
In another blow to ministers’ housebuilding goals, they are being urged to rethink an infrastructure levy on new developments which dozens of housing groups warn will worsen the housing crisis.
A coalition of local authorities, developers, housing associations and homeless campaigners have joined together to urge the government to abandon the plans in a move that will exacerbate Conservative tensions over homebuilding.
[ more...]
Cuts to local government funding had a direct impact on health inequalities, Professor Sir Michael Marmot said this morning.
Responding to questions on the health inequality landscape prior to the pandemic at the UK Covid-19 Inquiry in London, Professor Marmot said, “the funding of the healthcare system was inadequate post 2010”.
Professor Marmot, professor of epidemiology and public health at UCL, described the reduction in funding for social care as “regressive”.
[ more...]
The Government has announced a £10m cash package to improve sites for travellers and give the communities easier access to healthcare and education.
The councils being given extra cash are Brighton and Hove, Cornwall, Doncaster, Kensington and Chelsea, Kent, Lancaster, Norwich, Preston and Swindon.
[ more...]
Local authority leaders, developers, charities and others have written to levelling up secretary Michael Gove criticising the Government’s proposed infrastructure levy.
They say the proposed reform, which would allow councils to impose a levy on developers based on the estimated final value of a scheme, could mean fewer affordable homes being built and less money for roads, health centres and schools.
[ more...]
It is time for the sector to debate how far the ‘all-purpose council’ should go, writes a former chief executive in London local government.
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Thurrock Council’s financial failings were the “result of a breakdown of political and managerial leadership”, according to the best value inspection report published this morning.
The council has a debt of £1.5bn and has been under government intervention since September 2022.
Last December Thurrock issued a section 114 notice effectively declaring bankruptcy and accepted further government intervention in February.
[ more...]
Published 2022/23 local authority draft accounts have shown a “significant” and “worrying” decrease in councils’ reserves, new data by consultant LGimprove has revealed.
According to the analysis, based on the 116 local authorities who have published their 2022/23 draft accounts, usable revenue reserves have gone down by 11% over the last financial year. However, when you adjust this figure to remove the Covid-19 business rates relief councils’ received, reserves decreased by 4%.
[ more...]
Commissioners at crisis-hit Thurrock Council have called for sector-wide measures to bolster the role of top officers. The team from Essex CC led by Tony McArdle made recommendations for the wider sector in its Best Value report on Thurrock, published 15 June.
It suggested the Government issued guidance to strengthen the role of the three statutory officers – section 151, monitoring officer and head of paid service – and require them to work together, in addition to legislating to ‘strengthen and clarify’ the role of the monitoring officer.
Earlier this year, Max Caller, a regular reviewer and commissioner at failing authorities, said there was ‘no real rules’ on how the three statutory roles should work and ‘no explicit qualifications’.
[ more...]
Councils have called for the remaining £1bn in the Levelling Up Fund to be ‘allocated on the basis of robust evidence and local need’.
It comes amid mounting criticism of ‘resource intensive and costly’ competitive bidding from the Centre for Cities think-tank and MPs on the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee.
In a new briefing, Centre for Cities argued a ‘single pot’ of funding for local growth – as put forward by former deputy Prime Minister Lord Heseltine in his 2012 report No Stone Unturned – ‘could realise economic potential more effectively than the current system relying on competitive bids’.
[ more...]
Local government leaders have welcomed an official report recommending more autonomy for Integrated Care Systems (ICS) but criticised the Government’s decision not to increase proportion of resources spent on prevention.
Commenting on the Government’s response to the Hewitt review of ICSs, the Local Government Association (LGA) says it is disappointed that the Government has rejected a recommendation to increase the proportion of resources spent on preventative healthcare by at least 1% over the next five years.
The Hewitt review recommended there should be fewer national targets set for ICSs, set up last year to deliver 'joined up' health and care services and involving a range of participants including the NHS, councils, community and voluntary organisations, and said there should be more emphasis on prevention.
However, in their response the Department of Health and Social Care said: ‘we do not agree with imposing a national expectation of an essentially arbitrary shift in spending.’
[ more...]
The scale of Woking Borough Councils’ deficit means that even if it sells some of its assets it will need “very large scale” financial support from the government, the authority’s chief executive has said.
As Woking stares down a £1.2bn deficit (compared with £16m of core funding power), chief executive Julie Fisher made the warning in response to the council’s Section 114 notice issued last week.
“The council has no means of funding the financial deficit and must therefore approach [the] government to explore the prospect of financial support,” she wrote in the paper, which will be discussed at an extraordinary council meeting next week.
[ more...]
A Best Value Inspection report concluded that while the council’s true financial difficulties will be unknown for some time, it is likely that services will remain at low levels for years.
“The scale of the financial challenge now facing the council means it is inevitable that, in addition to making extensive efficiency savings, the council will have to undertake a significant and rapid reduction in the scope of local services,” the report said.
“Many services, which have been relatively well funded over the past decade may, as a consequence, be equipped to do little more than the statutory minimum for the foreseeable future.
[ more...]
Councils have called for the remaining £1bn in the Levelling Up Fund to be ‘allocated on the basis of robust evidence and local need’.
It comes amid mounting criticism of ‘resource intensive and costly’ competitive bidding from the Centre for Cities think-tank and MPs on the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee.
In a new briefing, Centre for Cities argued a ‘single pot’ of funding for local growth – as put forward by former deputy Prime Minister Lord Heseltine in his 2012 report No Stone Unturned – ‘could realise economic potential more effectively than the current system relying on competitive bids’.
[ more...]
Commissioners at crisis-hit Thurrock Council have called for sector-wide measures to bolster the role of top officers.
The team from Essex CC led by Tony McArdle made recommendations for the wider sector in its Best Value report on Thurrock, published today.
It suggested the Government issued guidance to strengthen the role of the three statutory officers – section 151, monitoring officer and head of paid service – and require them to work together, in addition to legislating to ‘strengthen and clarify’ the role of the monitoring officer.
[ more...]
Phil Rook has been appointed as the chief financial officer (section 151 officer) at Worcestershire County Council.
He succeeds Michael Hudson, who left Worcestershire in March to become executive director of resources at Cambridgeshire County Council. Hudson worked at the authority for five years and after his role at Worcestershire was director of finance at Wiltshire Council from October 2010 to April 2018.
[ more...]
English councils have welcomed a government pledge to fully fund a pay rise for NHS contracted services this year, which council leaders said will safeguard community healthcare.
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A damning independent report on Thurrock Council’s investments highlights the risk of these strategies and the negative impact on services, CIPFA has warned.
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Thurrock Council will need to cut services back to near the statutory minimum after “repeated failures” to manage major investment and regeneration projects led to substantial losses, a long-awaited independent report has said.
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Local authority leaders have called for ‘clarity’ on pay increases for staff working in non-NHS provided services will be fully funded.
The call came in response to the announcement that the Government will meet the pay increase for NHS staff working in council commissioned community health services.
Cllr David Fothergill, chairman of the Local Government Association’s (LGA) Community Wellbeing Board, welcomed the move.
[ more...]
Procurement legislation is being tightened to improve oversight of the £300bn spent by the government on goods and services.
The Cabinet Office said new rules would improve the quality and efficiency of public services, and drive growth locally and nationally.
The Procurement Bill, which will enable the changes, moved to its report stage just as the official inquiry into the handling of Covid-19 formally opened.
But opposition parties have called on ministers to go further by closing the ‘VIP lane’ that enabled ministers to be lobbied for contracts at the height of the outbreak.
According to the Commons public accounts committee, 176 contracts are in dispute including those for the £4bn of PPE that was ruled to be unusable in the NHS.
[ more...]
The time has come for local government reorganisation and for councils to be given more power, former levelling up secretary Greg Clark has said.
Speaking to The MJ, he said: ‘I do think the time has come to think about the two-tier structure of local government.
'Often residents don’t really understand who is responsible for what and I think a conversation as to how we can have a simpler system is probably medium-term.’
[ more...]
Council tax bills have more than tripled to £2,000 since the charge was first introduced 30 years ago, with the fee for an average band D home increasing by 79 percent, according to research by the Taxpayers’ Alliance. An average band D bill when council tax was introduced in 1993 was £568 but has now reached £2,065, the research found. In response the LGA said that in recent years, the Government has relied on council tax raising powers to increase councils’ core spending power. An LGA spokesperson said: “Faced with the increased cost of providing local services and rising demand for support, councils have faced the tough choice about whether to increase bills to bring in desperately needed funding to protect services at the same time as being acutely aware of the significant burden that could place on some households."
[ more...]
Parents could soon have to pay more for school lunches because heads are struggling to find cash from their own tightly squeezed budgets to shield prices from food inflation, it is reported. Head teachers in England say they have been using their school funds to keep the cost of school meals down to as little at £2.20, when otherwise the real cost would be more than a third more.
[ more...]
Introducing consequences for councils that fail to publish their accounts by the end of May deadline would be unfair, local government finance experts have argued.
The idea of potential consequences for late audit completion was discussed at a meeting of the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities-convened local audit liaison committee, according to the latest published minutes.
[ more...]
Generative AI tools, such as ChatGPT, Bard and other large language models (LLMs), are at the cusp of revolutionising the global workforce. Clerical and secretarial roles are most at risk; AI/machine learning specialists and engineers stand to benefit; and high-growth green jobs, such as heat pump engineers are AI-resistant.
Local authorities must act now to recognise the opportunities and risks presented by these technologies, and re-shape local skills provision to match future workforce demands.
Following research Social Finance conducted into global skills trends and best practice for City of London, they offer five strategies that local authorities could deploy to prepare their communities, particularly those most excluded from the labour force, for the widespread adoption of AI by local businesses.
1. Double down on basic digital skills provision
2. Map local economy skills gaps
3. Develop AI-focused skills training for people excluded from the workforce
4. Deploy innovative finance to fund outcomes-focused pilots
5. Continue to focus on ‘fusion’ skills
[ more...]
The most recent finance settlement for local government was better than many had feared. But after 13 years of cuts, stubbornly high inflation and rapidly increasing demand and pressures on our services, councils are one bad settlement away from being in a position of real difficulty.
At the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities (SIGOMA) we recently issued a financial pressures survey to our membership. We are still compiling all the data, but one key theme is emerging: the amount of uncertainty that local government is currently facing is something our membership makes clear to us repeatedly.
Councils have received five single-year settlements, and while the department did provide some information about what we could expect for 2024-25 as part of the most recent one, this did not contain any indicative allocations and so the uncertainty about future funding levels remains.
[ more...]
Pollution from farms has prevented housing developments being approved by 35 councils, analysis by The Times and Watershed Investigations, the not-for-profit organisation, can reveal.
Natural England, the regulator, has issued advice to 74 local authorities where water bodies were already in “unfavourable conservation status”.
The public body told them that new developments should be approved only if they would not worsen the already polluted rivers. Nutrient pollution, in the form of excessive nitrogen and phosphorus from farm fertilisers, animal slurry and human sewage, damages rivers by causing an overgrowth of algae. With the water starved of oxygen, the wildlife is suffocated. In extreme cases, this can lead to dead zones.
[ more...]
The NHS will deploy street mental health teams in English locations from Devon to Doncaster in an attempt to curb a rise in rough sleeping in England.
Fourteen outreach teams will aim to get more rough sleepers on to a path to counselling, medication or other treatments and will seek out people “who have often been through incredibly traumatic experiences to ensure they get the help they need”, said Prof Tim Kendall, NHS England’s clinical national director for mental health.
The latest data showed a 15% annual rise in new rough sleepers in London, while an England-wide snapshot taken last autumn revealed a 26% annual rise.
[ more...]
A £150 million fund to help Ukrainians into their own homes has been announced by the Government. The new money will go to councils to help Ukrainian families into private rented accommodation and find work. It will also go towards continuing sponsorship arrangements, as many guests are in their second year in the UK.
[ more...]
As the covid inquiry gets underway this week, its narrative must not be written before those at the sharpest end get a look in, warns an independent care and health specialist.
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More than three million people have been taken to court for council tax debt in some of the poorest parts of the country in the past two years, i can reveal.
Since Covid, magistrates courts across England have handed out the equivalent of more than 4,500 debt orders a day in what campaigners say is the latest illustration of the scale of the cost-of-living crisis.
Figures obtained via Freedom of Information requests show there has been a rise in local authorities taking legal action against people who haven’t paid their bills as coronavirus restrictions ended and inflation began to soar.
[ more...]
Landlords are losing thousands of pounds while bailiffs are being stopped from evicting tenants because their stab vests do not fit.
Repossessions filed through the county courts were up 69pc at the beginning of this year due to a flood of landlords trying to sell up ahead of incoming rental reforms.
But delays are now mounting after Whitehall officials ruled that bailiffs did not have correctly fitting stab vests.
[ more...]
Pothole protection that can extend the life of roads by 15 years is being increasingly shunned by councils, sales figures show.
Data shared with The Telegraph show that the sales of road surface dressing, a key method of making roads pothole-proof, has plummeted in the last decade, while the cost to fix them has rocketed.
Figures from the Road Emulsion Association (REA) and the Road and Surface Treatments Association (RSTA) show that in 2022, enough surface dressing materials were bought to cover just 13.9 sq miles of roads - down from the 24.7 sq miles in 2012.
[ more...]
Ministers accused of neglecting ‘tidal wave’ of child mental ill health in England
Exclusive: Research reveals only a quarter of primaries will have vital school-based support by end of 2024
Sally Weale Education correspondent
Fri 9 Jun 2023 06.00 BST
Ministers have been accused of failing to grasp the “tidal wave” of mental ill health blighting children’s lives, after research found that only a quarter of English primaries will be able to offer vital school-based support by the end of next year.
With almost one in five pupils aged seven to 16 now thought to have a mental health disorder, specialist support teams were set up to work with children in schools, addressing early symptoms and reducing pressure on overstretched NHS services.
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Communities secretary Michael Gove has said the Government should not ‘dictate’ to councils on waste collections.
Speaking to councillors at the Local Government Association (LGA), Mr Gove said he sympathised with local authorities as they await much-delayed plans to align waste collections across the country.
[ more...]
Some local authorities have opted not to undertake long-term borrowing from the Public Works Loan Board (PWLB) in 2022/23 due to economic instability and the rising interest rate environment, council reports have revealed.
West Berkshire Council, Surrey County Council and Newcastle City Council have all stated in their 2022/23 treasury management strategies, published this week, that they didn’t draw down long-term loans from the PWLB this financial year.
[ more...]
The Government must do more to help local areas adapt to climate change, councils in England have said.
The Local Government Association (LGA) asked more than 300 councils in England about concerns and barriers to adapting their services that cover roads, flooding, fire, housing, public health, the natural environment and social care to the changing climate.
It comes after the UK saw wildfires and significant infrastructure disruption as temperatures soared to record highs last year.
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Where did it all go wrong? That question haunts me. For many it has gone not wrong but very right. But they do not have blood on their hands. They did not start the take-over. It began when two people met in The Corral Bar and asked ‘What if we could replace the council’s chief executive with an AI CEO?’.
Those two people were me, William Caster, head of transformation, and the council’s deputy leader, Karel ?apek, who ran a digital services company. We would develop and control the artificial intelligence, claiming that the AI CEO was a person who had been hideously disfigured in an accident, so only worked remotely and was never seen on a Teams call.
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A national care service is required to provide a long-term solution for the sector’s crisis, a new report has concluded.
Support would be provided locally and delivered under one name across England under the system envisaged in a report commissioned by trade union Unison from left-wing Fabian Society think-tank.
Report co-author Andrew Harrop said: ‘This comprehensive plan for a national care service for England is an ambitious roadmap for solving one of the country’s most significant and enduring social challenges.’
[ more...]
Britain will have the highest inflation of any major developed economy this year but should narrowly avoid recession, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has said in its latest set of forecasts.
The Paris-based OECD - a club of rich countries - said that inflation in Britain will be higher in 2023 than nearly any of its other members save for Argentina and Turkey.
It warned that higher interest rates are likely to dampen economic growth and incomes in the coming months.
[ more...]
Government targets to increase levels of cycling and walking in England are set to be missed, according to a new report.
Delivery of active travel schemes has been “patchy” and the Department for Transport (DfT) “does not yet know” if local authority projects “have been of good enough quality”, public spending watchdog the National Audit Office (NAO) said.
The Government’s objectives for active travel include doubling the number of journeys made by cycling from 0.8 billion in 2013 to 1.6 billion in 2025.
[ more...]
Huge debt and failing investments have led to Woking Borough Council’s interim finance director issuing a section 114 notice, halting all non-essential spending.
Section 151 officer Brendan Arnold said in his notice that had the extent to which the assets have lost value, the new calculations for MRP and the many other pressures being felt such as inflation have left the council far out of its depth – with £1.8bn of debt and core funding of just £16m.
“There is no prospect that the council will balance its budget in 2023-24, 2024-25 or the successive years without external intervention on a very large scale,” he wrote.
[ more...]
A Labour council leader has claimed that the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) is likely to focus on areas that want or already have an elected mayor in its next tranche of devolution deals.
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Years of financial mismanagement, including breaking legal restrictions on borrowing, have left Woking BC requiring £1.2bn in government financial support to survive, the council has admitted.
The scale of Woking's debt compared to its income means the government is "likely to have to write it off", according to Rob Whiteman, the chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (Cipfa).
[ more...]
Auditors should be allowed to draw a line under outdated accounts in order to clear the extensive current backlog of audited local government financial reports. And long-term structural challenges must be addressed to ensure the current crisis in auditing in England does not reoccur.
Those were some of the conclusions drawn by panellists at the second evidence session of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (LUHC) Committee’s inquiry into financial reporting and audit in local authorities.
“Finding a way to clear the backlog is key – unless and until that is done, all the other things in the system that are really important are not going to be able to proceed,” said Conrad Hall, director of resources and s151 officer at the London Borough of Newham, and the chair of the CIPFA LASAAC Local Authority Code Board. “Imposing a date where an audit opinion – whether qualified or unqualified – must be provided may be a part of that.”
[ more...]
Giving oral evidence to the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee amid a backlog of more than 1,000 local government audits, Gareth Davies said auditors should push ahead with signing off council accounts without resolving every query.
He said it should be considered as a ‘temporary measure’ to clear the backlog ‘even if it means we see high numbers of qualified audit opinions’.
[ more...]
Norfolk CC is to reinstate the role of chief executive at the council after scrapping the role in 2018 in favour of a head of paid service and executive director model.
At a meeting of the council’s employment committee last week, Norfolk’s councillors voted unanimously to recruit a new chief executive as head of paid service.
[ more...]
Woking BC's financial strategy was agreed on a “cross-party basis” in "almost all instances” the council's former deputy leader has said.
Woking was placed under statutory intervention with immediate effect on 25 May by levelling up secretary Michael Gove due to its financial situation. The council is currently £1.9bn in debt, but this is set to rise to £2.4bn by 2024-25.
[ more...]
The huge backlog of unaudited local government accounts has ramifications across government, including for entire departments and the NHS, the head of the NAO has warned.
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Councils are struggling to reach households hit by the cost of living crisis due to the Government’s failure to share its data with local authorities.
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Financial failures at Woking BC could lead ministers to scrap sector borrowing freedoms unless efforts to identify councils at risk are found.
The Government is consulting on what metrics to use for identifying councils at financial risk.
Proposed measures include the proportionality of debt, the proportion of capital assets invested to return a profit and the proportion of debt borrowed from outside central or local government.
[ more...]
The UK has to "reduce its reliance on hotels" for housing asylum seekers, immigration minister Robert Jenrick has said.
Speaking to the BBC, he said he had to look after taxpayers and his duty was to the British public over migrants.
He added it was "fair and reasonable" to ask asylum seekers to share rooms in hotels in some circumstances.
[ more...]
The British Retail Consortium suggests that a scheme to charge retailers and manufacturers for the cost of councils recycling their packaging will increase the cost of household goods by £4 billion a year when it is rolled out from April next year.
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A feature explores the care costs facing some individuals and families and the lack of preparation by many for how they will pay for it. About 52 per cent of those over 55 have not thought about how they will afford care costs, according to a survey by Fidelity International. In the year to March 2022, the number of people living in care homes was 360,792, up from 291,000 in 2011. One in seven are expected to face total care costs higher than £100,000 and one in 10 will pay over £120,000.
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Many local authorities are confused about whether the surveillance equipment they are using is subjected to any security or ethical concerns, according to the biometrics and surveillance camera commissioner.
Professor Fraser Sampson has published a report based on a survey of councils, carried out last year, on their use of overt surveillance cameras in public places.
It says the responses have made clear there is little understanding of which suppliers of the equipment the concerns might apply to.
[ more...]
Councils have urged the Government not to delay landmark environmental reforms that would shift the cost of collecting household waste from taxpayers to producers.
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Food inflation in the UK fell in May after more than a year of sharp increases in the price of food. The British Retail said annual food inflation eased this month from 15.7 per cent to 15.4 per cent, even as the overall rise in shop prices hits a new high.
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Parents on Universal Credit will be able to claim hundreds of pounds more to cover childcare costs from the end of June, the Government has announced.
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A devastating catalogue of failings in the Home Office’s “flawed and inefficient” asylum system has been uncovered in a damning UN report.
The eight-month audit of the UK’s asylum system by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) picked apart the government’s immigration policy to reveal a deeply dysfunctional department.
The 200-page report found that children were wrongly detained as adults, trafficking victims were potentially missed, vulnerable people were locked up, and laws and government policies were violated.
[ more...]
Senior officers have formally rejected the ‘full and final’ pay offer tabled by employers.
The Association of Local Authority Chief Executives (ALACE) said in a letter the offer of a 3.5% increase for 2023-24 was ‘unacceptable’ and is pressing for parity with other council staff, which would equate to a 3.9% rise.
ALACE honorary secretary Ian Miller said describing the offer as ‘full and final’ was ‘unhelpful language’ and is seeking a formal meeting for further negotiations.
He added the offer ‘risks antagonising the most senior officers in local government’.
[ more...]
The Government has launched a consultation seeking views on changes to the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS).
In 2014, the LGPS changed from a final salary scheme to a career-average scheme, which included transitional protection known as an ‘underpin’ for members closest to retirement.
In 2018 the Court of Appeal ruled that these changes unlawfully discriminated against younger members.
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Healthcare leaders are warning that end-of-life care and other vital health services face cutbacks or rationing after thousands of staff were excluded from a new government pay deal. The Government confirmed staff working in outsourced services are not included in the NHS pay deal, meaning their employers will have to fund any pay rise themselves. A joint letter from the LGA, NHS Confederation, NHS Providers and the Association of Directors of Public Health to Health Secretary Steve Barclay warns that organisations could be forced to stop recruiting new staff and reduce the level of service they provide in order to match the pay rise for NHS-employed staff.
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Labour is planning to grant local officials new powers to buy land cheaply and develop on it. The party reportedly wants to pass a law allowing local development authorities in England the power to buy up land at a fraction of its potential cost if they want to build on it.
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Analysis of government data shows more than 90 primary schools in England – many of them in cities and towns – are to close or are at risk of closure because they are more than two-thirds empty. The LGA said the challenges of managing falling pupil rolls were compounded by the fact that local authorities had no direct control over academy schools. An LGA spokesperson said: “Councils should be given powers to reduce the size of, or close academies – as they do with maintained schools – where there is evidence of a significant drop in demand and a need to ensure a school remains financially viable. Councils should also be given the responsibility for in-year admissions, and powers to direct all schools to accept local children on to their roll, where appropriate.”
[ more...]
Inflationary pressures are making it “almost impossible” for councils in London to build new homes, while shared ownership is no longer an affordable product, the former chief executive of one of the most active housebuilding councils has warned.
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Growing private involvement in care provision has led to more children being placed outside their local authority and away from their families, according to research by Oxford University. The study found that 17,000 out-of-area placements in England can be attributed to the outsourcing of care to for-profit providers between 2011 and 2022. It has also been revealed that the growing private involvement has disrupted the lives of vulnerable children.
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Care users are being pushed into financial crisis, with disabled people paying “a tax on disability”, according to charities and disabled people’s organisations (DPOs). Groups including Mencap, Scope and Inclusion London said that disabled care users are being pushed into hardship, with some forced to go without essential home care and others facing up to £20,000 of arrears to their local authority.
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Councils are spending a third less on filling potholes as they were eight years ago, opting for cheaper options to tackle the backlog, according to analysis by the Asphalt Industry Alliance. Research shows that £96 million was spent last year, compared to £144 million in 2015, with experts saying councils are being forced into the less expensive, shorter-term repairs as a result of funding constraints. Cllr Linda Taylor, transport spokesperson for the LGA, said: “Only by the government providing councils with increased and long term funding certainty can this growing problem be addressed and our roads brought up to scratch.”
[ more...]
All councils should be required to have Local Government Association peer reviews, a former chief executive of the membership body has said.
Speaking to LGC to mark her retirement from local government after a career spanning 40 years, Carolyn Downs said the challenging financial situation local government is in means even well led councils can struggle.
[ more...]
Home Office civil servants are threatening potential strike action over the Government’s Rwanda deportation policy and small boats legislation.
The Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union, which represents nearly 16,000 staff in the Home Office and Border Force, said it was “going to have to consider” industrial action if members were forced to implement measures that they believe to be unlawful.
The PCS has previously threatened judicial review and refused to co-operate over plans by Priti Patel, the former home secretary, to use Border Force jet skis to turn back migrants attempting to cross the Channel in small boats.
[ more...]
More than 90 schools are at risk of closing down because of low pupil numbers amid falling birth rates and an exodus from cities driven by the cost of living.
Schools are funded per pupil, so lower enrolment numbers mean less money - which can lead to schools struggling to survive.
Some 88 primary schools were more than two-thirds empty in the last academic year - roughly matching the 66% vacancy rate of the 156 schools that have closed since 2009/10, according to a Guardian analysis.
[ more...]
People will be warned they need to put less in their recycling bins as part of a Government overhaul of waste disposal, i can reveal.
Ministers want to launch a crackdown on “wishcycling” – when well-meaning people try to recycle items that cannot actually be processed, which contaminates the recycling chain.
They are set to ask households in England to be more selective in what they recycle, in the hope that this will drive up recycling rates by reducing the volume of material which needs to be separated at waste processing centres and sent to landfill.
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The Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee has warned that there is ‘no oversight’ into Levelling Up spending in a report published today. The report claimed that the Government was not aware of which pots were used in the fund. Cllr Kevin Bentley, Chairman of the LGA’s People and Places Board said, “Levelling up has the potential to transform people’s lives and livelihoods, with councils best placed to make this happen. This should be locally led by evidence of where crucial investment needs to go to, not based on costly competitive bids between areas, as this important report confirms."
[ more...]
Cllr Linda Taylor, LGA transport spokesperson, spoke to BBC Radio 4 about council calls for long-term government funding to improve our local roads. It comes as a report by the AA found an increase in pothole breakdowns and compensations paid to drivers. Cllr Taylor said current funding levels mean councils are only able to “stand still” and patch up roads as opposed to embarking on widespread resurfacing projects.
BBC Radio 4 PM programme (46 mins 42 secs)
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Local authority leaders have welcomed the launch of the Government’s £165m skills fund but say councils should be given more powers and resources to help people into employment.
The Local Skills Improvement Fund will be used to renovate facilities with up-to-date equipment, help to upskill teachers, and deliver new courses in key subjects such as green construction.
[ more...]
Bristol City Council has been warned it must take urgent action to avoid bankruptcy over the spiralling cost of special educational needs and disabilities.
In the last financial year it spent £94.6m on the sector, £16m more than was initially budgeted.
Added to previous overspend, it now has a total deficit of £42.5m with three years to reduce the amount.
[ more...]
Hundreds of children in care are missing school and not receiving any kind of education, according to new research.
The Children’s Commissioner for England Dame Rachel de Souza says this means they at risk of being ‘without any of the vital opportunities education provides.’
[ more...]
Thurrock Council is to stop its garden waste collection until further notice.
The council has announced a one-off brown bin garden waste collection in the week beginning Monday 5 June, after which the service will be paused indefinitely.
Thurrock has cited issues “with waste crew staffing numbers” as being behind the disruption.
[ more...]
With workforce issues presenting local government with an “almost existential” challenge, one experienced chief believes the solution could lie in a fast-developing but controversial area: artificial intelligence.
Surrey CC chief executive Joanna Killian is the new chair of the Association of County Chief Executives, and told LGC it was a topic her colleagues “talked a lot about” when they met at their annual CEO retreat last month.
For her, the workforce challenge is now “as bad as I’ve ever seen it” and represents an “almost existential” issue for the sector.
[ more...]
Secretary of state Michael Gove has demanded an intervention in Working BC begin immediately after the scale of its financial problems emerged.
The council has been branded the ‘most indebted’ council in the country, with debts to the tune of £1.9bn on a net budget of £24m, tied up in regeneration schemes and commercial investments.
In a departmental letter to Woking chief executive Julie Fisher, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) official Suzanne Clarke said: ‘There is a pressing case for urgent government action.’
[ more...]
Senior council figures have questioned whether Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s pledge to end the use of asylum hotels is deliverable.
The MJ understands recent ‘reasonable worst-case scenarios’ produced by Whitehall officials show they expect more asylum seekers to make Channel crossings this year compared with 2022, when a record 45,755 people arrived in so-called small boats.
Currently, there is a backlog of 110,000 asylum seekers awaiting a decision on their application after six months.
But Whitehall officials estimate that could increase to 140,000 by the end of this year and 154,000 in 2024.
Consequently, local government experts have suggested hotel use will need to continue.
[ more...]
Croydon Council has set out plans to dispose of more than £50m of its assets to help deal with its large debt burden of £1.3bn.
In a report presented to the council’s Scrutiny & Overview Committee earlier this week (22 May), Jane West, corporate director of resources and s151 officer, outlined plans for the authority to sell off 28 properties in 2023/24 to bring in a “minimum” of £50m.
[ more...]
CIPFA has warned that some councils are worried about serious consequences arising if they publish their unaudited financial statements by the end of the month, in light of the “significant challenges” they face.
[ more...]
Levelling up is likely to fail unless its funding model changes, an influential committee of MPs has warned.
In a report published today, the Commons levelling up, housing and communities committee said that while the government is right to prioritise its levelling up policy, “this laudable aim is unlikely to be successful given the government’s current approach to funding”.
[ more...]
According to Lee Rowley’s ministerial statement, which was published yesterday, Woking has amassed a debt of £.1.9bn, which is set to increase to £2.4bn by 2024-25.
With a net budget of £24m and core spending power of £14m, Woking is the most indebted council in England compared to its financial size, the statement said.
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The authority reported a £15m deficit in 2022-23, mainly attributed to a large overspend in the high needs budget, a council report said.
The report, published ahead of a school’s forum meeting, said the deficit created a £39.7m cumulative overspend, which the authority will need to clear by 2025-26.
Angel Lai, finance manager for children and education, told local education leaders the authority will be unable to fund the current overspend without reforms to how services are run.
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Insufficient data means the government has no understanding of what departments and combined authorities are spending on levelling up, MPs have warned.
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Thousands of Afghan refugees brought to the UK during the Kabul evacuation will be evicted from their Home Office hotels with no offer of housing, the government has revealed.
A Home Office letter, seen by The Independent, has been sent to Afghans living in government hotels telling them that they need to start searching for private rented accommodation as existing support will end from 2 May.
Around 8,000 Afghans are living in hotels in the UK after fleeing the Taliban in August 2021. The government announced plans to evict them in March, saying the refugees would be given a few months’ notice. But initial reports said all refugees would be offered a property to live in.
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Too few people experiencing alcohol problems are in treatment, with many experiencing barriers in getting help, according to a Public Accounts Committee report. The cross-party group said government data on the number of people struggling with alcohol problems is out of date, and that more needs to be done to ensure councils that provide treatment services have the resources they need to offer people help. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, said: “Councils have seen £1 billion worth of cuts to their local public health grant over the last eight years, which goes to fund alcohol treatment services.”
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Breakdowns caused by potholes have risen by almost a third in the last year, according to figures from the AA. The motoring group helped more than 52,000 people whose vehicles were damaged by potholes in April, around 1,700 a day. Cllr Linda Taylor, transport spokesperson for the LGA, said: “Only by the Government providing councils with increased and long-term funding certainty can this growing problem be addressed.”
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Funding for the Government’s flagship tutoring programme is reportedly set to double next academic year, with £150 million made available as part of a £1.5 billion package over the next four years. The national tutoring programme (NTP) was launched in November 2020 to help with lost learning as a result of the pandemic.
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UK inflation has dropped to 8.7 per cent in the largest recorded fall since the cost of living crisis began, according to the Office for National Statistics. The drop sees inflation as measured by the consumer prices index fall below double digits for the first time since August 2022.
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The UK is no longer predicted to fall into recession this year, but tax cuts could still fuel inflation and result in a long period of high interest rates, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF now forecast the country’s gross domestic product to grow by 0.4 per cent this year, up from its April estimate of a 0.3 per cent contraction.
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The next Government has been urged to fund councils to carry out basic neighbourhood services to boost community cohesion.
It comes after increased feelings of neighbourhood cohesion at the beginning of the pandemic declined, with the percentage of people who thought Britain would be more united than before post-coronavirus dropping from 57% in April 2020 to 28% just two months later, according to the Office for National Statistics.
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The green quango Natural England has been accused of blocking 160,000 new homes and helping to push housebuilding to its lowest level since the 1920s.
The Home Builders Federation (HBF) has warned that Natural England’s actions, and recent changes to planning policy, threaten to reduce the number of new homes from 240,000 a year in 2018-19 to 111,000 by 2025.
Rules imposed by Natural England, the agency within the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs responsible for protecting the landscape, have led 74 councils to block developments that could not show they would not pollute water systems.
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A local government pensions expert has demanded a meeting with fund managers amid concerns about how investment managers exercise proxy votes at shareholder meetings.
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More than a third of a million council and school support staff in England and Wales have started voting on a possible strike over pay.
Their union Unison says the flat rate rise of £1,925 offer made to local government staff is ‘nowhere near what’s needed to meet rising prices during the cost of living crisis’.
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Room to increase spending or reduce taxes has narrowed after the latest figures showed borrowing was £11.9bn higher than the same time last year.
Growth in tax receipts was offset by the extra costs of energy support schemes, increases in benefit payments and higher debt interest, leading to a monthly borrowing total of £25.6bn - the second highest April level since 1993.
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The gap between the highest and lowest ranked UK cities is narrowing but levelling up and devolution are still too slow, according to a new study.
The Demos-PwC Good Growth for Cities Index, which ranks 50 of the UK’s largest cities with populations of at least 350,000 based on the public’s assessment of 12 economic measures, found Oxford, Swindon, Exeter, Bristol and Southampton made up the top five.
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Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer has pledged to deliver more care staff, closer health and care integration and a new National Care Service if he becomes Prime Minister.
His policy document Build an NHS Fit for the Future outlined plans for his National Care Service, which would be 'locally delivered but underpinned by high national standards, where people are helped to stay in their homes for as long as possible'.
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Local authorities said they were taking action after a data breach by the revenues and benefits software supplier Capita.
Councils including Colchester and Coventry city councils, South Staffordshire and Adur DCs and Worthing BC were reportedly affected.
The Information Commissioner’s Office, the data protection regulator, said several councils had reported the incident and it was ‘assessing the information provided’.
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The Department for Transport has announced allocations for the £200m fourth (2022-23) round of the Active Travel Fund and revealed that it had blocked all low traffic neighbourhood (LTNs) schemes from the funding.
The DfT suggested that, unlike the winners, LTNs did not 'benefit the community as a whole'.
Over 265 schemes in 60 areas will receive a share of the £200m, which will provide 121 miles of new cycle track, 77 miles of new paths and greenways and initiatives to make streets safer around 130 schools.
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Poor, older people living in almshouses enjoy longer lives than far wealthier people living elsewhere, a study has found. The report from the Bayes Business School says the longevity of those who move into one of the UK’s 30,000 almshouses – the oldest form of social housing – is boosted by as much as two and a half years. At a time of a severe shortage of affordable rental accommodation, almshouse charities say they should be put at the forefront of the community housing concept, providing an “exemplar housing model”. In 2018, the latest figures available, there were 2,500 people aged over 60 who were officially homeless and the LGA had previously warned in 2017 that the scale of existing elderly homelessness was set to double by 2025.
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The Department for Transport has announced allocations for the £200m fourth (2022-23) round of the Active Travel Fund and revealed that it had blocked all low traffic neighbourhood (LTNs) schemes from the funding.
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Changes to simplify council accounts will not be implemented in the short-term due to a lack of capacity in the sector, a member of the leadership team at the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) has said.
CIPFA recently held an informal inaugural meeting of its Better Reporting Group, which will aim to provide advice to councils on how to streamline the information in their financial statements, but attempts at simplification have so far failed to bear fruit amid the backlog of more than 1,000 local government audits.
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Councils have spent nearly £300million on pothole compensation claims over the past decade - enough to fill five million potholes.
Fresh figures show £11.6million was paid out to motorists, cyclists and pedestrians for damage and injuries last year, with a further £11.1million spent on handling claims.
Yet the same sum of cash could have filled an additional 340,000 potholes - potentially preventing future accidents, according to research by Citroen UK.
It comes after the Daily Mail revealed how highway authorities were turning away millions of pounds in pothole claims each year, with fewer than one in four resulting in a payout.
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Leicestershire County Council has warned that the challenge of balancing its medium-term financial strategy (MTFS) is “much more significant” than it has been in the past.
A report by Chris Tambini, director of corporate resources at the council, outlined that despite Leicestershire’s 2023/27 MTFS being balanced for 2023/24, it is predicted that there will be a budget shortfall of £13m in 2024/25, which will rise to £88m by 2026/27.
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Section 151 officers at local authorities who have failed to submit timely financial reports and audits came under fire yesterday (15 May) at a select committee inquiry held at the Houses of Parliament.
The Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (LUHC) Committee held the first evidence session of its inquiry into financial reporting and audit in local authorities, with committee member Natalie Elphicke pressing those giving oral evidence on whether enough individual responsibility was being taken for the “shocking” backlog of unaudited financial accounts.
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The Labour party has pledged to introduce a Scottish-style right to roam law in England if it wins the next general election, with access to green space enshrined in law.
The shadow environment minister, Alex Sobel, made the announcement during a debate secured by the Green MP, Caroline Lucas, who has been campaigning for wider access to the countryside.
Only 8% of England has a right to roam, which covers coastal paths, mountains and moorland. Some private landowners, such as national trusts and some farmers, open their land and pathways for people to walk in and that is not included in the 8% figure.
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The Tories have been accused of levelling down Britain after figures showed that almost the whole country outside London suffered a downturn following the outbreak of war in Ukraine.
Economic output in six out of nine English regions fell in the three months to September last year, new figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show.
Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales also all suffered a contraction or stagnated.
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More children than ever are being home-schooled in England, according to new figures, prompting ministers to launch an investigation into how many are missing out on education.
The Department for Education said it wanted local authorities and schools to identify children who may be at risk of missing out on education, especially those of compulsory school age who were not registered at a school and may not be receiving a suitable education.
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The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) is leaning on the Local Government Association (LGA) to slim down its improvement offer, The MJ understands.
It is believed the LGA is under pressure to focus its peer reviews on key areas like finance and corporate governance.
Reviews of softer services – like communications and workforce diversity and inclusivity – could face the axe as DLUHC is becoming more explicit about what it considers to be helpful and what it does not value.
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The £2 cap on bus fares in England has been extended again until the end of October, the government has announced.
The cap, which applies to more than 130 bus operators outside of London, will then rise in November to £2.50 for 12 months, before prices are reviewed.
The current limit on fares has now been extended twice after warnings hundreds of services could be cut without it.
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Landlords will be prevented from imposing a blanket ban on tenants having pets in their homes as part of reforms to the rental sector to be announced by ministers.
Under new protections for tenants, landlords will be able to put up rents only once a year and will have to give at least two months’ notice if they want to end a rental agreement.
No-fault evictions will be abolished to protect tenants who complain about poor standards from being made to leave their home through no fault of their own. However, notice periods will be reduced where tenants have been irresponsible — for example, by breaching their tenancy agreement or causing damage.
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More than a million homes in England that got planning permission in the last 12 years still haven’t been built, FactCheck analysis has found.
Using a methodology developed by the independent Local Government Association (LGA), we looked at the number of homes granted planning approval versus the number of dwellings actually built since 2010-11.
Comparing those totals, we found 1,017,000 homes that should have been finished but haven’t.
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The Government has scrapped the appointment of levelling up directors.
A dozen roles were to be created in an effort to ‘champion local places’ across Whitehall departments and interviews took place during the summer.
However, the appointments will now not go ahead following a review of the project, levelling up minister Dehenna Davison has confirmed.
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The number of outstanding local authority audits could reach more than 1,000 by the end of 2023 without “urgent and decisive action” to unblock the system, MPs have been told.
Director of local audit at the Financial Reporting Council, Neil Harris, told Parliament’s levelling up committee that the hundreds of existing delays have been caused by a “multiplicity of reasons”, and warned there is no one solution.
However, given the situation is, Harris said, “getting to a crisis stage now”, solutions need to be found.
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Afghan refugee families uprooted from London to Yorkshire earlier this year have been issued with eviction notices in the name of Suella Braverman.
This will be the fourth time that some of the families have been forced to move home, sometimes leaving jobs and schools, since being airlifted out of Kabul to the UK in August 2021. They were invited to the UK under Operation Pitting because at least one family member worked closely with the British authorities and it was believed that their lives would be at risk if they remained in Afghanistan.
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The UK’s biggest regeneration event has opened with public sector projects dominating the announcements.
The Real Estate Investment & Infrastructure Forum (UKREiiF) opened in Leeds with ambitious plans and a demand from council chief executives for the ‘handbrake’ to be taken off of economic growth.
The Thames Estuary Growth Board has announced a new “Investuary” platform that will channel £18bn of funding towards projects in the south east.
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An exodus of teachers is driving public sector pay rise plans to a record high, new data shows.
Public sector employers plan to increase pay by a record 3.3pc as they struggle to find new staff, according to the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development’s quarterly Labour Market Outlook.
More than half of public sector employers report having vacancies that are difficult to fill, with the strike-hit education and health-care sectors facing the biggest challenges in recruitment.
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The Cabinet is reportedly divided over immigration policy as ministers prepare for migration to reach a record. Forecasts have suggested that the net figure for last year, to be published this month, could be as high as a million with ministers said to be drawing up plans to stop family members from joining overseas master’s students at British universities.
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Planning application fees will have to increase by 57 per cent, the LGA has warned, as it said plans to raise fees for homeowners do not go far enough and will not cover the “true cost” of processing applications. The LGA has calculated that 305 out of the 343 local authority planning departments were operating in a deficit totalling over £245 million in 2020/21. LGA Planning spokesperson Cllr Linda Taylor said: “Councils must have the flexibility to set planning fees at a local level to cover their costs relating to planning, which could include the employment of qualified planners. This would put councils in a stronger position to address the issue of resourcing in the planning sector.”
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Millions of homeowners are facing a total £12 billion increase to their mortgage bills, as borrowers are warned to expect “plenty more mortgage pain”. An estimated 3.75 million households are yet to face the impact of rising mortgage rates as they are still on cheap fixed deals, according to the think tank Resolution Foundation and could see their annual payments rise by £2,300 on average, after 12 increases to the Bank of England’s base rate of interest.
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Rural areas are facing a surge in numbers of obese and overweight people but are hamstrung in their efforts to deal with it, according to council leaders.
New analysis from the County Councils Network (CCN) shows the number of adults who are overweight or obese has increased by 1.1 million in county and rural areas since 2015.
These areas account for 58% of the increase in England as a whole, yet they receive only about half of what councils in London receive in public health grant and much less than the national average.
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Councillors on the new North Yorkshire unitary have criticised one of the county’s former districts for allocating millions of pounds in grants that it did not have the authority to award.
At its last full council meeting in March before being dissolved, Ryedale DC awarded £2.9m from the Community Infrastructure Levy scheme to local organisations.
But at a North Yorkshire executive meeting last week (9 May) George Jabbour (Con) said that Ryedale did not follow due process.
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Bin crews could soon be putting their feet up on a Monday as the wave of four-day-week trials spreading across the UK finally reaches frontline public services.
South Cambridgeshire district council has agreed to test a 32-hour working week for 150 refuse loaders and drivers this summer after successful experiments with reduced working hours with office- and laptop-based staff. Workers who investigate fly-tipping, undertake dredging and are council caretakers will also try the new working pattern.
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The number of homeless families being housed by English councils in hotels and B&Bs for longer than the legal limit is at its highest in 20 years.
The latest government figures show that 1,630 families were being housed in hotels and B&Bs by councils in England past the six-week legal limit between October and December last year. This is the highest reported figure since 2003. It also marks the highest quarterly increase ever recorded, jumping 35% since data was last reported, for July to September last year.
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Proposals to raise planning fees by up to 35% will do little to future-proof the sector and prevent a significant national shortfall in planners, local leaders have warned.
In March the Department for Levelling up, Housing and Communities proposed increasing planning fees by 25% for most applications and by 35% for major projects – future changes would then be linked to CPI inflation every year.
Responding to the proposals, the Local Government Association said that it broadly supported the rise, but warned an increase of about 57% is needed to fully compensate authorities planning costs.
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Councils are turning away millions of pounds worth of compensation claims for injuries and damage caused by potholes – rejecting three in four claims.
Thousands of motorists and cyclists submit claims to councils and highway authorities each year for injury compensation and repair bills after hitting potholes.
But a damning Mail audit has shown less than one in four claimants receive a payout. And one in five local authorities reject at least 90 per cent of claims.
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More than £130 million of taxpayers’ money has been spent on paperwork applying for “levelling up” funding - including hundreds of bids that were rejected.
The Government has made billions of pounds available for projects to boost local economies such as reviving high streets or re-opening old railway stations but local authorities and mayors are forced to submit detailed bids for every scheme they hope to carry out.
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The UK saw weak growth in the first three months of the year and shrank during March as the economy was affected by strike action.
The economy grew by 0.1% between January and March the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.
The figure comes a day after the Bank of England said it was more optimistic about prospects for the UK and that the economy would avoid recession.
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Landlords in England will be able to evict tenants for antisocial behaviour more easily as part of a wider package of reforms to the rental market, after heavy lobbying by industry organisations and Conservative backbenchers.
Michael Gove will use the renters’ reform bill, which could be introduced to the Commons as soon as next week, to strengthen landlords’ rights when it comes to dealing with alleged antisocial behaviour.
The move is designed both to reduce antisocial behaviour and to allay landlords’ concerns as the housing secretary also prepares to bring an end to “no-fault” evictions. But charities warn it could also harm victims of domestic abuse, who are often accused mistakenly by neighbours of antisocial behaviour because of the violence happening within their homes.
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A £50m scheme to protect thousands of homes from flooding by the autumn has been pulled by the Environment Agency.
Businesses that put together bids for the scheme to provide homes in England with flood defences including flood doors, non-return valves and waterproof floors, say they have spent tens of thousands preparing their bids.
But on Tuesday the EA said the tender process was being pulled. In an email to companies, the EA said: “Following careful consideration the Environment Agency has decided to discontinue the current procurement of a new property flood resilience (PFR) framework that was commenced earlier this year.
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GMB members working for local authorities have joined Unite in rejecting the National Employers’ pay offer for 2023-24.
Members of both unions in England, Wales and Northern Ireland voted to reject the offer to increase salaries by at least £1,925 for all staff. This equates to a rise of between 3.88% and 9.42% depending on an individual’s pay grade.
Unite stated that with RPI inflation at 13.5%, the pay offer amounted to a real terms pay cut of nearly 10% for some members.
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Northumberland CC is facing a judicial review over the fees it pays to care home providers, its cabinet was told this week.
Care North East (CNE), a trade organisation representing care home providers in the region, is said to be bringing the proceedings after it objected to the way the council is planning to set fees paid to care homes.
At a meeting of the council’s cabinet on Tuesday (9 May), Neil Bradley, director of adult’s social care at Northumberland, explained CNE has three primary objections to the council’s setting of rates.
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Tory MPs critical of progress on levelling up have written a second letter to the Government demanding the flagship legislation becomes law before the summer.
In the wake of dire local election results for the Conservatives, Nottinghamshire CC leader and Mansfield MP Ben Bradley has coordinated a letter to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak calling for the levelling up Bill to be fast-tracked through Parliament to help turn around the party’s fortunes.
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Local authorities have been “hindered by a lack of dedicated funding” in achieving net zero targets according to a report by Key Cities.
The network's 27 cities all have net-zero target strategies in place, or in development. The report which was published yesterday (11 May) has urged the government to “provide devolved funding with net zero powers to local areas” which could cover a range of services including installing EV charging infrastructure and retrofitting homes.
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The household support fund should be locally led if it continues beyond next year, the chair of the Local Government Association's (LGA) resources board has said.
Peter Marland (Lab) said at a meeting of the board this week that if the scheme continues beyond 2024 funding should be as “locally controlled” as possible and not be used “to passport money to the benefits system”.
The scheme "is about individual areas deciding...what local needs are then distributing money accordingly - that should be the way forward," he told councillors.
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The Local Government Association is calling for unfinished council audits from previous years to be deprioritised in order to clear mounting backlogs.
In written evidence submitted to the Commons levelling up, housing and communities committee, the LGA said that the “immediate priority has to be to deal with the current backlog in audited accounts and then resolve the crisis facing local audit”.
Last year Public Sector Audit and Appointments said that audit delays were “beginning to seriously undermine” the sector, with just 12% of audits for 2021-22 completed on time and more than 220 opinions from prior years outstanding.
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Councils paid out £22.6bn in grants to support businesses during the pandemic, of which the government estimates about £1.1bn was paid wrongly – but just £11.4m has so far been recovered.
During an inquiry session on Covid-19 grants, MPs on the Public Accounts Committee said the fact that all of the recovered funding goes directly to the Department for Business and Trade has meant councils have prioritised other work.
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, deputy chair of the committee, said: “If it was easy to recover this money, either on error or fraud, it would have been recovered by now.
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The government has ditched its plan for thousands of EU-era laws to expire automatically at the end of the year.
The plan - dubbed a post-Brexit bonfire - would see laws that were copied over to the UK after Brexit vanish, unless specifically kept or replaced.
Critics of the bill had voiced concern that it could lead to important legislation falling away by accident.
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The Bank of England has raised interest rates for a record-breaking 12th successive time, lifting the cost of borrowing to 4.5% and warning that inflation would be higher this year than it previously anticipated.
The Bank's Monetary Policy Committee said that there would be no recession this year, upgrading its economic growth forecasts by more than in any of its previous reports.
It is a dramatic change from only a few months ago, when it was predicting the longest-lived recession in modern British history.
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Increasing numbers of landlords are profiting from letting bad housing to some of society’s most vulnerable people, the National Audit Office has found.
Gaps in regulation are allowing property owners “to profit by providing costly, sub-standard” supported housing “with little or no support, supervision or care”, the spending watchdog said.
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MPs have expressed concern that local authorities in England are failing to pass on government funding for free childcare places to nurseries, after research showed councils were holding back millions of pounds to offset deficits or add to reserves.
Freedom of information requests submitted by the National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA) revealed that more than 90 of the 150 local education authorities that responded underspent to the tune of almost £46m in total last year.
Fifteen LEAs underspent by at least £1m each, while five of those underspent by a similar amount in two of the previous three years. The NDNA calculated that over the past four years there had been a £229m underspend of funds intended for providers of free childcare.
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The next chair of the Local Government Association (LGA) is expected to be Labour’s Shaun Davies following the shift to the left in the local elections.
While calculations to decide the political control of the association will not be complete until the end of next week, the swing towards Labour – and away from the Conservatives – will mean there will almost certainly be a Labour-led LGA.
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Councils in England are holding back millions of pounds of funding meant for free childcare places, according to nursery leaders.
The National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA) said responses to freedom of information requests showed more than 90 out of 150 local education authorities had underspent by a total of £46m in the last year.
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Labour's new council leaders have pledged to deliver emergency cost of living plans within 100 days of taking office.
The party has 22 new council leaders as a result of last week's local elections, which saw Labour triumph in Tory heartlands including Medway, Swindon and East Staffordshire.
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The UK ruled an empire from Whitehall when the last Coronation took place in 1953.
Today, it’s a very different place with power and service delivery based in Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales and increasingly with the English regions.
As part of our Coronation coverage, we’re reflecting on the changes that have taken place since, and development of four distinct nations is one of them.
England is playing catch-up, according to Akash Paun, senior fellow at the Institute for Government.
“The post-1997 devolution reforms transformed the British constitution, creating new centres of power in Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast in what had previously been a unitary state dominated by Westminster,” he said.
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Westminster City Council says it is ‘deeply concerned’ over the arrest of three women’s safety volunteers who were arrested in the early hours of coronation day.
The Metropolitan Police arrested the ‘Night Stars’ volunteers in the Soho area of central London on suspicion of conspiracy to commit public nuisance.
The Met said it received intelligence that people were ‘planning to use rape alarms to disrupt the procession’.
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The Conservatives have lost seats in the North, South and Midlands, with Labour and the Lib Dems scooping up victories.
Former chairman of the Local Government Association, Lord Porter, has lost his seat on South Holland DC, marking the end of his 20-year reign as leader.The party has, however, held the council.
Finishing fourth in the count, Lord Porter paid tribute to his council staff and said: ‘If it is time for me to go, it is time for me to go. The electorate is never wrong.’
Elsewhere, LGA improvement board chairman Cllr Peter Flemming was ousted from his seat and as leader of Sevenoaks DC, as was environment spokesperson David Renard after a decade leading Swindon BC.
Cllr Paul Bettison, leader of Bracknell Forest BC was lost his seat after 26 years, and in Lincolnshire, South Kesteven DC leader Kelham Cooke was also ousted – as was his deputy – with the Conservatives losing control of the council.
At Boston BC the Tories lost 10 councillors, with independents taking the majority of seats.
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Homeowners are waiting more than six months for planning permission to make simple home improvements amid rise in town hall red tape.
Home extensions needing planning permission such as kitchen makeovers, granny annexes and garden offices are now taking longer than ever to be approved by local councils, with over 100,000 applications across England taking more than eight weeks to reach a decision last year. This is nearly twice the number recorded just five years ago.
It comes amid government plans to increase planning fees for households by a quarter. Local councils nationwide are preparing to increase planning application charges by 25pc – from £206 to £257.50. Charges were last increased in 2018, but local planning departments are routinely struggling to meet the statutory eight-week turnaround time.
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Welsh local government funding faces shake-ups hoped to “eliminate unnecessary bureaucracy”, show the devolved administration trusts authorities and make the council tax system fairer.
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More schools than ever were unable to fully open in England's latest teachers' strike, Department for Education (DfE) data suggests.
Teachers belonging to the National Education Union (NEU) took part in their fifth day of national strike action on Tuesday.
Members of four teaching unions have rejected a pay offer which ministers said was "fair and reasonable".
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Inflation has reignited in the UK, pushed higher by the economy roaring back and emboldening businesses to pass on higher costs to customers via rising prices, a closely watched survey out today unveils.
S&P Global and the Chartered Institute of Procurement and Supply’s (PMI) for the country’s services sector climbed sharply to 55.9 points last month from 52.9 points in March.
The reading was above analysts’ expectations and a big upgrade from a preliminary reading of 54.9 points.
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Unite announced that 75% of its members in England, Wales and Northern Ireland (Scottish council pay is negotiated separately) voted to reject proposals to increase salaries by £1,925 or 3.88%, whichever would be higher – a 9.4% rise for the lowest-paid workers but far less for many others.
GMB and Unison are also recommending that their members reject the deal (described when it was tabled as the “full and final” offer), with GMB’s ballot concluding in the next week or so and Unison’s, which will include voting on industrial action, beginning on 23 May.
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Cuts to school funding over the last decade and a half have cost pupils £5,000 each in lost education, new research reveals.
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The UK needs at least 11,000 more school nurses to deal with the increasingly complex needs of young people after the pandemic, and help prevent them from developing serious mental health problems, researchers and campaigners say.
The number of school nurses has fallen by 35% in the last five years to about 2,000, and research by Oxford Brookes University, the University of Birmingham and the Oxford Health NHS foundation trust has found that a lack of long-term investment has resulted in many local areas scrapping the roles altogether.
The researchers surveyed 78 school nurses who shared feelings of exhaustion, stress and low morale, said Dr Georgia Cook, a researcher at Oxford Brookes University.
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A network of urban councils has launched a manifesto calling on the Government to end competitive bidding and return to a redistributive local government funding model.
SIGOMA, a campaigning network made up of 47 urban local councils, has launched a manifesto ahead of the local elections on Thursday outlining a number of measures it says will make the levelling up agenda a ‘significant success’.
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The local election campaign has prompted a focus on potholes and anti-social behaviour from both main parties, writes the director of LSE London.
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Councils have been urged to ‘apply maximum flexibility’ when UK nationals returning from Sudan present as homeless.
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The Home Office is planning to use 10 redundant cruise ships, ferries and barges to house asylum seekers in ports around the country, with Merseyside expected to be next in line as ministers struggle to get to grips with the asylum backlog.
Officials have been told to look at “all options” to find housing for people caught up in processing delays, including former military camps and prisons, with the total backlog more than 1,500 higher than in December when Rishi Sunak pledged to clear it within a year.
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The local elections could spark a raft of legal challenges against new voter ID laws as well as candidates seeking to force a re-run of close races across England, campaigners and lawyers have warned.
Strict new proof of identity laws, brought in by the Government to prevent voter fraud, are expected to lead to people being turned away from polling stations on Thursday.
As a result, campaign groups including the Electoral Reform Society and Liberty are considering legal action. Meanwhile, the Good Law Project will on Monday announce its intention to seek a judicial review to scrap the policy before the next general election.
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The first council to experiment with a four-day working week is expected to extend the trial after analysis showed it was “overwhelmingly positive” for staff health and wellbeing without affecting performance. Around 450 mainly desk-based employees of South Cambridgeshire District Council embarked on the three-month pilot in January.
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A report from the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Rural Business suggests a “rural premium” is forcing countryside residents to pay up to 20 per cent more on the cost of living. It said agricultural communities feel the impact more as a result of weaker energy security and worse infrastructure than their urban counterparts.
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Councils will be given more powers to start new bus services if Labour wins the next General Election, the party has promised.
Shadow transport secretary Louise Haigh vowed to boost the UK's ‘failing’ network and accused the Government of overseeing a ‘spiral of managed decline’.
She said that, under Labour, town halls will have greater powers to open new routes and reduce fares while a ban on launching publicly-owned bus companies will be lifted.
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Local government employers have reduced their average contribution to the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) amid strong investment returns, new analysis has shown.
An assessment of more than 70 LGPS funds by independent consultancy Hymans Robertson found that, at the end of March 2022, average employer contributions into the LGPS were 20.8% of pay - compared with 21.9% in 2019.
Over the same three-year period, average LGPS employee contributions increased slightly from 6.4% to 6.5%.
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Teachers in England will strike on Thursday in a long-running dispute over pay.
Tens of thousands of teacher members of the National Education Union (NEU) are estimated to walk out of schools and sixth-form colleges across England, with another day of action scheduled for Tuesday.
The “majority of schools” are expected to either restrict access to pupils or fully close as a result of the strikes, the NEU has said.
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The most deprived 10% of councils have seen their funding cut in real terms by 28.3% on average between 2010-11 and 2023-24, while the least deprived 10% have received just a 10.1% cut during the same period, according to research by the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities.
The shift in importance from direct funding towards local taxation, in the form of council tax and business rates, means wealthier areas have generally felt the sting of austerity less.
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Despite market instability brought on by Covid-19 and exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the overall funding level rose to 107% of past service in March 2022, compared to 98.5% in 2019, Hymans Robertson said in a report.
Analysts reviewed the triennial valuations of 73 of the 86 LGPS funds, and said that on average fund asset values rose by 27.5% up to March 2022.
Hymans Robertson said the better-than-expected funding outlook has prompted a reduction in employer contributions, from 21.9% of pay in 2019 to 20.8% now.
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Teachers across England are asking for a 15pc pay rise, despite receiving pension contributions nearly eight times that of the private sector.
Having rejected a pay increase offer of 4.5pc and a £1,000 one-off bonus, unions are now taking to the picket line once again to place fresh pressure on the Government. Today is the first of five walkouts leading up to early July.
The National Education Union has argued teachers’ pay has fallen by 23pc in real terms since 2010, and that they are leaving “in their droves” because of it. One in four teachers leave the profession within three years of qualifying, according to the NEU.
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Drivers are suffering from a surge in pothole-related breakdowns, new figures suggest.
The RAC said it responded to 10,076 call-outs for faults most likely caused by poor road surfaces during the first three months of the year.
That is a 39% increase on the same period in 2022.
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Many Local Government Pension Schemes are in a stronger position than three years ago to meet future member benefits, pension advisors have said following the most recent valuations.
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Better housing options, tackling low staff pay and making care more affordable are issues raised in a new road map for the future of social care as a sector leader warned it has never been “so close to breaking point”.
Now is the time to act to reform the system of care and support in England, a publication commissioned by the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (Adass) said.
The report acknowledged that the current context is “challenging” and delivering on its vision will require some fundamental changes and “significant increases” in investment.
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The Bank of England's top economist has said people in the UK need to accept that they are poorer otherwise prices will continue to rise.
Huw Pill told a podcast in the US that there was a "reluctance to accept that, yes, we're all worse off".
He said in response to higher bills and other costs rising, workers had responded by asking for wage increases and businesses were charging more.
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The membership body representing directors of social services has published a ‘roadmap’ for fixing social care and says there is a consensus on what needs to be done but a lack of political will.
The Association of Directors of Social Services’ (ADASS) roadmap sets out how care and support could be transformed in England, focusing on 10 key areas for change from improving housing options for older and disabled people to tackling the chronic social care staffing issues.
It charts what needs to be done in the next two years, what changes are needed in two to five years and longer term over the next 10 years to ensure that everyone who needs care and support, can access it.
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The poorest councils have suffered cuts in Government funding nearly three times higher than the richest, according to a research group.
The Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities (SIGOMA) says that on average the most deprived councils in England have received a 28.3% cut in the last 13 years while the richest 10 have received only 10.1% reduction.
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Councils could deliver welfare better than the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP), leaders have claimed.
Sector representatives were brought before the Work and Pensions Committee to tell their experiences of delivering the Household Support Fund.
The fund was launched in 2021 during the pandemic and subsequently extended several times amid the cost of living crisis - to at least March next year.
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What is the modern digital equivalent of a broken record? Whatever it is I fear I’m about to be it.
Last time I wrote a piece for The MJ I was appealing for common sense around the deadlines for the 2022/23 accounts. Sadly the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities choose not to change the deadlines and whilst the majority of the sector will meet the publication of the draft accounts by 31 May there will be a number of us who will struggle.
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About 4% of the estimated two million people who do not have valid ID have signed up for a government scheme to allow them to vote.
May's local elections will be the first time all voters in England must show photo ID.
Some 85,000 people have applied online for a free Voter Authority Certificate ahead of the deadline for May's poll.
The government said the vast majority of voters already had an accepted form of ID.
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Council reserves are currently the subject of renewed government scrutiny.
There can be a fine line between the perfect amount of reserves and holding too much or too little. If reserves are too low it raises concerns the council might not be able to weather any unexpected crisis. But if the rainy day fund grows too large questions are asked about why it is sitting on money that could otherwise be invested in public services.
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CIPFA has published a major report on sustainability reporting in the public sector providing guidance, best practice and advice to help public sector bodies prepare sustainability reports and disclose their sustainability impacts.
“Public sector sustainability reporting: time to step it up”, authored by accounting professor Carol Adams, examines the barriers to widespread adoption of sustainability reporting in the public sector. In the private sector the practice is already common.
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Capita has admitted data was stolen during a Cyber attack that disrupted council services.
The firm is a major player in outsourced services, with clients including a number of local authorities.
In an update on the incident, Capita said that cybercriminals had access to about 4% of its servers for nine days between 22 March and 31 March, with ‘some evidence of limited data exfiltration,’ which ‘might include customer, supplier or colleague data’.
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Councils’ reserves may have risen during the pandemic, but most plan to make use of them in the short and medium term.
Ahead of the autumn statement last year a Grant Thornton analysis of reserves warned that without action to tackle systemic underfunding one in six councils were at risk of running out of their reserves by the end of 2023-24.
Simon Christian, director, public services consulting at Grant Thornton UK, told LGC that although allowing councils to raise more from council tax could help, when the team looked at collection rates they found “it would only take a reduction of 2% on the current collection rates to wipe out, in essence, the totality of that additional flexibility”.
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Recommendations for a more joined-up approach to the care of disabled children in care homes must be fully implemented otherwise “appalling harm” suffered by this vulnerable group could be repeated, experts have warned.
Health and education watchdogs should carry out joint inspections of residential settings and urgent training must take place on the use of physical restraints, the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel said.
It has made nine recommendations to government departments, inspectorates and NHS England, as it published its latest report on protecting children with disabilities and complex health needs from abuse in these settings.
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A slanging match between local authorities and their auditors won’t solve the accounts crisis, writes Conrad Hall.
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Higher life expectancy could see pension and social care costs exceed more than a quarter of government spending over the long term, the Institute for Fiscal Studies has warned.
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The Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) will hold a formal ballot for school leaders to vote on strike action for the first time in the union's history.
Senior elected members of the union decided to ask its members whether they want to stage walkouts "over the school funding crisis, the erosion of teacher and leader pay and conditions, and consequent staff shortages which are undermining the education system".
If members opt to strike, the union said action would be expected to take place during the autumn term of the next school year.
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Only 9% of respondents to LGC’s confidence survey said their capital projects had been unaffected by inflation.
Just over a quarter of respondents said projects had been scrapped and 44% said projects had been scaled back. Almost one fifth told us they had needed to find alternative funding.
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More than 4,000 people have died while homeless in the UK since 2019, according to campaigners, many in unregulated taxpayer-funded ‘exempt’ accommodation.
Research by the Museum of Homelessness (MoH) shows the number of people dying while homeless in the UK reached 1313 in 2022, an 85% increase over 2019.
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Leicestershire County Council has agreed to refund a mother’s school transport costs after Ombudsman found flaws in the way it handled her application.
She won an appeal for school transport costs for her teenage son, who has disabilities and attends the post-16 section of a special school, which was upheld by the council.
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More than 3,000 council officials are taking home more than £100,000, campaigners said on Tuesday night.
The TaxPayers’ Alliance said an analysis of councils’ accounts shows that 2,759 have staff on six-figure remuneration packages.
But because so many local authorities did not publish their accounts, the group estimates the true total could be around 3,126.
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Soaring prices for bread, cereal and chocolate meant the cost of living rose more than expected last month.
Inflation, which measures the rate of price rises, fell to 10.1% in the year to March from 10.4% in February.
It was widely expected to fall below 10%, but food prices continued to soar, rising at their fastest rate in 45 years.
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The number of council staff receiving more than £100,000 is nearly at 2,800, according to campaigners, which is down slightly from last year.
The latest Town Hall Rich List from the Taxpayers’ Alliance shows that the number of council staff receiving more than £100,000 stood at 2,759, of which 721 received more than £150,000.
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Many councils are expecting cuts in their budgets for parks despite growing numbers of people using them, according to a new survey.
The Association for Public Service Excellence (APSE) found that 85% of councils in the survey were expecting budget cuts of at least 5% and almost 30% were anticipating cuts of more than 15%.
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Devon CC is set to embark on a governance review in a bid to tackle ‘serious, material, well evidenced failures’.
Proposals for a ‘root and branch’ review by a cross-party working group will be put before a meeting of the council’s procedures committee next week.
It has been prompted by failures to get to grips with children’s services, special educational needs and disbilities (SEND) provision, and budget sustainability, with ‘concern from stakeholders regarding confidence in the council to address these challenges’, according to the officers’ report.
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Bournemouth, Christchurch & Poole Council may not need the £20m capitalisation direction it requested from government last year, after finding itself in a “better financial position”.
Last year, BCP applied for the government loan in order to cover expenditure from its transformation programme which was set up to help the council make savings after it went through local government reorganisation to form a new unitary council.
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Historical governance and financial management issues have led external auditors for the London Borough of Croydon to outline significant weaknesses in previous years’ accounts.
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Low capacity in council finance teams and the failure to deal with historic accounting issues mean the current September audit deadline is unlikely to be met, local auditors Grant Thornton have warned.
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Thousands of people have a holiday home less than six miles from their home, the census has revealed.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has released figures showing the characteristics of people in England and Wales who have a second address.
Researchers said that, between 2011 and 2021, there was a 4.7 per cent increase in the number of people staying in a holiday home for more than 30 days per year. The number rose from 426,000 to 447,000.
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More than 8,000 council seats will be up for grabs across 230 local authorities next month in a poll largely seen as a test of political opinion ahead of the next general election.
The polls in May will be the largest round of local elections since 2019, when former prime minister Theresa May was still in power.
Elections are also taking place to choose mayors in Bedford, Leicester, Mansfield and Middlesbrough but no elections are scheduled in London or Birmingham.
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Thousands of private landlords in the capital are receiving billions of pounds of public money despite letting poorly insulated and mouldy homes, research from the London mayors’ office has claimed.
City hall analysis found that landlords receive around £1.6bn in housing benefit payments a year, while properties have damp and mould problems and lack modern facilities.
Researchers for the mayor claimed London accounted for almost a third of spending (£493m) followed by the north west (£258m) and the east of England (£172m).
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Energy suppliers must give struggling customers more chance to clear their debts before forcibly switching them to a prepayment meter, Ofgem has said.
New rules outlined by the regulator will also see forced instalment banned in the homes of customers over 85.
Those with severe illnesses will also be exempt from forced switching when behind on payments.
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H
undreds of thousands of people could be prevented from voting in the local elections next month if new photo ID requirements aren’t delayed, a senior Tory MP has claimed.
Voters will need to show photo ID for the first time in England at polling booths on May 4, including either a passport, driver’s licence or blue badge.
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Once fully operational, UK councils are expected to receive an extra £1.2bn from the Government’s delayed Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) scheme, which aims to shift the cost of collecting household waste from taxpayers to producers.
However, the estimated allocations for councils in 2024-25 has still not been publicly shared and may not be confirmed until as late as February – after local authorities have to draw up their budgets for next year.
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Some councils in England are taking over a month on average to fix potholes once they have been reported, a freedom of information (FoI) request has revealed.
Figures provided by 81 councils to the Liberal Democrats have revealed what the party calls a ‘pothole postcode lottery’.
The councils reported 556,658 potholes in the financial year 2021/22, up from 519,968 in 2017/18.
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Unfunded NHS pay rises are likely to mean the scaling back of essential frontline public health services, senior sector figures have warned.
The ongoing pay negotiations between the government and unions have seen nurses offered a 5% pay rise, which was rejected by the Royal College of Nurses last week.
A letter seen by LGC sent by Jonathan Marron, director general of the Office for Health Improvements and Disparities, to all council chief executives and directors of public health, informed councils the public health grant will need to “cover all pay pressures for 2023-24, including the impact of NHS pay settlements”.
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The industry body for accountants has called for the new local government watchdog to play a key role in looking at the effectiveness of councils.
In a new vision for local audit by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) – designed to ‘prompt discussion’ – the body highlighted ‘weaknesses in monitoring by central Government’ and ‘interventions when it is far too late’.
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Hotels are being turned into "longer-term" accommodation for asylum seekers despite pledges by Rishi Sunak to end their use.
Owners are reopening disused hotels and negotiating "longer-term" deals with the Home Office to take hundreds of migrants.
The moves suggest asylum seekers will be housed in hotels for what ministers admit will be “longer than originally envisaged” as they race to open alternative bigger sites such as former military bases.
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An elections chief has admitted the upcoming local elections are unlikely to be delivered to the standard “that everybody would want to achieve”.
Peter Stanyon, who is chief executive of the association of electoral administrators, said there were still “unanswered questions” about how Voter ID will work at the ballot box.
“The majority of polling station staff are being trained as we speak, they are now beginning to understand the questions they will need to ask; the barrier that has potentially been put in there before we can actually issue that ballot paper,” he said.
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Devon County Council has announced it will halt its plans to cut adult day and respite services after the mental health charity Mencap threatened to take legal action.
In January, the county council announced plans to reduce its in-house provision for day care and respite services to help cut £30m from the adult care budget.
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Councils in England are sharing in a £775,000 pot of cash to help roll out schemes to tackle fly-tipping.
LGC's sister title MRW reports that 21 local authorities are taking part, and they have six months to put their anti fly-tipping initiatives in place before sharing how they did it with other councils.
A similar project was run last year by the Department for the Environment, Food & Rural Affairs where £450,000 was shared between 11 councils.
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There needs to be pay parity between NHS and care staff to fix the social care workforce crisis, the president of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services has told LGC.
Sarah McClinton spoke to LGC about tackling workforce pressures in adult social care, why there should be parity of pay and esteem between NHS and care staff, and the sector’s ongoing engagement with government.
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Only 8% of unpaid carers in England approached their local authority for help in 2021 and only a quarter of them received help, research by a health think tank has revealed.
Published by The Health Foundation, the report also found that of the 8% who approached their local council, only one in four ended up receiving direct support.
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Many care home staff worked extra hours without extra pay to prop up the system during the pandemic, a study suggests.
Public money helped stabilise UK care homes during the first wave of Covid-19 but it was withdrawn too soon and not focused on staff, says the research, led by Warwick Business School.
While many homes struggled financially, some larger companies were able to pay more to shareholders, the study found.
Ministers are discussing reforms to adult social care across the UK.
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The government has confirmed the two-year extension to the IFRS 9 statutory override (taking it to March 2025), allowing councils to record changes in the value of pooled investments in a special reserve rather than the revenue account.
A consultation was launched in August 2022 amid concerns the implementation of IFRS 9 from this April (when the previous override was set to end) could create volatility in setting council budgets.
The vast majority (91 out of 99) of respondents from local authorities supported a permanent override, with many expressing concerns that recording investment losses in revenue accounts could lead to budget cuts, and that local authorities already monitor investment risks through statutory codes.
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Care homes across the UK received £2.1bn of extra government funding from March 2020 to April 2021 to help offset rising costs and lower occupancy rates.
A report from the Warwick Business School, University College London and the Centre for Health and Public Interest said the additional funding enabled some for-profit providers to increase dividend payments.
Researchers said that of the 460 companies that filed profit and loss accounts during the first year of the pandemic, 122 paid out £120m in dividends – an 11% increase from the previous year.
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The UK is set to be one of the worst performing major economies in the world this year, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
It says the UK economy's performance in 2023 will be the worst among the 20 biggest economies, known as the G20, which includes sanctions-hit Russia.
The IMF predicts the UK economy will shrink this year, although this is a small upgrade from its last forecast.
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Drivers are facing a north-south pothole divide, according to researchers.
Half of the 20 councils found to have the highest concentration of pothole reports were in the North, research found, with the West Yorkshire district of Kirklees named as the worst offender in England and Wales.
It racked up an average of just under 20 reports per mile of road – 23,513 across its 1,191-mile road network in 2022.
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The Whitehall department responsible for local government has seen its staff cost double between 2016-17 and 2021-22 while local government cut back its staff.
According to figures from report and accounts documents, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) had 5,705 full time equivalent staff (FTE) in 2021-22, at a cost of £393m.
Under its predecessor department, the Department of Communities and Local Government, there were 3,311 FTE staff in 2016-17, costing £195m – less than half the current bill.
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The Conservatives are braced to lose 1,000 council seats in next month’s local elections.
Party chairman Greg Hands said the figure represented ‘independent predictions’ that came from the ‘most credible academic sources’.
A modest six-point swing from the Tories would be enough to produce four-figure losses.
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New rules to give communities greater control over short-term lets in tourist hot spots, while also strengthening the tourism sector, have been unveiled by the Government today.
A consultation published today by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities will propose introducing planning permission for an existing home to start to be used as a short term let – helping support local people in areas where high numbers of holiday lets are preventing them from finding affordable housing.
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The government will hold a new consultation about its proposals to remove unlawful age discrimination in the Local Government Pension Scheme.
Reforms to move the LGPS from a final salary to a career average salary scheme in 2014 included transitional protection known as an 'underpin' for members closest to retirement. However, a Court of Appeal ruling in 2018, known as the McCloud judgement, said this discriminated against younger members of public sector pension schemes.
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Ten new local authority areas are set to receive up to £1m each to help families with children with special educational needs take short breaks.
They include the following SCT Members:
Cambridgeshire County Council
Norfolk County Council
Suffolk County Council
Surrey County Council
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Inflation caused by Brexit and exacerbated by Covid-19 and the war in Ukraine has caused delays to planned works in the Swansea Bay City Deal, leading to a £72.5m underspend in 2022-23, a project update has said.
The report, published ahead of a Swansea Bay City region joint committee meeting relating to work up until December, said it is likely the underspend could become even higher by the end of the financial year, and councils will need to revise the projects in light of new costs.
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Communities secretary Michael Gove has been accused of ‘treading on the Department for Transport’s toes’ after writing to councils about cash use in car parks.
In a letter sent to every local authority in England, Mr Gove said he was concerned about the elderly and vulnerable being excluded if traditional pay and display machines that use cash were scrapped, adding that it would not be appropriate for high street parking to be ‘solely available for those who have access to a mobile phone’.
However, senior council officials have questioned whether Mr Gove was legally entitled to tell councils how to discharge their functions.
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Unison is poised to ballot for strike action at Surrey CC after members rejected this year’s pay offer from the authority.
A spokesperson for the county council, which negotiates pay locally rather than through the national scheme, said the union’s decision was ‘disappointing’ and the offer equated to a 7.8% increase for the lowest grades and 4.5% for the highest.
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The Government is planning to work with councils to hand out vaping kits in a drive to help people stop smoking.
Health minister Neil O'Brien will today announce £45m of funding for measures to help make England ‘smoke free’ by 2030.
The ‘swap to stop’ scheme will be aimed at almost one if five smokers and will include offering pregnant women up to £400 to stop smoking.
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A football mascot’s life as a municipal leader is bringing a complex subject to new audiences, writes the artistic director of Stan's Café Theatre Company.
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All state schools in England face simultaneous closures during the summer term in the “biggest strike action on record” as militant teaching unions prepare to co-ordinate walkouts.
Millions of children could be forced to stay at home for multiple school days after the NASUWT teaching union said it will ballot its members for strike action before the end of the summer term.
Dr Patrick Roach, the union’s general secretary, said the union will “be looking to co-ordinate wherever we can” with other unions to maximise disruption.
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The country is facing a house-building crisis after fifty local authorities scrapped their planning targets amid warnings that government reforms are creating a “nimby’s charter”.
The latest figures show that the number of housing projects granted planning permission in England last year fell to the lowest level since 2006, when figures were first collected.
At the same time 55 local authorities have suspended their development plans, which specify how they will meet demand for new homes in their area.
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Government plans to put heavier lorries onto the roads could add to the country’s pothole problem.
Proposals put forward by the Department for Transport would allow 48 tonne oil tankers to travel on roads when the country faces a fuel crisis, four tonnes more than the current 44 tonne limit.
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Over 5,000 Ukrainian refugee households have now become homeless, including over 3,000 families with children.
According to data released monthly by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities, over 800 households have become homeless in the first three months of 2023 alone up from 4,295 at the end of January to 5,105 at the end of March.
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Four fifths of respondents to LGC’s confidence survey were doubtful about the sector’s financial health over the next three years, with most expecting a reduction the quality of services.
Just 5% of respondents were confident about the sector’s financial health and 14% were neither confident nor doubtful.
Some 14% of respondents said their council could issue a section 114 notice – a warning that the council cannot balance its budget – by the end of 2024-25. Almost a quarter said that their council could need to seek exceptional financial support from the government by the end of 2024-25.
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An improvement notice has been issued to Kent CC after it failed to turn around its special educational needs and disability (SEND) services.
The Department for Education said the council had ‘failed to make sufficient progress’ in addressing nine areas of weakness highlighted in inspections by Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission (CQC).
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A head teachers' union in England has voted overwhelmingly to reject the government's pay offer for teachers.
The National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT), mainly representing primary heads, is considering balloting members again over strike action.
It is the third union to reject the offer - including the National Education Union (NEU), which is planning further strikes.
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More people are using bus services since a £2 fare cap was introduced in January, according to a survey by Transport Focus. The study found that 40 per cent of people surveyed said bus journeys were replacing ones they would have made by car. The cap was originally due to expire in March but has been extended until June amid fears that hundreds of services across England could be reduced.
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Councils are to be offered £3,500 per migrant for housing them on barges, according to reports.
The money would be in addition to the £50 per day per person paid by the Home Office to house the migrants, according to the Telegraph’s report.
Ministers say the £50 cost is a third of the £150 a day currently being spent to house 51,000 asylum seekers in nearly 400 hotels.
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Cornwall County Council has dropped its plans to accept a devolution deal which included an elected mayor.
Cornwall’s U-turn came after a consultation revealed some public opposition. Of 6,105 responses to a survey, 69% were against the deal with a mayor.
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The government’s suggestion that the number of Local Government Pension Scheme pools could be reduced is “really disturbing,” a senior figure has warned.
The government launched its pooling programme for the LGPS in 2015, with each of the 86 LGPS funds expected to transfer their assets to one of eight pooling organisations to invest on their behalf.
It was hoped that because of their bigger scale, the pools would be able to invest in major infrastructure projects and achieve savings through economies of scale.
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More funding will be needed to arrive at a fair cost of care, writes the social care policy adviser at the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy.
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The Government has held back £600m of promised social care funding after its drive to reduce delayed discharges cost £4.3m per bed.
Latest official figures showed the number of people stuck unnecessarily in hospital beds has dropped by just 176 since last April despite the Government investing an extra £750m since September to tackle bed blocking.
Announcing its ‘next steps’ to reform social care, the Government admitted £600m ‘remained to be allocated’ but would be invested ‘over the next two years’ after ministers had ‘drawn on lessons learned from our investment in improving discharge’.
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Past failures to deliver on savings targets cannot be repeated if Kent CC is to avoid a section 114 scenario, the council has been warned.
Cabinet member for finance, Peter Oakford, told a meeting last week the council’s predicted overspend for the 2022-23 financial year was £53.7m.
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The government has briefed that allowing councils to keep 100% of their right to buy receipts for two years will help increase social housing stock by thousands – but it could fail without other changes, and some authorities might even lose money.
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The vast majority (95%) of local authorities across the UK are dominated by men, while only just over a third of local councillors are women, according to figures that highlight the gender disparities of local government.
The analysis, conducted by the Fawcett Society and Democracy Club in the run-up to local elections in May, reveal only 18 of 382 councils have the minimum gender representation parity.
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Funding promised to develop the social care workforce in England has been halved, the government has confirmed.
In 2021 the government pledged "at least" £500 million for reforms, to be spent on training places and technology over three years.
But that figure is now £250 million, according to the Department of Health.
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Ministers have faced renewed accusations that the plan to impose mandatory photo ID for voting is a waste of time and resources, after statistics showed there was not a single proven case of in-person voter impersonation last year.
Meanwhile, other official data showed minimal take-up of free official voter documents before the first mass use of ID during local elections in England on 4 May, with applications for the documents closing in three weeks.
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The Times Health Commission looks at how cold, damp, overcrowded homes are causing mental and physical problems and keeping patients in hospitals. It says fixing it could help to plug holes in health service funding. The LGA said housing adaptations and mobility aids can reduce the need for costly health and social care intervention.
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The government has been accused of "kick[ing] the can down the road again" after it confirmed that funding promised to improve the adult social care workforce had been halved.
The People at the Heart of Care white paper, published in December 2021, promised the allocation of £1.7bn in funding for social care reform over three years.
This included £500m investment in workforce, £150m for technology and digitisation, £300m to integrate housing into local health and care strategies and £70m to help local authorities to improve the delivery and standard of care.
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The Government has been accused of leaving its own social care vision ‘in tatters’ after unveiling plans that hold back £600m of promised funding.
Ministers today detailed plans for £2bn of previously-announced funding, including proposals to further digitise social care, ‘bolster the workforce’ and speed up hospital discharges over the next two years.
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Inflation and private sector expansion will make it increasingly difficult for local authorities to recruit and retain audit and accounting staff.
Two industry surveys revealed expansion plans as firms focus on improving performance as margins squeeze.
The research commissioned by American Express also revealed chief executives believe finance roles will evolve to meet new demands such as sustainability.
Stacey Sterbenz, general manager, UK commercial at American Express, said: “With calls from finance leaders for greater digital and analytical skills to interpret and act on organisational data, it’s clear that the finance function is evolving in response to new challenges.
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Local authority leaders have welcomed the Government’s decision to allow councils to keep 100% of their right to buy receipts for the next two years.
A letter sent to all council chief executives and section 151 officers on Friday on behalf of Michael Gove confirmed that councils would be able to keep their right to buy receipts for 2022-23 and 2023-24.
A Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities spokesperson said: ‘We want councils to be able to keep more of the money generated from Right to Buy sales to invest in new social homes for local people and will set out further detail in due course.’
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People who work with children in England will be legally required to report child sexual abuse or face prosecution under government plans. The move, which is subject to a consultation, was recommended last year by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse and Home Secretary Suella Braverman is expected to set out more details in the coming days.
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Labour's local election campaign launch included a bold, if short sighted, commitment on council tax but the other main parties' offer to voters were less clear, writes head of content Kirsty Weakley.
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Overall RVs have risen by 7.2%, driven by 6.1% increase in industry RVs. Office RVs are up by 2.3%, other by 1.3% whilst retail RVs fall by 2.5%.
The East, South East and London regions saw the strongest growth in RVs - totalling 3.9%, whilst the North East grew by just 0.1%.
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The British Beer and Pub Association is warning that the average energy bill for a pub will rise by £18,400 a year this month when the Energy Bill Relief Scheme ends. Landlords say this will put many pubs out of business.
While pub numbers across the UK have been in decline for decades, the energy crisis and the after-effects of the pandemic have put more pressure on them than ever before.
In December 2021 there were about 37,500 pubs in Britain. Twelve months later, CGA and Alix Partners calculated that more than 1,200 of those had closed.
Adding to the misery, a UKHospitality survey has found businesses expect an 82% rise in their energy bills after the Energy Bill Relief Scheme is reduced this month.
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Some of Britain’s most vulnerable children are being moved to care homes more than 300 miles away from the neighbourhoods they grew up in, according to an Observer investigation revealing a “national scandal”.
The shocking figures make clear for the first time the scale of the crisis that has long worried child welfare experts. They show dozens of children from London alone are in foster or care homes more than 250 miles from the city, as councils battle a significant shortfall in provision. Children from the capital have been placed in homes near Perth, Glasgow, Knowsley, Leeds and Carlisle.
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Last month, the Asphalt Industry Alliance published its annual local authority road maintenance study, warning it would cost £14.02 billion to tackle the backlog of repairs and “bring the network up to a standard from which it can be maintained efficiently and cost effectively going forward”. The LGA said at the time: “Councils work tirelessly to repair our local roads, which are the bedrock of our economy – vital for businesses and for ordinary people going about their day-to-day lives.”
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Planning applications in England have fallen to their lowest level in at least 16 years, according to figures published this week by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. Local authorities received fewer applications to build new buildings or improve old ones in 2022 than at any point since before 2006, the earliest year for which government statistics are available.
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More than twice as many civil servants reported that their day-to-day lives were being affected by long Covid last year than members of the public, new data reveals. More than one in 10 – 10.8 per cent – said they had the condition in autumn 2022, with 7.4 per cent saying it was affecting their day-to-day life, compared to 3.3 per cent of the general public who said it was doing so.
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The UK economy performed better than previously estimated at the end of last year, revised official figures show.
It was previously thought the economy had not grown in the last three months of 2022, but new Office for National Statistics data shows it grew by 0.1%.
The latest figures confirm that the UK economy avoided falling into recession at the end of 2022.
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Staff at a quarter of fire and rescue services in England have reported alleged racist, homophobic and misogynistic behaviour in their ranks in the past five years, inspectors say.
Their report found bullying allegations in all services - and inspectors say this could be "the tip of the iceberg".
Cases include male firefighters telling a colleague they would rape her and a senior officer using a racial slur.
The government called the findings "deeply concerning".
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Councils will miss out on over £93m in income that could have been raised through a new council tax premium on second homes from next year due to delays to the levelling up bill.
A measure included in the Levelling Up & Regeneration Bill is set to allow councils the ability to charge a council tax premium of up to 100% for any property left empty for more than 72 days a year.
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Councils are in despair over their capacity to deliver the Household Support Fund (HSF) as the new financial year begins.
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has confirmed that the fund will be boosted by an extra £842m from next month.
But some local government sources have questioned whether they have enough resources to deliver the fund.
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There has been a notable lack of controversy emanating from the reorganisation of North Yorkshire CC and seven districts into a single unitary council.
Though the district and county put in competing bids, publicly at least, the districts have been accepting of the government’s decision to create what will be the largest unitary council in England in terms of geography and third largest overall in terms of population.
Covering 2,483 square miles, when it formally comes into being tomorrow the new North Yorkshire Council will serve an area four times the size of Greater London.
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The publication of the Government’s plan for reforming social care has been delayed, a minister has confirmed.
Health minister Lord Markham said it was due to be released on Wednesday, but has now been pushed back to next week, during the Parliamentary recess.
[ more...]
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A new plan to move Afghan refugees out of hotels and into permanent homes in the UK has been announced.
Afghans in "bridging hotels" will be written to and given at least three months' notice to move, Veterans Minister Johnny Mercer said.
Labour said the government was "serving eviction notices" with no guarantee of suitable housing for families.
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Plans to allocate £2.5bn of funding to improve school and college buildings and support more school places fall well short of the sector’s needs after a decade of underinvestment, leaders have said.
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The number of homes available to rent in the UK has fallen by a third over the past 18 months, according to data from Zoopla. The drop in the number of listings has driven up rents for new tenants by 11 per cent.
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New unitary councils being launched this weekend are planning to improve and develop services for their communities.
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People are being put off recycling their plastic waste because of the complexity of messaging on packaging and varying systems in different places, according to a new report.
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A partnership of three district councils has backed the idea of becoming a unitary to help secure a Lincolnshire-wide devolution deal.
Lincolnshire is currently made up of unitary authorities North Lincolnshire and North East Lincolnshire while the rest of the county is two-tier, including seven districts.
East Lindsey DC, South Holland DC and Boston BC have written to local government secretary Michael Gove about the three districts’ ‘ambitions for [the] unitarisation of Lincolnshire’.
Lincolnshire CC has argued for a single county unitary sitting alongside the two existing northern unitaries.
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Landlords will be able to evict tenants who are disruptive to neighbours, cause damage or fall behind on their rent within two weeks under government plans to tackle antisocial behaviour. Homeowners who rent out their properties on Airbnb will also be forced to register on a new database, which will give local councils the ability to deal with complaints about rowdy guests.
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Andrew Bailey said a wave of early retirement is responsible for forcing up interest rates and inflation as Britain faces the steepest price rises of any large rich country. The Governor of the Bank of England said that a sharp decline in the number of people in the workforce was “part of the reason why we have had to raise Bank Rate by as much as we have”.
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Less than 10% of the £4.8bn levelling up fund has been spent by the government since its launch in 2020 according to figures supplied to the Labour party.
The information was obtained by Labour via a freedom of information request and it shows that £392m (8%) of the fund has been spent as of 22 February 2023.
The fund awarded £1.7bn to projects in October 2021 and another £2.1bn in January of this year. A third round to allocate the remaining funds is expected later this year.
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Schools and colleges are set to receive £2.5bn in order to upgrade classrooms and refurbish buildings.
Around £1.8bn of this funding for the 2023-24 financial year will go to improving the condition of the school estate across England, according to the Department for Education.
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Parents objecting to the withdrawal of bus services to schools in rural areas have accused Oxfordshire County Council of denying their democratic rights.
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The Financial Reporting Council’s (FRC) first director of local audit is facing increasing pressure to back the slashing of requirements amid a persisting council accounts backlog.
Neil Harris has demanded ‘higher standards and higher expectations of local authorities and auditors’ but has also acknowledged a ‘need for more proportionality and better risk focus for local audit’.
Calls to make audits more proportionate in the drive to help improve timeliness have recently been made by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA), Public Sector Audit Appointments (PSAA) and the Local Government Association (LGA).
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Around half of the UK's community swimming pools could close or face cuts to services within the next six months, estimates from Community Leisure UK have revealed. It has warned that despite recent Government support, the sector was struggling in light of rising energy bill costs.
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Two-thirds of people who have used or had contact with social care were dissatisfied, an analysis of the British Social Attitudes survey has revealed. The findings found that dissatisfaction had been growing since 2018.
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OVO has offered has offered its first deal cheaper than the Government’s bill guarantee, as gas prices start to fall. The offer is £225 less than the Government’s Energy Price Guarantee, which caps the cost of a typical household’s annual energy bill at £2,500.
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The Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) have warned that the Government’s migration bill could undermine child safeguarding measures. The organisation warned that the care system ‘could not be used as a holding mechanism for the immigration system’, stating that care leavers had the right to be supported until the age of 25, not 18 as the current bill proposes. They warned this would create safeguarding challenges for those leaving care.
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Councils will be handed extra powers alongside increased accountability for tackling anti-social behaviour.
The Government announced today it will bolster powers around begging, derelict buildings and patrols.
This will be coupled with council league tables for fly-tipping, with the Office for Local Government (Oflog) tasked with improving ‘accountability on anti-social behaviour outcomes’.
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The average council tax bill for a band D property is set to top £2,000 from April, an increase of £99 on the previous year, according to government figures. With councils under growing financial pressures, households outside of London will see bills rise by around five per cent, with London seeing the largest annual percentage rise of 6.2 per cent. LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson said: Council tax has never been the solution to meeting the long-term pressures facing services. It also raises different amounts of money in different parts of the country unrelated to need and adding to the financial burden facing households.”
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Taxpayers spent almost £480 million on “inadequate” care homes in the last four years, with many rated unsafe and in special measures, meaning they are threatened with closure, according to a Guardian investigation. Overall, an estimated £7.5 billion has been spent on poor quality care homes since 2019, analysis reveals. The LGA has forecast a £13 billion shortfall in funding to meet rising care costs and increasing demand from an ageing population.
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Almost two-thirds of council budgets are now being spent on social care, putting pressure on other services such as waste collections and road maintenance. A combination of rising inflation, a reduction in government grants since the last decade and increasing demands of an ageing population have meant reductions have had to be made to services. Councils in England spent more than £30 billion on social care in 2021/22, an increase of almost £4 billion, or 15 per cent, since 2012.
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The UK should set aside 10 per cent of health spending for preventive measures like anti-obesity strategies and cycle lanes, according to a report by the Tony Blair Institute. The report suggests that a centralised NHS model focuses almost entirely on treating sickness and is harming people’s health, with over 2.5 million people out of work as a result of long-term ailments.
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Interest rates have been raised to their highest in 14 years, with the Bank of England “much more hopeful” for the UK economy. Rates were lifted to 4.25 per cent from four per cent following the unexpected rise of inflation rate in February. The Bank said the UK was now no longer heading into an immediate recession.
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Councils and the government should draw up contingency plans by December to avoid a repeat of the chaos that surrounded the various covid-19 business grant schemes in any future emergency, the National Audit Office (NAO) has said.
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Councils in Devon have been told they can submit a bid for a level two devolution deal, which would not involve an elected mayor.
It would apply to Devon CC, unitaries Plymouth City Council and Torbay BC and to Devon’s eight districts.
Levelling up minister Dehenna Davison has given outline approval for the deal although the range of services and money to be devolved is still to be settled.
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The levelling up white paper has been described as “insufficiently ambitious” a year on from its publication, by one of the policy's architects Andy Haldane.
The white paper was released in February of last year and set out the government’s plan to “improve productivity, boost economic growth, encourage innovation, create good jobs, enhance educational attainment and renovate the social and cultural fabric of the UK”.
However, whilst speaking at the Local Government Association’s (LGA) Urban Summit on Wednesday, Mr Haldane, who now chairs of the government's levelling up advisory council and is also the chief executive of the Royal Society of Arts (RSA), said that UK cities were “underperforming” when compared to their international counterparts.
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Councils will now be able to use their UK Shared Prosperity Fund allocations for skills programmes from this April, but senior figures are frustrated the change came after budgets had been set.
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The Bank of England is expected to increase interest rates for an 11th consecutive time following a surprise jump in the rate of rising prices.
Analysts think an increase in the Bank rate from 4% to 4.25% is the most likely outcome of the Monetary Policy Committee meeting later.
Policymakers face a balancing act between controlling inflation and ensuring financial stability.
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Vital public health services will have to be cut to fund the new NHS pay deal, councils have warned.
Local authorities, which provide a range of NHS services, have been told they will not get any extra money to cover a 5 per cent pay rise for nurses and frontline staff.
This will leave councils with a £66 million shortfall in health funding — leaving them with no choice but to cut services such as school nursing, sexual health clinics and drug addiction services.
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A group of treasury managers have warned that the “banking crisis” is not over, but suggested that it would be “over panicking” if local authorities were to withdraw their funds from the financial institutions.
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Vital public health services will have to be cut to fund the new NHS pay deal, the LGA has warned. The Treasury is expected to provide billions in funding to cover the pay deal for staff employed by the NHS in hospitals, ambulance trusts and GP surgeries. However, councils - who employ NHS staff working in the community through commissioned services - will have to find the extra cash out of their existing budgets. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, said: “NHS pay rises cannot and should not be an additional burden on already pressured council public health budgets. Vital public health services run by local councils cannot continue to maximise their role at the heart of communities while continually having to make budget cuts or manage uncosted new burdens.”
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Ofgem is investigating breaches of its regulations after social care providers reported energy cost increases as high as 500 per cent. The UK's energy regulator has found "evidence of significant concern" about energy pricing for non-domestic customers according to Care England.
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County councils need to make £1bn worth of savings to cope with ‘unprecedented’ financial pressures, county council leaders have said.
New research by the County Councils' Network (CCN) and the Society of County Treasurers showed inflation was expected to add £1.6bn to their members' budgets next year on top of high price rises last year, which increased costs by £1.41bn in 2022-23.
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The cost of living unexpectedly increased last month after shortages of salad and vegetables helped push food prices to their highest for 45 years.
Alcohol prices in restaurants and pubs also drove up costs for households, as inflation jumped to 10.4% in the year to February from 10.1% in January.
Clothing costs, particularly for children and women, rose last month but fuel prices continued to fall.
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Councils taking responsibility for both adult’s social care and transport is “illogical”, the former leader of the Local Government Association Labour group has said.
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Local authorities, providers of social housing and charities have been awarded £1.4bn to help provide energy efficiency upgrades to low income houses.
The funding, announced today by the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, is the second phase of the Home Upgrade Grant and the latest phase of the Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund.
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The increasing cost of essential food and energy has created a “second health emergency” after Covid, councils and local public health directors have warned. At the start of their joint annual conference, the LGA and the Association of Directors of Public Health (ADPH) said the rising cost of living is having significant health consequences, particularly in communities with existing higher levels of deprivation. However, increasing numbers of people who were previously “just about managing” now need support too, according to the organisations’ annual public health report. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, said: “Public health services, such as for sexual health or school nurses which are crucial in helping to relieve the pressure on our health and care system, continue to face challenging financial circumstances. To address this, the Government should provide long-term funding increases to public health services, which do so much to improve health outcomes in our local communities.”
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Shortfalls in pothole repair budgets among local authorities have reached a record high, according to research. Councils in England and Wales said they only received two-thirds of what they needed during the current financial year to stop local roads further deteriorating, the Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance (ALARM) survey found, which resulted in a total carriageway maintenance budget shortfall of £1.3 billion. Three out of four local authorities in England and Wales responded to the survey. LGA transport spokesman Cllr David Renard said councils “work tirelessly” to repair roads but the backlog is “increasingly challenging to tackle”.
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The Government's plans to introduce consistent waste collection policies across England could prove chaotic and unworkable, some councils have warned. The details of major government reforms to waste collection in England are expected to be confirmed soon and the changes could see councils ordered to arrange the separate collection of six types of recyclable waste.
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The Department for Education has agreed 20 new ‘safety valve’ funding deals with councils that have high dedicated schools grants deficits.
Kent, Nofolk and Cambridgeshire CCs are among those to have secured funding to reform their special educational needs and disabilities provision in this round. This year’s deals total £586m, with some arrangements extending until 2028-29.
DfE started the ‘safety valve’ programme in 2021 when five councils were enrolled, with £100m funding agreed. Nine deals were struck last year totalling £300m.
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Section 151 officers are urging the government to provide greater certainty over future council funding through multi-year settlements, otherwise “we will see many more section 114 notices”.
Speaking at Room151’s Local Authority Treasurers’ Investment Forum North, Emma Foy, West-Lindsey District Council’s director of corporate services and section 151 officer, said that the government “truly believes” that its local government finance policy statement has given councils a multi-year settlement.
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The UK government's plans to introduce consistent waste collection policies across England could prove chaotic and unworkable, councils have warned.
The details of major government reforms to waste collection in England are expected to be confirmed soon.
The changes could see councils ordered to arrange the separate collection of six types of recyclable waste.
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Fifteen years of wage stagnation has left British workers £11,000 worse off per year, according to research shared exclusively with BBC Panorama.
The figures come from the Resolution Foundation think tank, which focuses on low-to-middle income households.
It also found typical UK household incomes have fallen further behind those in Germany. In 2008, the gap was over £500 a year, now it is £4,000.
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Ministers are reportedly preparing to cut £250 million from investment in the social care workforce in England, in a move that providers say could set back care “for years to come”.
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More than 70 libraries, museums and arts centres are to be given a £60m boost, culture secretary Lucy Frazer has announced.
She said this will level up opportunities to access the arts, support local economic growth and safeguard local collections for future generations.
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Government is set to cut its planned spending on for adult social care workforce, reform and integration by at least £550m, HSJ has reported.
Hundreds of millions will be cut from investment which was promised for improving social care workforce standards, increasing supported housing, and integrating care “into local health and care strategies”, several senior sources said.
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Teachers’ unions and the Government are having “intensive” talks to try to resolve a dispute over pay in England. The National Education Union has said it will not announce any more strike dates for the next two weeks, while talks take place.
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One in 24 bridges on Britain’s local roads are unable to carry the heaviest vehicles, figures show.
Local authorities identified 3,090 bridges as being substandard at the end of last year, the RAC Foundation said.
This means they are too weak to be used by 44-tonne lorries.
Many are subject to weight restrictions, while others are under programmes of increased monitoring or even managed decline.
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More than half of Ukrainian refugees struggle to find affordable rental accommodation after moving on from living with their host families, according to research published a year on from the launch of the Homes for Ukraine scheme.
In the past year more than 117,000 Ukrainians have arrived in the UK under the hosting scheme. Another 49,000 have arrived to join relatives who were already living here.
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Rural areas are struggling with a homelessness crisis driven by soaring housing costs and a shortfall in local authority funding, a new report claims.
A survey of rural charities and housing associations found an overwhelming majority thought rural homelessness was a serious problem that was getting worse.
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Nineteen council bids that missed on the second round of the levelling up fund were awarded grants in yesterday's Budget after additional funding was identified.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced that 16 regeneration projects would get a share of £200m and three capital regeneration projects would get a share of £58m
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Council leaders have welcomed the funding announcements in yesterday’s budget but were disappointed by the absence of investment in adult social care, public health and children’s services.
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Almost 600 new school places for children with additional needs will be created in Cambridgeshire after an agreement was reached between the county council and the Government.
The council will be given an extra £49m through the Safety Valve programme which means it will be able to balance its budget by 2026/7.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has confirmed a further £200m in 2023-24 to tackle what he described as ‘the curse of potholes’.
The cash will allow local authorities in England to ‘complete resurfacing, and invest in major repairs and renewals, such as keeping bridges and major structures open’.
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The public health grant will be £3.5bn in total, according to the Government, but council leaders have criticised it as ‘insufficient’ in the face of ‘soaring demand’.
Minister for public health Neil O'Brien announced on Tuesday afternoon that the Government is increasing the public health grant to £3.529bn, providing each local authority with a 3.3% cash terms increase.
This represents an increase of £110m on this year's grant.
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The chancellor has announced 'up to' £20bn for carbon capture and storage, alongside a new round of funding for city regions in England and £1bn for Levelling up.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has announced the Government will ‘boost mayors’ financial autonomy’ in his Budget.
Announcing ‘trailblazer deals’ for the West Midlands and Greater Manchester combined authorities that will give them greater control over transport, skills, employment, housing, innovation and net zero, Mr Hunt said single, multi-year funding settlements would be introduced for the two regions at the next Spending Review.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has confirmed in the spring budget plans to go ahead with 12 investment zones, each backed by a multi-million-pound injection of cash.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has unveiled a Budget which has sounded the death knell for Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs), but revived the levelling up agenda.
Reiterating local government’s role at the heart of economic growth, the Chancellor vowed to hand powers from the LEPs and hand them to councils.
Budget documents added: ‘The Government is minded to withdraw central government support for LEPs from April 2024.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has announced that the Government will extend the Energy Price Guarantee for another three months, as part of the Budget. Typical household energy bills had been due to rise to £3,000 a year from April, but instead the cap will be kept at £2,500 until the end of June.
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F
unding to fix potholes across England will be boosted by £200 million, Jeremy Hunt has announced.
The Chancellor said the Government’s Potholes Fund – which previously provided £500 million a year to councils – will be increased to £700 million in the 2023/24 financial year.
The cost of bringing pothole-plagued local roads in England and Wales up to scratch has been estimated at £12.6 billion.
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The Chancellor will announce £63 million of new money will be made available to leisure centres with pools in a one-year-fund, as part of this year’s Spring Budget, after concerns some may need to close or reduce opening hours due to rising costs. There are more than 2,000 public leisure centres in England, over 800 of which have pools. Cllr Gerald Vernon-Jackson, Chair of the LGA’s Culture, Tourism and Sport Board, said: “Councils and pool operators have worked hard to keep them open for as long as possible in the face of rising energy costs but have been warning that without investment we would have seen a large number of closures. This funding will enable us to keep the doors open, and also continue the transformation of our pools to an energy efficient future that offers a lasting legacy for communities.”
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In an opinion piece Andrew Fisher, former director of policy for the Labour Party, writes about how there are 165,000 care worker vacancies in the UK, more than in the whole of the NHS. The shortage of care workers is driven by low pay and underfunding and he says this week’s Budget is a chance to mobilise finances to provide dignity and respect for all people. Mr Fisher quotes Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, about how councils need £13 billion to help meet service demands, including £3 billion to offer higher pay for care workers.
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Jeremy Hunt will use his Budget to raise the lifetime allowance for pension savings to a record level to encourage people to keep working. The Chancellor will boost the allowance on tax-free pension savings on Wednesday from £1.07 million to £1.8 million, taking it to the joint highest level on record and benefiting nearly two million people, as he seeks to address concerns that allowances are driving doctors and other professionals into retirement.
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Nearly two fifths of people in England and Wales are economically inactive, rising to more than half in some coastal areas, official figures show. Office for National Statistics data showed that there were 19.1 million economically inactive adults on census day in 2021, equivalent to 39.4 per cent of the adult population and found that coastal local authorities had some of the highest rates of economic inactivity, often linked to having a higher number of pensioners or students living in the area.
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Hopes for increased social care funding for struggling local authorities have been dashed.
Social care minister Helen Whately said during a Local Government Association (LGA) webinar that councils would receive further support if they were found to be in need of improvement under new Care Quality Commission (CQC) assessments.
However, deputy director of adult social care data at the Department of Health and Social Care, Julie Laughton, said this would not mean more funding.
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The chancellor will announce 12 new investment zones across England as part of tomorrow’s Budget.
In his speech in the House of Commons tomorrow, Jeremy Hunt will announce discussions with places set to host the new zones, which will each be backed with £80m over five years, including tax incentives.
Eight locations in England have been selected to host the 12 investment zones, and the government aims to agree plans with local partners by the end of the year.
These locations are the proposed East Midlands MCA, the proposed North East MCA, Greater Manchester MCA, Liverpool City Region MCA, South Yorkshire MCA, Tees Valley MCA, the West Midlands MCA, and West Yorkshire MCA.
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Peers have rounded on a lack of detail in the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill.
In a House of Lords debate yesterday, ministers were told that too much has been left to be brought forward in regulations after the Bill has passed, particularly details of how combined county authorities [CCAs] will work.
Lib Dem spokesperson for levelling up, communities and local government, Baroness Pinnock, a former leader of Kirklees MBC, said: ‘A lot of the detail is insufficient for us to understand completely what the Government seeks to do and how they hope these new CCAs and mayors - or not mayors - will operate.
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Local government employers have criticised Unison’s timetable for consulting its members on industrial action after all three unions rejected their pay offer.
Following talks with employers last week, Unison, Unite and GMB announced they had decided to recommend rejecting the 2023-24 pay offer, with the former announcing a ballot for industrial action.
However, chief executive of the Local Government Association, Mark Lloyd, claimed Unison’s timetable meant any industrial action may not start until September - more than six months after the employers’ final offer was made.
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Billions of pounds of taxpayer money will reportedly be given directly to regional mayors in a “devolution revolution” under which Whitehall will cede unprecedented control over key budgets. The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is expected to announce this week that the West Midlands and Greater Manchester will be handed full control over budgets in areas such as education, transport and housing in what is being billed by government as the future of levelling up.
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The Chancellor is reportedly set to announce a £200 million fund to tackle the potholes plaguing Britain’s roads. Jeremy Hunt’s pledge means around four million more holes will be filled in. The funding represents a boost of almost a fifth to annual funds for fixing rural and local routes and will be released to councils in the coming weeks. An LGA spokesperson said: “We look forward to seeing the details of how this money will be allocated. Despite the best efforts of councils, which repair a pothole every 19 seconds, our local roads repair backlog is rising and would take more than £12 billion and nine years to clear.”
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The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has vowed to help reduce the cost of childcare at Wednesday’s Budget as part of a wider drive to support people into work. Mr Hunt said that the costs were stopping some parents taking a job, and the Government could make a “big difference” to reduce them.
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Over the last five years, the provisional figures have been announced in mid-late December and sector figures have been calling for this to be brought forward to make it easier to plan and set budgets.
Lee Rowley was asked about the timing at the Local Government Associations’ (LGA) Councillors’ Forum last Thursday, and said: “I will see what we can do at DHLUC to speed that up, historically it's always been Christmas Eve thereabout or 21 December.
“We will see what we can do about bringing it from late December to a little bit earlier.”
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Local government minister Lee Rowley has told councillors to ‘judge us by what we do, not what you worry about’, as he defended the planned Office for Local Government (Oflog).
Speaking at the Local Government Association, Mr Rowley said the Government would ask the sector to suggest one of the five metrics that Oflog would be charged with collating.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has said he will deliver a "back-to-work" Budget next week that will "help people find jobs that are right for them". He said measures will see benefit claimants being asked to attend more meetings with work coaches and attend skills bootcamps to help them get back to work. Parents claiming universal credit are also set to get more help with childcare costs. This pledge has been backed by the LGA, which is also calling for a major publicity campaign after the most recent figures showed 713,500 eligible parents from a total of 823,600 are not even claiming childcare costs. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People Board, has told the Observer today: “The cap on childcare support for working parents receiving benefits has not changed in almost 20 years, while childcare costs have more than doubled during that time.”
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Motoring groups have criticised councils for increasing car parking charges, suggesting they will add further pressure to high streets. The LGA said: “Councils are working hard to ensure there are parking spaces available for everyone at all times of the day. Income raised through parking charges and fines is spent on running parking services – with any surplus spent on essential transport projects, like road repairs.”
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Two-thirds of drivers surveyed by the Mail said their local road conditions have got worse over the last year with one in 14 believing there had been an improvement. Nearly three in 10 of the 1,079 poll respondents said they had reported a pothole to their local authority. The LGA revealed this week that the Government spent 31 times more per mile maintaining motorways and A roads last year than it did on funding councils to repair crumbling local roads.
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A minister has told the Local Government Association not to expect further support with energy bills for leisure centres because the government believes councils have enough money, sector leaders heard yesterday.
Gerald Vernon-Jackson (Lib Dem), chair of the LGA's culture, tourism and sport board, updated the councillors' forum on a meeting with the Stuart Andrew, minister for sport, tourism and civil society at the Department for Culture, Media & Sport.
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Bournemouth, Christchurch & Poole Council is “beset with difficulties” which do not “reflect well on its reputation”, a Local Government Association corporate peer review has found.
A progress report from the LGA which was shared with the council in December 2022 and published this week ahead of a cabinet meeting on Wednesday also said BCP appeared to the outside world like “A Tale of Two Cities”.
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Government funding decisions and inflation will force almost all members of the County Councils Network (CCN) into huge cuts to highway maintenance and new projects.
CCN called on chancellor Jeremy Hunt to use next week's Budget to provide £500m of new capital funding for highways in county areas, after its survey revealed threats to roads it called “the arteries of England”.
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The leader of the school and college leaders’ union has accused the Government of eroding local support services for children.
Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) president Evelyn Forde gave the warning at the union’s annual conference as she unveiled a survey in which 99% of those answering said provision of children’s mental health services was inadequate.
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Croydon LBC has approved a 15% council tax increase as part of a 2023-24 budget that was originally rejected.
The budget proposed by Mayor Jason Perry had failed to pass through the council last week due to opposition to the proposed tax rise.
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New research from the LGA ahead of the Budget reveals the Government spent 31 times more per mile on fixing motorways last year, when compared with money provided to councils to fix potholes on local roads. Cllr David Renard, LGA transport spokesperson, said: “Spending more on improving our motorways whilst neglecting crumbling local roads is counterproductive." The County Councils Network has also warned that 85 per cent of county councils plan to cut their roads maintenance projects this year as inflation hits the cost of carrying out work.
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The economy rebounded to grow by 0.3 per cent in January, according to official figures which reaffirmed that the UK avoided recession at the end of last year.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt will have £166 billion of headroom to cut taxes and invest in next week's Budget, according to The National Institute for Economic and Social Research think-tank.
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Local government minister Lee Rowley told MPs calling for long-term funding of councils and social care that plans to be revealed shortly would ‘assuage some of their concerns’.
Chair of the local government select committee, Clive Betts, said in yesterday’s debate: ‘We cannot carry on believing that the existing local government finance system, with occasional top-ups from Government on an ad hoc basis every year or so, will sustain adult social care for the longer term or even the medium term.’
Mr Rowley responded: ‘We acknowledge that there is a desire and it is important to try to plan for the long term.
‘We will bring forward a plan for adult social care reform in the spring.’
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The three main local government trade unions - Unison, Unite and the GMB - have decided to recommend rejection of the local government pay offer.
Last month’s offer equated to an increase of 9.42% this year for the lowest paid while for those on all pay points above the top of the pay spine an offer of 3.88% was on the table.
The three unions met the employers for talks yesterday.
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A peer review of the Local Government Association has recommended it should reshape its approach to sector led support to provide a separate offer for councils requiring a higher level of assurance.
Overall the peer challenge was positive about the LGA, which it said had improved since the last peer challenge in 2015.
The peer review noted that 84% of local government stakeholders were supportive of the sector-led improvement approach, up from 62% in 2015.
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Comparethemarket has published a map of local road conditions across the UK. Cllr David Renard, Transport spokesperson for the LGA, said: “There are many reasons for differences in the condition of local roads, including the age of the road network, weather impacts, how regularly it is used or if it is dug up by utility companies. Current funding levels are already insufficient and with the impacts of inflation will lead to a worsening of roads.”
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Three councils have received preliminary approval from the government to use almost £900m of capital income to meet their budget gaps.
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The Local Government Association (LGA) today revealed plans to beef up its oversight of councils in an effort to stave off Government interference.
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The Government’s ambitious public health levelling up mission is impossible to meet by its 2035 deadline with the available money, experts have warned.
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A dozen English councils risk failing to meet their statutory duties in the coming months, which researchers said underlines the need for drastic reforms to local government funding.
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Trade unions have urged their local government members to reject the proposed pay offer, which they said represents a real-terms pay cut of up to 10%.
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School nurses may have to be cut due to a “cliff edge” in public health funding, the NHS Confederation and NHS Providers have warned today. Central funding to provide pay increases for NHS staff has not been confirmed for 2023-24, meaning that local authorities will have to absorb pay rises into existing budgets. NHS Confederation and NHS Providers have warned that this cost cannot be absorbed without cuts to school nursing services and sexual health clinics.
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A survey by the Local Government Information Unit has found more than half of councils in England plan to cut more services while also raising council tax by the maximum possible amount. Nine out of 10 councils are increasing council tax from April, but this alone will not balance their budgets, meaning most are also proposing to cut spending (52 per cent), increase fees for services such as parking and waste (93 per cent), spend their “rainy day” financial reserves (67 per cent) and sell off assets such as land and buildings. Cllr James Jamieson, LGA Chairman, said: “Many councils are still grappling with significant challenges when setting their budgets and trying to protect services from cutbacks due to the deep underlying and existing pressures they face.”
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Firefighters have accepted a new pay offer, ending the prospect of strike action. The settlement is for a 7 per cent increase backdated to July 2022, plus an additional 5 per cent from July 2023
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Key stakeholders in the local audit system must continue their efforts to secure timely publication of audited accounts which are often delayed for multiple reasons, according to a report by a leading firm of accountants.
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The GMB Union organised a march against Croydon LBC's proposed plans to increase council tax by 15% on Saturday.
Protesters gathered at Croydon University Hospital and marched to Croydon Town Hall holding placards reading "Fund Corydon fairly" and "No more cuts". Another protest is set to take place at the next full council meeting on 8 March.
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Government support for energy bills is expected to continue for three months from April, protecting consumers from an average increase of £500. The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt will cancel a reduction in support that would have seen typical annual bills rise from £2,500 to £3,000.
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The Government’s Levelling Up department is set to spend 25 per cent — or nearly £2.5 billion — less on regeneration projects this year than planned, blaming housing market turmoil and delays in delivery. New figures provided to MPs show almost all of the unspent cash relates to capital spending on housing or housing-related projects, such as cleaning up industrial land for development and providing loans to developers or potential homeowners, including £1 billion originally intended for new affordable homes this year.
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Jeremy Hunt will find himself with an extra £30 billion to ease the cost of living crisis and resolve labour shortages, new research suggests. The Resolution Foundation thinktank said the Chancellor would benefit from borrowing being about £30 billion lower than anticipated this year, due to tax receipts recovering and a lower bill than expected for energy support.
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The Treasury is reportedly poised to rule out any major public sector pay rises in next week’s “slimmed down” Budget in a bid to keep the country’s finances under control. Officials highlighted the Institute for Fiscal Studies' pre-Budget analysis that one-off measures, such as prolonging the freeze on fuel duty and extending energy bills support would be affordable, but not large public sector pay rises or a cut to corporation tax.
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Social housing in England will lose a further 57,000 homes by the end of the decade because of the Right to Buy scheme, according to new analysis.
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England’s national parks are set to receive £4.4 billion from the Government to help them protect the environment and support tourism. England’s 10 national parks will share the funds equally, using the money to support park rangers and maintain visitor and education centres.
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The Government has launched a road safety campaign to raise awareness of risks when speeding or driving too fast for road conditions, especially on rural roads.
The latest statistics show 60% of all serious and fatal collisions involving young male car drivers happen on roads in the countryside.
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Councils should become the primary provider of state-subsidised childcare designed to get parents back to work and boost productivity, a new survey has found.
A report by the Centre for Progressive Policy (CPP) think-tank published today concluded the Government should redefine childcare as infrastructure in the Budget so ministers can borrow to invest in getting parents back to work.
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Scattergun demands and elite contempt: it’s time for a courageous conversation, writes House of Commons senior researcher Mark Sandford.
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Whitehall must release its grip of local finances to make devolution work, senior local government figures have said
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The Government published their new SEND improvement plan, identified local authorities in England where 33 new special schools will be built as part of the free school programme to try to ease pressure on special school places. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People’s Board said that the measures “do not go far enough in addressing the fundamental cost and demand issues that result in councils struggling to meet the needs of children with Send”
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Integrated care boards have been told to cut their running costs — most of which is made up of their staff — by 30%
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English councils have pleaded for an extra month for local authorities to publish their draft unaudited final accounts and open them to public inspection.
The deadline was extended to the end of July for 2020-21 and 2021-22 but the Government is consulting on a proposal to bring this forward to the end of May for the 2022-23 financial year.
In his weekly bulletin, Local Government Association chief executive, Mark Lloyd, wrote: ‘The deadline was originally extended in response to the crisis in local audit and it is quite clear that the crisis is continuing so in our response we have argued that the deadline should instead be extended to 30 June.’
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Thousands more specialist school places will be created for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) as part of a plan to end England's postcode lottery.
A total of 33 local authorities across England have been selected to have special schools built in their areas.
Staff training will also be expanded to ensure SEND children get the help that they need earlier.
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Decades of suspicion by minister and officials must be overcome to fix the UK’s creaking local government finance system.
Changes including the rise of regional mayors mean the current funding system, devised as a stop-gap to replace the poll tax, is unable to meet future demands.
That problem and potential ways to deal with it have been raised by the think tank Localis in a series of discussion essays, ‘Moving through the gears - Where will local government finance be in 2030?’.
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Local authorities in England were underfunding older people's residential and nursing care homes by over £2bn per year during 2021/22, independent care providers have calculated.
As of April 2022, the average difference between what a local authority in England pays for residential care fees and the Fair Cost of Care was £218 per week, a figure that increases to £231 per week for nursing care, according to Care England, the representative body for independent care providers.
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Herefordshire Council will be able to retain control over its troubled children's services department for now but it will have to demonstrate that it can make improvements, commissioner concludes.
Last year Ofsted rated the council’s services as inadequate, concluding that children were ‘not protected from harm’. The watchdog said the service had ‘significantly deteriorated’ since it was last rated as requiring improvement in 2018.
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The demand for publicly-funded social care is at a record high, a new study has revealed.
Latest figures showed that requests for support have increased to around 1.98 million yet the number of people receiving long-term care fell to 818,000 in 2021-22.
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Most councils across Europe are failing to consider the needs of vulnerable people sufficiently when planning for climate change, according to a study published today.
A new study involving Nottingham Business School (NBS), part of Nottingham Trent University, has found that only 167 out of 327 European cities had full urban adaptation plans by the end of 2020.
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CIPFA’s annual library survey, published today, reveals total expenditure on libraries in Great Britain fell 17% to £9,982 per 1,000 people in 2021/22, from £11,970 in 2020/21. This continues year-on-year declines in expenditure since 2018/19, when total expenditure stood at £12,646 per 1,000 people.
The survey also shows that the income libraries received fell by 24% over the last financial year, which will put yet more financial pressure on libraries as high inflation increases their running costs. This is a drop from £868 per 1,000 people in 2020/21 to £660 per 1,000 people in 2021/22.
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Thousands of 10 and 11-year-olds have failed to get into their first choice of secondary school as offers were made across England, but the expected increase in demand for year 7 places in some big cities once again failed to materialise.
There were predictions that the proportion of children awarded a place at their top choice could hit a record low nationally this year as a result of a baby boom 11 years ago, but in London and Birmingham the number of applications and success rates were similar to last year.
In other areas of England, fewer children appeared to have gained places at their first choice of secondary school, according to a Press Association survey. Out of 33 councils polled, 18 reported a decline in the proportion of pupils getting their first preference.
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The number of UK children in food poverty has nearly doubled in the last year to almost 4 million, new data shows. According to the Food Foundation, one in five households reported skipping meals, going hungry or not eating for a whole day in January.
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New research from the University of Bristol has found that disadvantaged children are suffering “geographic exclusion” from England’s best state schools because they cannot afford to live near those with the best exam results. The research also found that very few state secondary schools give priority to pupils who qualify for free school meals.
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A select committee has demanded local government secretary Michael Gove appears before them after their recommendations for a governance overhaul were snubbed.
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Councils are being kept in the dark over budgets for public health in the coming year, local government leaders have warned.
The Local Government Association (LGA) has joined several major organisations in demanding the urgent announcement of the public health allocation due to take effect in April.
They warn the Government is risking ‘avoidable and unacceptable’ harm by delaying the announcement.
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A further 33,000 more civil servants have voted to strike next month - joining 100,000 already walking out.
The newly balloted members of the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union will join the other civil servants who are walking out on 15 March - the same day as the next budget announcement.
They are calling for a pay rise of at least 10%, protection to pensions, job security and no cuts to redundancy pay.
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Peers have called for greater recognition of district councils in combined county authorities (CCAs).
An amendment to give lower-tier councils voting rights on CCAs was put forward by former Lib Dem minister Lord Foster as the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill was debated in the House of Lords.
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An independent report into the reasons for the financial collapse of Croydon LBC that has finally been officially published has said ‘heads must roll’.
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Nottingham City Council spent more than £250,000 on unsuccessful bids for support from the ‘leveling up’ fund, according to new information.
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Housebuilding in England is set to fall to the lowest level since the second world war, according to the Home Builders Federation (HBF).
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The Government has been urged to act after official figures showed the number of children’s social workers has fallen for the first time since 2017.
New Department for Education data revealed there were 31,600 children and family social workers in England at the end of September 2022 - down 2.7% from the previous year and the first reduction in numbers since the Government started collecting the information in 2017.
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A total of 73,000 breakdowns have been caused by damaged roads so far this year, according to figures published by RAC. Campaigners have called for more funds to repair broken roads, as part of a new Mail campaign ahead of the Spring Budget, with the Asphalt Industry Alliance claiming that the current pothole backlog would take nine years to clear. A spokesperson for the LGA, said: “Councils spend considerably more every year on repairing roads and pavements than they receive in Government funding, with a pothole repaired every 19 seconds.”
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The Department for Health and Social Care is reportedly looking at a range of options to prevent the rise in the number of under-18s vaping, including the banning of candy-flavoured products. It is currently illegal to sell vapes to anyone under the age of 18, but national surveys reveal an increasing trend of 11-17 year olds using the devices, with health leaders attributing this to marketing and child-friendly flavours such as bubblegum. The LGA has called for vaping products to be subject to the same rules as cigarettes, following concerns of vapes being sold to children in parts of the country.
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Councils have published guidance for people who want to host a street party to celebrate King Charles’ Coronation on 6 May. Published advice covers applications for road closures, as well as recommendations to ensure relevant insurance is obtained. Cllr Gerald Vernon-Jackson, Chair of the LGA’s Culture, Tourism and Sport Board, said: “Councils need to balance supporting as many residents as possible while ensuring events that do take place are set up and run safely. Where people want to have street parties, councils want people to be able to enjoy these safely.”
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The proportion of children managing to secure a place at their first-choice secondary school is expected to hit an all-time low, according to Professor Alan Smithers, Director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research. The proportion of pupils reaching their first choice in England dropped from 85.2 per cent in 2014 to 83.3 per cent last year, having recovered from a historic low of 80.9 per cent in 2019. Cllr Louise Gittens, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People Board, said councils have no powers to direct academies to expand and are unable to open new schools. She said: “Councils need these powers as soon as possible to ensure as many children as possible get the places they want.”
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New figures show government departments are due to spend £24 billion less than the Treasury budgeted for last October. A breakdown of Whitehall spending shows big reductions in the budgets of the business department, and the levelling up department.
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A report by the New Economics Foundation has claimed the Government is hiding £28 billion of “stealth cuts” to public services over the next five years, and warns that a renewed austerity drive at next month’s Budget would further damage the economy.
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Analysis has shown a third of funding pledged by the Government for insulation and installing heat pumps has not yet been spent. Around £2.1 billion remains unspent of the £6.6 billion that was supposed to be used between 2020 and 2025 on making buildings more energy efficient and decarbonising heat.
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Leading poverty charities are calling for a change in the law to fix the UK’s welfare system after research found that the basic benefits given to low-income households are at least £140 a month below the real cost of food, energy and everyday basics.
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Council staff in England, Wales and Northern Ireland have received a pay offer for April of at least £1,925.
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A redesign of local government’s pay spine is ‘inevitable,’ employers have admitted privately.
Regional employers’ groups, which have been meeting this month to consider the unions’ RPI+2% pay claim for 2023, have been told that reshaping the spine is now a matter of ‘when not if’.
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Local government finance experts will ‘look again’ at a six-year-old report by MPs on improving taxpayers’ understanding of how and why public money is spent.
Technical manager for local government financial reporting at the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA), Sarah Sheen, said the organisation would examine the April 2017 report by the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee (PACAC) to freshly consider whether any of the conclusions and recommendations might apply to councils.
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Seven in 10 councils do not expect to be able to dole out a key winter energy bill grant until the second half of March.
A survey of billing authorities showed that more than 70% did not expect to deliver the £400 the Government has promised to around one million households that do not have a domestic electricity connection for at least another month.
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Care home capacity in the UK shrank in 2022 for the first time in three years, figures by CSI Market Intelligence has shown. showed that 247 care homes closed their doors last year, while 123 new businesses opened. It was the lowest number of new entrants to the market since 2015.
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Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is exploring a 5 per cent pay rise for public-sector workers to end an escalating wave of strikes. The move came after official figures showed public borrowing was likely to be £30 billion lower than expected, due to factors such as high tax receipts, a fall in energy prices and low public investment. The Treasury has indicated in a private memo, seen by the Financial Times, that public sector awards of up to 5 per cent for 2023/24 would have only a “low risk” of setting a benchmark for protracted high private-sector pay growth. However, official submissions to the independent pay review bodies released by government departments and relating to the salaries of doctors, nurses, teachers and police officers in 2023-24, suggest public sector workers should receive a 3.5 per cent pay rise next year.
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The lowest-funded councils have called for “fundamental change” to the way local government is financed – or they risk having to make cuts across all services.
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An expert body designed to give the government specialist advice on its flagship policy agenda has met seven times and is in the “initial stages” of agreeing new areas to explore.
The levelling up advisory council was established last year and is made up of 11 academic and private sector experts with expertise to support the delivery of the government's 12 levelling up missions.
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The Government’s £250m initiative to speed up hospital discharges reduced the number of bed blockers by less than 3% in its first month.
NHS England data showed the number of patients remaining in hospital who ‘no longer meet the criteria to reside’ went from 14,060 on 9 January when the initiative was launched to 13,657 on 9 February – a 2.9% decrease.
Ministers launched the three-month scheme with a promise that £200m would be distributed to buy ‘thousands’ of extra care beds.
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Bills will rise by an estimated £500 a year despite an expected reduction in Ofgem's household energy cap, analysts expect. Cornwall Insights has forecast the energy regulator will cap the amount households pay on electricity and gas bills each year at £3,294 from 1 April, a drop from the previous cap of £4,279, but customers will pay about 20 per cent more on their bills as the Government's energy price guarantee only partially protects consumers from paying the full price cap.
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The Government is “barking up the wrong tree” by trying to get people in retirement back to work to fix chronic staff shortages, according to a report which warns long-term sickness and pressure on the NHS is having a bigger impact on the jobs market. The sharp rise in economic inactivity – when working-age adults are neither in work nor looking for a job – is more likely to be driven by people waiting for treatment as the health service struggles to cope, as well as by people who permanently live in poorer health, according to the consultancy LCP.
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The UK government recorded a surprise surplus in its finances in January despite "substantial spending" to help households with energy bills and one-off payments to the EU. The Government spent less than it received in tax during the month, resulting in a surplus of £5.4 billion, which comes ahead of the Budget set to be delivered next month.
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The world's biggest trial of a four-day working week has been hailed a success, with most of the companies involved saying they would continue offering a shorter week. A total of 61 companies across several sectors in the UK were involved in the pilot, which ran for six months from June last year.
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A district council is believed to be the first in England to reduce its share of council tax this year after agreeing to a 2% cut.
LGC’s council tax tracker revealed last week that most councils planned to take up the maximum rise available without a referendum, and we have not identified any other area planning a cut this year.
Fenland’s budget was agreed yesterday meaning residents living in a band D household will pay £255.24 next year for services, down from £260.46 in 2022-23.
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Ministers have recommended NHS workers, police officers, teachers and judges are all given a 3.5% pay rise for the next financial year.
Government departments have written to the independent pay review bodies of each sector to submit their evidence and say what figure is deemed affordable by them and the Treasury.
But a number of unions are calling for much higher pay awards for the last financial year before negotiations even begin for 2023/24, and the figure for the following 12 months may not meet expectations.
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Research by the BBC has found half of state-funded schools in England for children with special educational needs and disabilities are oversubscribed. It found schools have converted portable cabins and even cupboards into teaching spaces because of a lack of room, while parents say the wait for places means their children are missing education. The LGA has warned councils are facing “significant financial challenges” and need long-term certainty over funding to support children with SEND. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People Board, called for the Government to urgently publish its long-awaited proposals “for a reformed system which better meets the needs of children with SEND”.
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Analysis of Department for Transport figures shows that the local bus network in Britain shrank by an estimated 14 per cent between 2016/17 and 2021/22. The total distance covered by buses each year also fell by 210 million miles. The LGA has warned thousands more bus routes could be lost without further support.
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In an interview to mark the upcoming first anniversary of the Russian invasion and the launch of the Ukraine refugee schemes, Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick has set out his ambition for a new asylum system that will offer “safe and legal” routes for genuine refugees but bar asylum claims within the UK for those who arrive illegally via small boats.
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The Government has announced that a further £80 million will be made available to support critical bus services from April with the £2 cap on bus fares in England also extended for three months. The LGA has been calling on the Government to urgently step in to ensure thousands of vital bus routes are not lost and said it was pleased that the Government had acted. Cllr David Renard, transport spokesperson for the LGA, added: “However, our bus services cannot survive on a hand to mouth existence. The Government should use the time this funding buys to work with councils and operators to develop a long-term, reformed bus funding model with significant new money."
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Inflation fell to 10.1 per cent in the year to January from 10.5 per cent in December. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said food inflation remained high in January at 16.7 per cent.
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Local government finance experts CIPFA have warned that the East London borough of Tower Hamlets is ‘going wrong again and will need intervention’.
The warning came after the departure of the council’s chief executive Will Tuckley ‘by mutual consent’.
It followed the unveiling of spending plans by controversial mayor of the borough Lutfur Rahman which would use millions of pounds of council savings to achieve his manifesto promises.
[ more...]
The Government is still ‘reviewing the recruitment process for levelling up directors’ despite appointing an ex-Number 10 official to a role with the same title.
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The funding is made up of three separate grants which aim to help councils better join up health and care services. In total, the grants come to £57.36m.
Local authorities will also be given a portion of a new one off £3m fund to support the introduction of new data collection.
The Local Reform and Community Voices grant will help local services champion for people who use health and social care services. It will also provide support to hospitals to assess when Liberty Protection Safeguards are needed for people who can’t make decisions about their own care.
The War and Pensions Scheme Disregard grant will support local authorities with costs associated with disregarding income from war pensions to help veterans with housing costs.
Finally, the Social Care in Prisons grant aims to support councils to meet the care and support needs of offenders residing in prisons, bail accommodation and approved premises, in their local area.
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Local authority leaders have called for the introduction of an automated sign-up system in order to expand access to free school meals to an extra 215,000 children.
Under the current system, parents have to formally apply to their local authority or via their child’s academy school to get free school meals for their children.
[ more...]
While the vast majority of councils are planning council tax increases, a few have said they will freeze residents’ bills in a bid to help them through the cost-of-living crisis.
Six out of 120 councils in LGC’s council tax tracker are planning to freeze council tax for 2023-24, although those with social care responsibilities are looking to increase the social care precept.
[ more...]
Concerns over a “completely unsustainable” financial position have forced the London Borough of Croydon to request additional government support, including the write-off of more than £500m of debt.
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Seven unions have written to the government demanding immediate action to address the “shocking” state of school buildings in England, some of which are in danger of collapse.
It follows a call from the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) for full disclosure over exactly which school buildings are most at risk, and for urgent intervention to shore up those buildings most likely to structurally fail.
The letter suggests, however, that the Department for Education (DfE) does not know which schools are at greatest risk, that current assessments are “not thorough enough” and underlying structural problems may go unnoticed.
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This week, nearly 96% of all acute beds in the Welsh NHS were occupied, which is the highest figure ever recorded. In Aneurin Bevan, during most of the last week there have been only two available acute beds vacant - the occupancy rate hitting 99.8%.
These delays are having an impact not just on individual patients and staff but the work of the entire health board.
[ more...]
Surrey County Council has agreed to review its special educational needs support for children and young people following an investigation by the local government and social care ombudsman.
The ombudsman was asked to investigate for the second time by the family of a young boy with special educational needs after the council failed to provide him with his full entitlement of education and therapy for 18 months.
[ more...]
Whitehall officials have told the sector they do not intend to create league tables as they push ahead creating a new local government performance body.
Amid sector concerns and uncertainty about the role, scope, breadth and implications of poor performance after the introduction of Oflog, local government minister Lee Rowley has insisted his department is ‘genuinely serious’ about co-designing the new regime with the sector.
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Three in four local authorities are set to increase their council tax by the maximum amount this April due to rising inflation and large funding gaps, research by the County Councils Network (CCN) has found.
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The “broken system” of local government funding has “favoured” relatively prosperous areas over the past 13 years, according to research by consultancy LG Improve.
The research found that after the funding formulae for local authorities was “frozen” in 2011/12, council tax has become a large part of how councils have been funded. The data revealed that council tax is now worth 57% of councils’ spending power, and it was 61% three years ago.
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Union leaders have urged the education secretary to make a "concrete" pay offer for teachers to prevent further strikes going ahead in schools in England ahead of crunch talks today.
Gillian Keegan is set to meet with the leaders of unions representing teachers and headteachers in a bid to resolve the ongoing pay dispute and to prevent further walkouts in the coming weeks.
Regional strikes in England are due to take place by National Education Union (NEU) members on 28 February, 1 March and 2 March, with national strikes in England and Wales planned for 15 and 16 March.
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The soaring cost of childcare in the UK is revealed in new figures today, suggesting nurseries will raise fees by £1,000 this year.
A survey of 1,156 providers by the Early Years Alliance found nine out of 10 expect to increase fees, typically in April, and by an average of 8% - higher than in previous years.
UK childcare costs are already among the most expensive in the world, with full-time fees for a child under two at nursery reaching an average £269 a week last year - or just under £14,000 annually.
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Teachers’ workloads could be slashed in a bid to halt strikes, under plans being drawn up by the Education Secretary.
Gillian Keegan has instructed officials to schedule talks with teaching union leaders to agree a strategy to slash bureaucracy in schools.
The Government is refusing to acquiesce to unions’ demands to increase and backdate pay for this academic year. Mrs Keegan has also told unions not to expect pay rises at or above inflation next year.
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The £421m in funding allocated to local authorities to improve drug and alcohol treatment is “less than the government took out of the public health grant in cuts”, the president of the Association of Directors of Public Health has said.
Today, the Department of Health & Social Care announced that 151 local authorities will be allocated £421m in funding through to 2025 to increase the number of drug and alcohol treatment places.
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Millions of households are facing an increase in their council tax from April, as local authorities try to balance their books.
The County Councils Network (CCN) found three-quarters of English councils with social care duties that have published budget details are planning a 5% hike.
This is the maximum allowed without a local vote, and would add £100 a year to bills for average Band D properties.
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Only 13% of attendees to a major meeting convened by Number 10 to discus winter health and care pressures had working knowledge of the social care sector, LGC can reveal.
The prime minister organised the NHS Recovery Forum in January to relieve strains on the system, and the Cabinet Office has now disclosed to LGC the 52 people present at the meeting following a Freedom of Information request.
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Less than a quarter of local authorities have paid out their full grants from the COVID relief fund for local businesses, new research reveals.
During the pandemic, the Government introduced the £1.5bn COVID-19 Additional Relief Fund (CARF) which was allocated to councils to help companies that were struggling with business rates.
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Landlords are scrambling to take back their properties before the Government scraps “no-fault” evictions, new data shows.
Eviction claims by private landlords hit a 23-year high in 2022, according to data from the Ministry of Justice.
Private landlords issued nearly 26,000 possession claims in England and Wales in 2022 – more than in any other year on record since at least 1999. The claims cover both Section 21 claims, so-called “no-fault” evictions, and Section 8 orders, which are handed down by the courts when tenants owe rent.
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Traditional log fires could be banned in more areas after two councils said they would review their regulations to help tackle air pollution.
Bedford and West Northamptonshire councils are considering expanding their smoke control areas, under which open log fires are banned, as part of the Government’s bid to cut fine particle pollution.
Domestic wood burning is one of the biggest single sources of PM2.5 fine particulate matter, which has been linked to asthma and strokes, and can exacerbate lung and heart problems.
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The UK narrowly avoided falling into recession in 2022, but the Bank of England still expects this to happen this year, new figures show. A recession is defined as when the economy contracts for two consecutive three-month periods, and despite shrinking between July and September, the economy saw zero growth between October and December, preventing a recession.
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London Councils has launched a broadside at neighbouring South East councils for luring children’s social workers by paying them more.
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The fate of plans to allow councils to set up multi-academy trusts (Mats) has been thrown into doubt following reports the government has scrapped the policy.
The government’s target of all schools being in or joining an academy trust by 2030 is also believed to have been dropped after the schools minister failed to commit to it in Parliament.
Both proposals formed part of last March’s schools white paper, and 29 councils applied to take part in a pilot scheme to test the concept of councils setting up a Mat, with a number of others telling LGC they would be interested in setting up a Mat in the future.
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Lancashire County Council have announced that, after a year of positive progress, the council has been set its first ever billion pound budget.
Yesterday saw a full meeting of the council, with the outcome proving that the current financial outlook is looking generally positive thanks to cautious management. Leaders did, however, say that complacency cannot set in and that hard decisions may still need to be made due to the current financial climate.
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Offices, schools, supermarkets and hospitals should be monitored for indoor air pollutants, according to England’s chief medical officer, amid concerns that dirty air in buildings may contribute to nearly as many deaths as outdoor air pollution.
Prof Chris Whitty said monitoring indoor air quality should become standard practice in public spaces and called for urgent investment to help establish records of pollutants that accumulate in homes, offices and public buildings.
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Rishi Sunak should funnel billions of pounds into free childcare to help get more parents into work to tackle acute workforce shortages, according to Britain’s leading business group.
The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) said the government urgently needed to announce extra funding and changes to childcare and early years support, arguing that a more accessible and affordable system was an immediate economic priority.
The lobby group, which represents more than 190,000 businesses across the country, said as much as £9bn of investment was required to improve the system and expand free childcare to one- and two-year-olds.
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Michael Gove’s government department has been banned from spending money on new capital projects without Treasury approval amid concerns about how well public money is being managed.
Insiders had signalled that Gove’s speech in Manchester on 25 January had prompted fears of rogue spending as he announced plans to fund a new round of local grants in northern counties.
It had also been claimed that Gove’s pledge in the same speech to provide £30m to fund improvements to substandard housing, after a two-year-old boy in Rochdale died after being exposed to mould in his family’s flat, had prompted fury among Treasury officials. The Treasury denied this.
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Strike action by firefighters has been put on hold while union members consider an increased pay offer.
During talks on Tuesday, fire service employers put forward a revised offer, which includes a 7% pay rise backdated to July last year and another 5% from this July.
The Fire Brigades Union (FBU) will now ballot members on the deal.
More than 80% of members who voted in a ballot in December backed strike action.
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Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has made a number of new appointments to his Cabinet, including Grant Shapps as the new Energy and Net Zero Secretary. Greg Hands has replaced Nadhim Zahawi as the Conservative Party Chairman, Lucy Frazer will head the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport and Rachel Maclean has been appointed as the new Housing Minister.
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Councils are struggling to build on brownfield sites due to the expenses they face when readying them for development. Analysis by iNews found an average of 1.2 million square metres of contaminated land, equivalent to around 169 football pitches, per council.
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Civil servants are set to strike on the day of the Spring Budget, the Public and Commercial Services union has said. Members will walk out on 15 March as part of an ongoing row over pay and conditions.
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Allowing three struggling local authorities to raise council tax beyond the normal limit only pushes the cost of their failure onto residents, experts have said.
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Thurrock Council’s opposition leader has called on the current administration to resign after the local authority was granted permission to increase council tax by 10%.
The government published the local government finance settlement for 2023-24 on Monday, which confirmed that Thurrock had been successful in its request to raise council tax above the 5% referendum limit.
Last year Thurrock issued a Section 114 notice amid a £469m black hole which left the local authority unable to deliver a balanced budget.
However, opposition leader John Kent (Lab) revealed that his party would not support any increase above the 5% limit and called on those responsible for the council’s financial situation to step down.
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Government proposals for every household to receive separate weekly food waste collections from this year will be delayed by two years, key Whitehall officials have admitted.
Ministers had said in 2021 that regular food collections to ‘stop the build-up of smelly waste that attracts flies and pests’ would be implemented by 2023.
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Home secretary Suella Braverman is expected to accept recommendations to overhaul Prevent after a review of the Government’s anti-terror programme.
Councils have played a central role in the operation of Prevent, which aims to stop people turning to terrorism.
Led by former Charity Commission chairman William Shawcross after being ordered by former home secretary Priti Patel in 2019, the long-awaited review will reportedly warn that Islamist terrorism is being wrongly treated like a mental illness.
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One in five households with prepayment meters have not cashed in their energy vouchers issued to help pay bills. Data seen by the BBC showed about 380,000 vouchers, totalling up to 19 per cent of homes, were not redeemed each month in October and in November, which means as much as £50 million of government support for energy has gone unclaimed by some of the most vulnerable.
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The Government is expected to announce new appointments to senior roles, amid reports that the Prime Minister will also set out a reorganisation of some government departments today. The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial strategy is expected to be broken up and the Department of Culture, Media, Digital and Sport is also anticipating change, it is reported.
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The housing minister and permanent secretary are leaving the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities as part of a shake-up of government departments.
Lucy Frazer is to become the secretary of state at the Department for Culture, Media & Sport, which has been renamed because responsibility for 'digital' is now part of a new department, the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology.
Ms Frazer was appointed housing minister by Rishi Sunak in November and was the fifth person to fill the role in 2022.
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The Local Government Association has raised concerns about the lack of extra support for district councils in today’s final local government finance settlement.
LGA chair James Jamieson (Con) also warned the fifth one-year settlement in a row would “hamper” councils’ financial planning and sustainability, and called for public health grant allocations to be published “urgently”.
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The government has said it expects councils to use its social care grant funding “to go beyond meeting inflationary pressures” and “commission higher quality” services.
As part of the final local government finance settlement for 2023-24, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities released the Social care resources explanatory note, alongside confirmation of funding allocations.
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Permanent secretary Jeremy Pocklington will leave the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) amid a series of Whitehall changes.
A DLUHC spokesperson today confirmed that Mr Pocklington will join the reconfigured Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) in what amounts to a job swap with fellow permanent secretary Sarah Healey.
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Government agency Active Travel England is inviting local authorities outside London today to apply for a share of a £200 million investment in walking and cycling. Schemes could include more paths in rural areas, new routes for children to walk to school and more inclusive street designs to support people using wheelchairs and mobility scooters. LGA transport spokesperson Cllr David Renard said, “It’s helpful that the Government recognises capacity constraints that councils face, and this funding will support them with efforts to get more people out of their cars and using greener forms of transport. However, funding must be delivered to where it is needed the most, not based on costly competitive bids between areas.”
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Business and retail organisations have written to the Government to warn that its £3.5 billion apprenticeship levy is a mistake. The British Retail Consortium (BRC), UKHospitality, techUK, and the Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC) said the Government was “holding back investment” in critical training that could increase productivity, fuel economic growth and raise wages.
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Three Norfolk MPs are to convene a summit of the county’s Conservative district and county councillors this Thursday to discuss its chosen devolution model.
In December, Norfolk CC signed a provisional devolution deal which will see a £600m investment fund devolved to the county over 30 years, and the election of a directly elected leader for Norfolk in 2024.
Concern has been raised over a lack of consultation with the county’s district and borough councils over the deal.
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Councils must get together with insurers to work out how to protect themselves against the risk of cyber attacks, a leading security expert has warned.
Ciaran Martin, founder of the GCHQ's National Cyber Security Centre, told MPs that local authorities across the country are still vulnerable to online attacks.
He told parliament's joint committee on the national security strategy that some councils cannot afford insurance cover to mitigate the risk and warned that taxpayers could end up paying the bill if something goes wrong.
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Vital frontline services, such as drug and alcohol treatment, tackling obesity and health visiting, are at risk of being cut unless Government announces public health funding for next year, council chiefs warn.
The Local Government Association (LGA) is calling on the Government to urgently publish the Public Health Grant funding allocations which councils will receive from April.
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County council leaders have called for more powers to tackle the labour squeeze in the countryside as a new analysis reveals that hundreds of thousands of people have left the rural workforce.
The analysis, published by the County Councils Network (CCN), found that over 320,000 more people have become economically inactive in England’s 36 county areas since the outbreak of the pandemic.
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Thurrock, Croydon and Slough will be allowed to increase council tax beyond the referendum limits imposed on others, the Government has confirmed.
Thurrock BC and Slough Council will be able to raise council tax by an additional 5% compared to other councils while Croydon LBC will be able to raise an additional 10%.
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Almost a million frontline social care workers would receive significant pay rises under Lib Dem plans to increase the minimum wage across the sector.
Under the party’s proposal, care staff would be paid at least £2 per hour more than the minimum wage.
Currently, the minimum wage for those older than 23 is £9.50 per hour – meaning the new level for most care staff would become £11.50 per hour.
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The government confirmed core spending power for councils will increase by an average of 9.4% in 2023-24 as it published the final local government finance settlement this afternoon.
Overall core spending power will reach £60bn and today’s announcement includes an additional £10m for the rural services grant and £19m for the services grant. In most other areas the government is proceeding as it set out in December's provisional settlement, and it rejected calls for greater council tax flexibility.
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The government has chosen CIPFA to look into select councils’ finances and governance, to inform any intervention the government then decides to make.
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Slough Borough Council has announced that Adele Taylor has been appointed as executive director of finance and commercial services and section 151 officer.
Taylor, executive director of resources for the past three years at the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead (RBWM), will take up the post at the troubled authority on 20 March.
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A delay to the fair funding review, risks of a new round of austerity and ongoing high levels of inflation have left the medium- to long-term funding outlook for councils “volatile” and “uncertain”, local authorities’ budget reports have shown.
Over the last week, Bristol City Council and West Sussex County Council have outlined that, despite the Local Government Finance Settlement providing more funding than expected for 2023/24, the outlook for both authorities in the long-term remains uncertain.
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One in seven beds in hospitals were occupied by people medically fit to be discharged, according to NHS figures. This is a small increase from last week’s figure. Previously the LGA, SOLACE and ADASS have written to the Secretary of State for Health Steve Barclay to challenge the assumption that the social care system was to blame for recent pressures on hospitals. In the letter, the organisations said, 'We are concerned about the manner in which social care is being portrayed and the level of engagement with local government in national discussions about delayed discharge.'
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Inflation has probably peaked and should fall to 4 per cent by the end of the year, the Bank of England has yesterday. Britain is still expected to enter a recession but it will be shorter and shallower than previously thought, it added, as interest rates were raised for a tenth consecutive time, to 4 per cent.
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The future of bus services in England ‘hangs in the balance’ with Government funding due to run out shortly, transport experts have warned.
The Urban Transport Group has urged the Government to prioritise spending on local urban transport in its Spring Budget next month.
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The Government has announced grants totalling up to £53m for councils to provide housing support to people in drug and alcohol treatment.
Essex will receive the biggest grant of £2,206,250 followed by Lancashire with £1,885,436 and Kent which will be given £1,853,719.
Health and social care secretary Steve Barclay said: ‘We’re supporting those recovering from drug and alcohol addiction by addressing the link between improved treatment outcomes and a stable home.
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The Government has announced plans to overhaul the children’s social care system. The plan, which also comes with a £200 million investment, has promised earlier help for families in crisis, strengthened local child protection teams, improvements in young people’s experience of the care system, and plans to tackle chronic staff shortages of children’s social workers. LGA Chairman, Cllr James Jamieson said much of the strategy is positive but long-term reforms do not address the issues facing services now. He added: “The funding announced, while helpful, falls short of addressing the £1.6 billion shortfall – estimated prior to inflation – required each year simply to maintain current service levels.”
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The Bank of England is expected to raise interest rates for the 10th time in a row. The benchmark rate is widely expected to go up from 3.5 per cent to 4 per cent after the Monetary Policy Committee meeting today and is already at its highest level for 14 years.
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The government plans to update the formula that determines how funding for children’s services is allocated to councils before the next spending review.
A consultation document, Stable Homes, Built on Love, was published this morning by the Department for Education (DfE) setting out the government’s response to three independent reports.
As part of this response the government said it would revive plans to update the funding formula for children’s and young people’s services.
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Children’s social work agencies are to face a crackdown on practices that are driving up cost and reducing quality of support for young people under plans set out by the government today.
A consultation, published alongside the children’s social care implementation strategy, proposes a cap on pay rates for agency workers, a minimum six week notice period and ban on councils from contracting agency ‘project teams’ to deliver routine children’s social care.
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The government’s £200m children’s social care plan "doesn’t represent the scale of transformation" the system needs, according to the chair of the independent review of children’s social care.
Under the new scheme, which was announced by ministers today, families will receive local early help and intervention with challenges such as addiction, domestic abuse, or mental health.
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The announcement of £200m to “fix” children’s social care is “disappointing” and “falls short” of what is "desperately needed", senior officers and councillors have warned.
The funding was announced by ministers today alongside the children’s social care implementation strategy which is the government’s response to the MacAlister independent review of children’s social care, reviews into the murders of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and Star Hobson and a review of the children’s homes market by the Competition & Markets Authority.
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Warrington BC has agreed to begin talks with the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy about its capital strategy and borrowing.
The council has been in discussions about its situation with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities for the last year.
Energy company Together Energy, which Warrington held a 50% share in, ceased trading in January 2022 and concerns were raised about the council’s overall level of debt, which then stood at £1.6bn.
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Firefighters are to go on strike in a row over pay after experiencing what they say is a cut in real-terms pay. Members of the Fire Brigade Union (FBU) voted for action in a ballot that closed yesterday – resulting in the UK’s first nationwide fire service strike over pay since 2003.
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MPs have approved plans aimed at enforcing minimum service levels for some sectors during strikes. Under the bill, some employees, including in the rail industry and emergency services, would be required to work during industrial action. They could be sacked if they refuse.
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The International Monetary Fund has said the UK economy will shrink and perform worse than other advanced economies as the cost of living continues to hit households.
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Local government will join an ‘expert group’ with the voluntary and community sector and care providers to ‘build adult social care capacity’ as part of a new NHS plan.
In a letter to council chief executives, social care minister Helen Whately said the Government would form the group next month to 'help identify how best to build adult social care capacity in preparation for next winter’.
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Council chief executives deserve a pay rise that is the “same” as those at the top point of the national pay scale, the Association of Local Authority Chief Executives said as it submitted next year’s pay claim.
Three unions today submitted their pay claim for 2023-24, calling for all council employees to receive a pay rise of 12.7%.
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Does the backlash against the levelling up fund spell disaster for the government’s flagship policy? LGC's head of content Kirsty Weakley looks into the issue.
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London mayor Sadiq Khan has accused the Government of forcing councils to waste money bidding for cash as part of the ‘levelling up’ policy.
He told the House of Commons levelling up committee that councils were criticised if they failed to bid for funding from Westminster even though only one in five succeeded.
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UK unemployment soars from 3.7% to 12.1% when a ‘hidden army’ of three million economically inactive people are included, according to Cities Outlook 2023.
Nine of the 10 places with the highest hidden unemployment rates are in the North, the annual Centre for Cities’ analysis has found.
In Blackburn and Middlesbrough, involuntary inactivity figures push the total unemployment rate up from just under 6% to more than 20%. In contrast the rate in cities like Gloucester and Reading is around 8%.
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The Government is set to publish an urgent and emergency care plan on Monday, as the Department of Health and Social Care announced that tens of thousands of elderly and vulnerable people are to receive tailored support at home each month, as part of a strategy to shift some NHS care out of hard-pressed hospitals. Officials said that current services would be standardised and scaled up to treat falls and frailty, building on the virtual NHS wards already in place which see patients treated from home while monitored by medics either through daily visits or through video calls. LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson said: “We are pleased to see the focus on expanding community health and care services and the recognition of the importance of therapy and recovery support to get people back home following discharge. Collaboration and a focus on outcomes will be key to successful delivery of the plan.
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Mayors and councils will keep more taxes paid in their local areas under plans being studied by Jeremy Hunt to boost local resources, it is reported. The Chancellor is said to have told colleagues that he is keen to increase the amount of business rates local areas can keep from the current 50 per cent level and to move away from the current system of “top-ups” and “tariffs”, which he believes offers little incentive to attract new businesses.
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Ministers have decided against the imminent publication of data showing those school buildings in England judged to be most at risk of collapse, after previously saying they would publish by the end of last year. Labour responded saying it would use a rare parliamentary device to force publication of the so-called Buildings Conditions Survey documents, so that parents can judge whether it is safe to send their children to classes.
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Jeremy Hunt has warned it is "unlikely" that there will be room for any "significant" tax cuts in the Budget. The Chancellor set out a plan to help lift the UK's economic growth which would focus on four pillars, or "four Es": enterprise, education, employment and everywhere.
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Tax cuts for businesses will be prioritised over those for workers before the next general election to boost Britain’s “long-term prosperity”, Jeremy Hunt has said. The Chancellor said that his focus was to reduce the burden of taxation on companies as soon as inflation was brought under control and added that while cutting business taxes may not be “eye-catching” for voters, people wanted the Government to have a plan to make the nation “prosperous and successful”.
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Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove has signed a £4.2 billion devolution deal with council leaders in the North East, which will provide funding over the next 30 years and see devolved powers over skills, transport and housing. Council leaders across Tyne and Wear, Northumberland and County Durham met in Gateshead yesterday to sign the agreement, although a public consultation and review needs to conclude before any deal becomes legislative.
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Trouble-torn Thurrock Council is set to receive £182.5m in Government support over the next year to shore up its services.
The Tory-controlled council said it would cover 57% of its spending, paying for social care, refuse collection and road maintenance.
It has a £469m blackhole this current financial year and an additional £184m for 2023/24.
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The success of a new Government funding scheme hangs in the balance after being hit by delays.
Details of the Energy Bill Support Scheme Alternative Funding were announced in December but Whitehall officials have since asked for more time to prepare before launch after a pilot with a small number of local authorities.
The Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) has apologised for the ‘delay in providing further information,’ with the deferral meaning it could be 27 February before the scheme is opened for applications.
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Councillors are split over how to tackle the workforce crisis facing the local government sector.
At its latest meeting, the Local Government Association (LGA)’s executive advisory board considered a survey that found more than nine in 10 councils were experiencing staff recruitment difficulties.
The LGA is lobbying the Government for investment in training and development, but also looking at ways the sector can help itself.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt will set out his plan today to boost growth, as criticism mounts over the Government's strategy for the economy. In his speech in central London, Mr Hunt will outline the opportunities in what he called "the growth sectors which will define this century” and will also pledge to build on "the freedoms which Brexit provides.”
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Tens of billions of pounds in additional funding will be required to keep public services running this year due to a collapse in productivity, which experts blamed on weak management and working from home. Public sector productivity fell 1.3 per cent in the three months to September compared with the previous quarter and is 7.4 per cent below pre-pandemic levels, compared with a 1.6 per cent increase in the equivalent economy-wide measure.
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Lord Amyas Morse, who served as the Comptroller and Auditor General at the NAO between 2009 and 2019 has been confirmed as Interim Chair of the Office for Local Government.
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Jeremy Hunt has warned it is "unlikely" that there will be room for any "significant" tax cuts in the Budget.
The chancellor has been under pressure recently from some in his party to cut taxes to stimulate the UK economy.
But Mr Hunt said that a pledge to halve the rate of inflation "is the best tax cut right now".
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Rochdale MBC plans to raise council tax by the maximum allowed without a referendum (4.99%) but then use its reserves to give residents a 2% discount on their bills.
The council has made the decision to raise general council tax by 2.99%, with an additional 2% for the adult social care precept because future government funding is expected to be based on councils increasing council tax by the full amount.
However, Rochdale is proposing to give all residents a 2% discount which will be taken off council tax bills prior to their being issued at the beginning of March.
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Hastings BC has not submitted a bid to the levelling up fund blaming the amount of resources needed to apply.
LGC analysis suggests this is only council that the government had identified as a high priority for levelling up funding that has not yet applied to the £4.8bn pot.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities devised an index of priority places for the fund. The highest priority councils were put into category one and were eligible for additional funding to support capacity with developing bids.
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Social care workers face unsafe working conditions and unlawfully low wages but still have high levels of job satisfaction, think tank finds.
A new report by the Resolution Foundation found that in April 2022 typical hourly pay among frontline care workers was £10.90 – below the economy-wide average of £14.47.
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For residents of Oldham, antisocial behaviour is pervasive. The lack of safety in the town centre is palpable, day or night. Three of its police stations have gone, shops and restaurants have vanished, the market has emptied. As one local mother says: “There is not a chance you walk round Oldham town centre on your own.” Hopping on a tram to Manchester is no better: the carriages are likely to be empty — ridership stalled years ago — and it can feel just as threatening. According to another resident: “You take your life into your hands for a £3.60 return.”
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The reliance on falling commercial income to fill funding gaps at Woking Borough Council has placed the authority’s finances at an “immediate risk”, according to an internal report.
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Analysis from the Labour Party has found that councils are freezing levelling up projects or having to make up the difference from their own budgets because of rising costs which have exceeded government grants. At least £500 million has been lost from projects funded by different levelling up schemes due to inflation and rising costs.
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Research from the IPPR shows that the North of England receives one of the lowest levels of investment among advanced economies. The report found the UK and the North are being held back by inequalities in research and development, social infrastructure and transport.
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As more census data becomes available, it will become increasingly apparent how out of date the funding system is, writes the director at LSE London
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Little progress has been made to address delays in local government audits, according to the National Audit Office (NAO).
The public spending watchdog published a “factual update” on the timeliness of reporting today which summarises the issues.
NAO highlighted that according to Public Sector Audit and Appointments (PSAA), just 12% of the audits for local government accounts were completed on time for 2021-22.
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Local government secretary Michael Gove has promised further devolution and changes to funding in the coming months.
Speaking at the Convention of the North in Manchester today, he gave a sneak preview of the trailblazer deals currently under negotiation, including more control over affordable homes programme budgets, and £30m extra funding for Greater Manchester and the West Midlands.
Mr Gove also said a devolution deal was in the pipeline for Cumbria following its reorganisation and other areas in the North of England later this year.
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A new Labour administration would make it a legal requirement for central government to consider all devolution requests, the shadow levelling up secretary has said.
Speaking at the Convention of the North in Manchester today, Lisa Nandy said that Labour would look to introduce the requirement in the first King’s Speech, if elected in 2024.
She told the convention that this would form part of the party’s proposed ‘Take Back Control’ Bill which was first trailed by leader, Keir Starmer earlier this month.
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Conrad Hall takes issue with a recent Room151 opinion article and argues that local government needs to embrace International Financial Reporting Standards rather than seeking exemptions and statutory overrides.
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Plans to appoint levelling up directors could be scrapped by the Government, MPs have been told. The 12 positions were advertised by the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities last year, but minister Dehenna Davison told a cross-party committee of MPs yesterday that officials are now reviewing whether they are needed. Ms Davison also said no decisions had been made over the next round of funding from the Levelling Up Fund and whether the rules on bidding would be changed. Speaking in the House of Lords, LGA Vice President and local Liberal Democrat councillor Baroness Pinnock said: “There were 525 bids for this latest round - 111 only were successful. That means 80 per cent were not successful. Each bid it is estimated costs £30,000 to make. That's £12 million of hard-pressed council funding basically wasted on a bid. Cannot the minister find a more effective way, such as devolving the money to local authorities, so this money is not wasted when it's desperately needed?”
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Archbishops have called for a "radical redesign" of England's "broken" social care system. A so-called National Care Covenant, setting out the rights and responsibilities of national and local government, communities, families and citizens should be established, the Archbishops' Commission on Reimagining Care said and also calls on government to "set out a long-term commitment to introduce a universal entitlement to care and support" on a par with the NHS.
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Local authorities with a “credible plan” to spend this year's allocation from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund will be able to roll funding over to next year, a senior official said yesterday.
During a Commons’ levelling up committee session yesterday Andrew Lewer, Conservative MP for Northampton South, highlighted delays to distributing UKSPF allocations.
Councils had to submit investment plans to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities for how they would spend allocations of the UKSPF by 1 August last year. However, it was not until late November that councils heard if their plans had been approved, despite a requirement that the £250m allocated in the first year of the fund be spent by the end of March 2023.
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A Government minister has admitted to shifting the rules on Levelling Up Fund bids after applications had been submitted.
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Local government secretary Michael Gove has effectively ordered a full takeover of Thurrock Council amid fresh concerns over the authority’s governance, scrutiny and operating model.
In a written statement today, local government minister Lee Rowley revealed the Government had proposed a huge intensification of intervention at Thurrock in the aftermath of the authority issuing a section 114 notice amid in-year debts of £470m.
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An article examines how many councils are struggling with the impact of inflation and legacy of austerity, despite the new regeneration funds offered by government as part of its promise to “level up”. It references the LGA’s warning ahead of November’s Autumn Statement that councils faced an “existential crisis” due to the impact of inflation. Most of the new regeneration funds are awarded after a competitive bidding process which is also expensive. The LGA estimates each application costs a council on average £30,000 and to bid for every single one available would cost about £2.25 million a year, an expenditure that LGA Chairman, Cllr James Jamieson, described as “nuts”. Cllr Jamieson said: “That’s wasted time and resources. It’s capacity of officers who, rather than writing a bid, could be looking at the vision for the place.”
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Local authority leaders have called on the Government to prioritise plans to reduce the amount of waste produced rather than focusing on schemes incentivising recycling.
The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) published their response to the consultation on the Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) on Friday, describing it as a ‘simple and effective system’ for encouraging recycling.
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The Department of Health and Social Care has announced that it is investing in provision for more tailored emergency care for those experiencing a mental health issue.
The new investment will see £150 million being allocated up until April 2025, with the aim of better supporting those who are experiencing or at risk of experiencing mental health crises. This includes better emergency care, more support in the community through specialised mental health ambulances, more crisis services, and improved health-based places of safety.
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The leader of Birmingham City Council has written to levelling up secretary Michael Gove to seek “urgent clarification” on levelling up funding bids.
Council leader Ian Ward (Lab) highlighted comments made by culture secretary Michelle Donelan in which she stated that because Birmingham was successful in the first round, bids in the second could not be awarded because the government needed to spread funding across deprived areas of the UK.
Ms Donelan told ITV Central that there was a "rule that in the second round those that had been successful in the first couldn't then be successful again".
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Local government trade unions are considering an inflation-busting pay demand for 2023-24, The MJ understands.
The three main unions in the sector – Unison, Unite and GMB - are still finalising their formal pay claim ahead of a submission to the National Joint Council (NJC) by the end of this month.
But key sources this week suggested unions look poised to coalesce around the Retail Price Index inflation rate, plus an extra two per cent, as they seek to shield town hall staff from the continuing cost of living crisis.
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A local government workforce crisis is threatening vital services, English councils have warned.
It comes after a new Local Government Association (LGA) survey found more than nine in 10 councils were experiencing staff recruitment difficulties in at least one occupation and more than eight in 10 were experiencing retention difficulties in at least one occupation.
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A total of 111 areas across the UK have been awarded money from the second round of the Government’s Levelling Up Fund, providing £2.1 billion for new projects. A new Eden Project site to be built from a derelict site in Morecambe and improved train services in Cornwall are among the projects set to get funding. Cllr Kevin Bentley, Chairman of the LGA’s People and Places Board, said the funding will help successful councils forge ahead with ambitious plans. However, he added that allocation of levelling up funding should be "locally led by evidence" of where investment is needed rather than "based on costly competitive bids between areas" and also warned fulfilling projects had become more challenging due to rising inflation and costs.
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Council leaders are disappointed after their levelling up fund bids were rejected with one saying it was a “kick in the teeth”.
Last night the government announced which 111 areas had been awarded money from the second round of the levelling up fund, but with 525 separate bids the success rate is around one fifth so many more areas missed out.
LGC analysis of 43 councils that collectively submitted 83 funding bids shows just 12 received the amount they bid for, 21 councils had all of their bids rejected and 10 were only partially successful.
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More than 350 leisure centres, pools and gyms across the UK have either closed temporarily or permanently or made changes to their services in response to rising energy bills in the past year, UK Active figures have shown. Eight organisations, including the LGA, have written to the Government to warn them "not to take for granted" the role and importance of sport and physical activity and that a "failure to identify bespoke support for the sector" will be the "final straw" for certain services.
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The Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) has announced a new £60 million fund for councils to regenerate disused brownfield sites for housing. Councils across England are able to bid for a share of the pot to revive disused urban areas and make room for new dwellings. The money, which is the second tranche from the £180 million Brownfield Land Release Fund 2, will go towards building new homes by March 2027.
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The annual rate of consumer price inflation declined to 10.5 per cent in December, from 10.7 per cent in November and further below the 41-year high of 11.1 per cent in October, according to data published on Wednesday by the Office for National Statistics.
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The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is planning a “slimmed down” spring budget with no immediate tax cuts, it has been reported. Boosting growth, bringing down inflation and reducing national debt were the government’s top priorities, reports suggest.
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Conservative MPs in key marginal seats have reportedly been told to not to use the phrase “levelling up” because no one knows what it means.
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A private care home operator, Redwood Homes, have been criticised after their owner was paid £21 million over five years despite one third of their homes being rated as ‘requiring improvement’ by the Care Quality Commission.
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A Labour government has not ruled out allowing local government to keep a greater proportion of taxes raised locally but will not “increase the tax burden on working families”, the shadow levelling up secretary has said.
Speaking at the Institute for Government’s annual conference on Tuesday, Lisa Nandy responded to recent comments from shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves in which she apparently ruled out fiscal devolution to local government.
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What the sector has been saying loud and clear is that it wants certainty and multi-year funding settlements. So surely people should be jumping for joy?
But in this instance the devil is in the timing detail. Paradoxically the next election is both too soon, and too far away.
Too soon because there is no realistic possibility that the current government could provide more than another one-year funding settlement at the end of this year.
Too far away because there are pressing issues calling out for an urgent response.
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The number of health visitors has plummeted by nearly 40% since 2015 due to public health grant cuts, local authority leaders warn.
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Peers from across the House of Lords urged the government to strengthen the levelling up bill during a debate yesterday.
The second reading of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill took place yesterday with over 65 peers contributing during a six-hour debate. Several raised concerns about affordable housing, and the devolution measures.
Opening the debate the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities minister Baroness Scott emphasised the “scale of the challenge” and said she looked forward to working with colleagues on the “achieving its objectives”.
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The government currently has no plans to merge the two largest schemes for housing Ukrainian refugees, despite concerns over costs to councils.
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Teachers will strike over pay in England and Wales on seven dates in February and March, the National Education Union has announced. National strikes are scheduled for 1 February, 15 and 16 March as well as several regional dates, with the NEU saying the strike will affect 23,400 schools.
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Wages have grown at the fastest rate in more than 20 years, but are still failing to keep up with rising prices, official figures show. Regular pay, which excludes bonuses, rose at an annual pace of 6.4 per cent between September and November, marking the fastest growth since 2001 - excluding the pandemic, when people got big rises after returning to work from furlough.
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A patient has been in a hospital for nine months despite being medically fit for discharge since September, due to a lack of adequate care in the community. It comes as Sarah McClinton, President of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services said government messaging around patients who are medically fit for discharge is too simplistic and can be misleading.
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A patient has been in a hospital for nine months despite being medically fit for discharge since September, due to a lack of adequate care in the community. It comes as Sarah McClinton, President of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services said government messaging around patients who are medically fit for discharge is too simplistic and can be misleading.
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Sir Andrew Dilnot, the author of the landmark government review on social care funding, says it is “very distressing to see social care put at the bottom of the priority list again” following the Autumn Statement announcement that tackling the problem would be deferred for another two years. The Association of Directors of Adult Social Services says an additional 542,000 people are waiting in the community for assessment or care, many of whom are elderly and frail and if they do not get the support they need, then they are more likely to have a fall and end up in A&E, further increasing pressure on the NHS.
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The Governor of the Bank of England has said there could be a “rapid” fall in inflation in Britain amid a drop in global energy prices over recent weeks, but warned that a shortage of workers could still pose major risks amid the cost of living crisis. Andrew Bailey told MPs on the Commons Treasury committee that the UK’s rate of inflation could fall back substantially this year after reaching the highest levels since the early 1980s during the autumn, after Russia’s invasion in Ukraine led to an increase in wholesale energy costs.
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The government has "no plans to amalgamate" the Homes for Ukraine scheme and Family scheme, the housing and homelessness minister has said.
Appearing before the Commons’ levelling up, housing & communities committee yesterday, Felicity Buchan said that the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities’ “current policy is that these are separate schemes”.
In November last year, levelling up secretary, Michael Gove told the committee that conversations were ongoing “about bringing [the schemes] more closely together”.
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Local authorities are being encouraged to bid for a share of a £3.6m fund aimed at helping families where children are exposed to conflict.
Announced yesterday by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), the fund is open to councils, digital firms and voluntary organisations who are working on projects that are focused on improving parents’ access to conflict support.
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MPs have questioned the rationale behind Government cuts to funding for refugees.
The Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee yesterday pressed ministers over what assessments had been made before reducing the funding from £10,500 per person to £5,900, leaving councils to pick up any shortfall.
Former shadow local government minister Kate Hollern said: ‘We seem to be constantly passing responsibility onto them [councils] with bigger financial burden and less support.’
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Thousands of new homes are said to be at risk after some councils cut or delayed their housebuilding plans after ministers decided to drop mandatory building targets. Analysis shows nine local authorities have either paused or scaled back their plans after Housing Secretary Michael Gove said the Government would no longer pursue a mandatory target of 300,000 homes a year.
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Bereaved families are being charged thousands of pounds in care home fees following the death of a relative in residential care. Some providers are reportedly charging next of kin sums equivalent to up to a month’s worth of care after the death of a resident, four years after the Competition and Markets Authority said such charges were illegal.
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The RAC has warned drivers to expect more potholes to appear on the roads because of the winter weather. It said the cold weather snap has created “the perfect recipe for potholes” on roads – a combination of heavy rain and freezing temperatures.
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The Home Office is to open a new office in Stoke-on-Trent, with plans to relocate roles from London by 2030.
The department has signed a new deal for office space at Two Smithfield in Hanley and has confirmed that the first employees will move in in March.
The Home Office has committed to creating 500 new jobs in Stoke-on-Trent and has said it has already filled the first 100 vacancies.
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Two treasury society presidents have expressed disappointment that the government has opted for a two-year extension to the IFRS 9 statutory override rather than implementing a permanent extension.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) has confirmed the two-year extension – as recommended by CIPFA and the ICAEW – but has yet to say whether it will also take up the institutes’ suggestion that the standard be applied fully after 31 March 2025.
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Introducing an auditor of last resort should be ‘seriously explored,’ the organisation responsible for appointing local government auditors has suggested.
It is understood that the idea has been raised at the local audit liaison committee, which was convened by the Government after Sir Tony Redmond’s review recommended the establishment of a committee made up of key stakeholders.
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Councils in the UK issued an average of 20,000 parking fines each day last year, a 12 per cent rise on the previous year, according to figures obtained by Churchill Motor Insurance. The revenue for councils is estimated to have increased to £777,287 per day last year. A spokesperson for the LGA, said: “Income raised through on-street parking charges and parking fines is spent on running parking services. Any surplus is spent on essential transport projects, including fixing the £11 billion road repairs backlog, reducing congestion, tackling poor air quality and supporting local bus services.”
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In a discussion with Adrian Chiles, Cllr Darren Rodwell, transport spokesperson for the LGA highlighted the issue of the cost of repairing potholes. He said: “£500 million pounds has been taken out of road repair funding alone since 2021 and we know there are £12 billion worth of repairs that need to be done. As local government, we repair on average a pothole every 19 seconds, so it’s not for the want of trying, but we do need resources.”
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The UK economy exceeded expectations by growing in November, boosted by the World Cup, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics. The country’s gross domestic product (GDP) rose by 0.1 per cent despite being widely expected to contract in November as it had in the three months prior.
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Energy bills could fall below £2,500 from July as wholesale gas prices drop, according to analysis by Investec. The international banking and wealth management group forecast that the cap on annual energy bills will fall to £2,478 for an average bill in the summer, down from a previous estimate of £2,640 earlier this month.
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Total spending by local authorities in England has continued to rise steadily over the last five years according to the latest statistics.
A report by research specialists Tussell shows direct spend by local government in 2021/22 totalled £61bn, up 3% on the year before.
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Pushing back the long-awaited fair funding review risks making the process even more difficult, according to analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) think-tank.
Senior research economist Kate Ogden told the Local Government Association’s finance conference that confirmation of its delay until after 2025 was a ‘missed opportunity and risks even further delay’.
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A call has been made for finance directors to take a lead as advocates for the sector.
Speaking at the Local Government Association (LGA) finance conference, delegates were told to highlight successes as well as much-publicised failures.
President of the Society of District Council Treasurers, Alison Scott, said: ‘We are quite timid of our own success and get on with things quietly.’
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Hundreds of bids by councils to be granted tax exemptions under the “investment zones” scheme will not happen as ministers look to scale back projects, it is reported. Fewer than 20 zones, which will probably be focused instead on universities, are now set to be agreed. The LGA has estimated that competitive funding bids cost councils around £30,000 on average to put together.
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Hundreds of bids by councils to be granted tax exemptions and liberalised planning rules under the “investment zones” scheme have been killed off, as Rishi Sunak’s government dismantles another of Liz Truss’s projects.
Sources said ministers were trying to scale down the scheme, which was a key part of the previous government’s growth strategy, while salvaging some aspects of it as a sop to the former prime minister and her allies.
Fewer than 20 zones, which will probably be focused instead on universities, are now envisaged. Following alleged disagreements between the Treasury and the Department for Levelling Up, a planned announcement last week about a replacement scheme was called off at the last minute.
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The most fertile ideas could come from the people who need care or who work in the system, writes an independent social care commentator and member of the Archbishops’ Commission on Reimagining Care.
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Ministers have given the final approval to two new freeports as part of Rishi Sunak’s long held ambition to use Brexit to attract foreign investment into some of the UK’s most deprived areas.
Under plans announced yesterday, Liverpool will join Felixstowe and Harwich in receiving £25 million of government seed funding to develop two new freeport zones.
The policy has been championed by Sunak since before he became a minister, when he proposed a series of freeports across the UK to drive economic growth by taking advantage of the UK’s position outside the EU customs zone.
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Local authorities rival health and education as a funding priority for the Government, a Whitehall official believes.
Speaking at today’s finance conference organised by the Local Government Association, director of local government finance at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, Nico Heslop, said he had been surprised by the increase in funding provided by the provisional settlement published last month.
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Councils fear the Government’s plans to buy up care home places to help with hospital discharges could create more problems than it solves.
Ministers unveiled the £200m initiative this week, explaining the money will pay for short-term care placements and fund maximum stays of up to four weeks per patient until the end of March.
But there are concerns the proposal will create new pressures for social care services because councils will have to manage the need once the four weeks are up despite no apparent additional funding to address workforce pressures and home care costs.
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Thurrock council are set to request dispensation from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DHLUC) to raise council tax above the legal limit wihtout holding a referendum.
Last month the local authority formally announced its £469 million debt had left them unable to deliver a balanced budget, leading to the council issuing a section 114 notice.
For 2023-24 councils with social care responsibilities such as Thurrock can raise regular council tax by 2.99% plus and additional 2% adult social care precept. Thurrock's plans to approach DLUHC emerged in papers to an extraordinary council meeting last night.
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Local government should be at the heart of transformed service delivery and closer working across the public sector, writes the acting head of policy at the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy.
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The government will share more details about its plans to set up an Office for Local Government “over the coming weeks”, the minister said yesterday.
Lee Rowley was speaking at the Local Government Association’s annual finance conference yesterday, where he said plans for Oflog, which was announced in June, will be revealed soon.
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Whitehall officials want to get a clearer understanding of “baffling” council reserves data to understand why levels seem to have increased sharply.
Last year’s policy statement noted a “significant increase in some local authority reserves over the two years of the pandemic” and suggested councils “consider how they can use their reserves to maintain services in the face of immediate inflationary pressures”.
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People will be allowed to keep claiming sickness benefits after returning to work and will be offered tax breaks for getting jobs, under plans to boost employment.
A reform of disability benefits is likely to scrap a “perverse” assessment system, which ministers think encourages people to prove they are too ill to work, in an effort to reverse a rise in the number of people not looking for jobs.
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Two struggling local authorities are set to request the government’s permission to raise council tax rate by more than the normal limit without triggering a local referendum.
Councils normally have to hold a referendum if they wish to raise council tax rates by more than the threshold – set at 3% plus 2% on the adult social care levy for 2023-24.
However, councils in Slough and Thurrock plan to write to the government asking for the ability to increase the tax without triggering a vote.
Both authorities are in discussions with ministers over exceptional financial support, following the publication of section 114 notices in 2022 because they could not balance their budgets.
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Since 2020-21, five local authorities have issued eight section 114 notices due to unlawful spending or their inability to set a balanced budget.
Despite giving exceptional financial assistance to 11 councils since 2020, Jeremy Pocklington, permanent secretary at the Department for Levelling up, Housing and Communities, said additional funding from the Autumn Statement should prevent further notices.
In the statement, the government announced £1bn of additional grant funding next year, and diverted £1.3bn originally earmarked for social care reforms that have now been delayed.
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In the government’s newly announced plans to run a smaller-scale Energy Bills Discount Scheme from March (when the current plan, always intended to be temporary, ends), businesses and the public sector will continue to have part of their bills subsidised for the next 12 months.
Some energy-intensive services will receive additional support, including libraries and museums, but leisure centres and swimming pools will not.
“These valuable public facilities are at risk of reduced hours or even closure due to unsustainable and increasing costs,” said Local Government Association energy spokesman David Renard.
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The business secretary, Grant Shapps, will be able to decide statutory minimum service levels for a string of public services under the terms of a new anti-strike bill condemned by Labour as likely to increase stoppages.
Unveiling details of the proposed law, Shapps said ministers would consult during the progress of the bill on what minimum services levels would be required for fire, ambulance and transport services, including rail.
The measures, which could lead to striking staff being sacked, will also affect health, education, border security and nuclear decommissioning. In these areas, Shapps said, the hope was to reach agreed minimum service levels “that mean that we don’t have to use that power in the bill”. Again, these were not set out.
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Councils are plotting double digit rises in parking charges as they scramble for cash.
As the annual local authority budget process gets under way, a string of councils have already indicated they are planning stealth raids on motorists and others who use their services.
Families are already braced for a 5 per cent rise in council tax after ministers agreed to lift the annual cap in response to local authority demands for more money.
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New research by the Resolution Foundation suggests the average household across the country will be £2,100 worse off by the end of the next financial year. After housing costs, it found the typical income for a working age family is set to fall by 3 per cent in the year to the end of March, followed by a 4 per cent drop over the following 12 months. Cllr Peter Marland, Chair of the LGA’s Resources Board, said: “Councils are urging the Government to make the household support fund it has provided to councils permanent, alongside greater flexibility so they can ensure it helps people in the greatest need. This would also allow councils to crucially shift their focus from short-term crisis support to investing in preventative services which build financial capability and resilience, such as welfare benefit entitlement checks; debt advice; and employment, health, and housing support.”
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New analysis by the Telegraph and Taxpayers’ Alliance has found millions of households could be hit with average council tax bills of over £2,000 from April. Councils have been told they can increase bills by up to 5 per cent this year. This could see 255 areas charging more than £2,000 a year on average to families in Band D homes. Cllr James Jamieson, LGA Chairman, said: “Many councils face significant challenges when setting their budgets and trying to protect services from cutbacks. This leaves them facing the tough choice about whether to increase council tax bills to bring in desperately-needed funding at a time when they are acutely aware of the significant burden that could place on some households during a cost of living crisis.”
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The Health Secretary Steve Barclay will unveil plans later to move thousands of NHS patients in England into care homes to ease pressure on hospitals. The emergency package will include measures to address delays to discharging patients who are medically fit to leave hospital. Separately the Times reports that patients face being moved into hotels as part of the plans.
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Care providers are asking double the usual fees to care for thousands of people who need to be discharged from hospitals to ease the crisis in the NHS. Care England said it wanted the Government to pay providers £1,500 a week per person, citing the need to pay care workers more and hire rehabilitation specialists.
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A new scheme to help firms with their energy bills is to be announced in the House of Commons today. The current scheme which caps the unit cost of gas and electricity for all businesses ends at the end of March and will be replaced with a new scheme that offers a discount on wholesale prices rather than a fixed price.
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Nearly a third of teachers who qualified in the last decade have since left the profession, according to Labour analysis that has been released as the party attempts to shift the political focus on to education.
With the results of strike ballots by teaching unions due in the coming days, Labour intends to use a Commons vote this week to push their plan to impose VAT on private school fees, which they say would help pay for new teachers in the state sector.
The party wants to use an opposition day on Wednesday to pass a motion – intended to be binding – that would set up a new Common select committee to look specifically at the issue of VAT on private school fees.
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Council leaders have called for a strategy to save local leisure centres as a new report from the public accounts committee (PAC) warns that the majority of councils are considering scaling back their leisure services as post-Olympics sports boom fails to materialise.
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The Government is making available £200m to help secure local care home spaces so that patients can be safely discharged from overcrowded hospitals.
The funding, which will be announced today by health and social care secretary Steve Barclay, will pay for short-term care placements and will fund maximum stays of up to four weeks per patient until the end of March.
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Representatives of the Local Government Association and the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives were not present at the prime minister’s NHS recovery forum meeting on Saturday.
LGC understands that representatives from the Association of Directors of Adult’s Social Care did attend the meeting which was held to discuss issues such as social care and delayed discharge.
When asked about whether any representatives from Solace attended the meeting, health and social care spokesperson, Dwayne Johnson said: “No, and we weren’t invited.”
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The Department for Health and Social Care has published its adult social care winter statement, which sets out initiatives intended to support the sector.
In the preface the minister for social care, Helen Whatley acknowledged that there are "additional pressures being felt right across the country this year, which are making an already challenging season even harder to navigate".
This statement had expected last year. In a letter to the health and social care sector in November 2022, Ms Whatley said the department would aim to release a statement in the “coming weeks” which would “set out what steps are being taken to support the care sector this winter, and actions for local systems to ensure they are resilient as possible during the colder months”.
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Labour will not pursue further fiscal devolution, if elected, a policy which would allow councils more control over tax raising powers, the shadow chancellor has said.
In an interview with the Yorkshire Post, Rachel Reeves said: “We don’t have any plans to give tax-raising powers to local authorities, and the tax burden is at a historical high.
“The last thing we need at the moment is more taxes being dreamt up by either Westminster or the Town Hall.”Labour will not pursue further fiscal devolution, if elected, a policy which would allow councils more control over tax raising powers, the shadow chancellor has said.
In an interview with the Yorkshire Post, Rachel Reeves said: “We don’t have any plans to give tax-raising powers to local authorities, and the tax burden is at a historical high.
“The last thing we need at the moment is more taxes being dreamt up by either Westminster or the Town Hall.”
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The staffing “crisis” in the home care sector means the government’s £200m discharging fund to tackle the NHS winter crisis will not work, care home bosses have warned.
Chronic understaffing has left homes with “beds but no staff” to take NHS patients on and home care services have been forced to reduce their support or give back contracts due, sector leaders have told The Independent.
The warning comes after health secretary Steve Barclay announced on Monday that the government would fund 2,500 care home beds this winter and spend £50m on building temporary wards outside of A&Es.
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Analysis from the Resolution Foundation think tank suggests families across the UK have only experienced half the lost income they are expected to suffer, with millions already struggling to cope with the massive increase in costs.
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Around 3,000 hospital patients will be moved into care homes, privately-run hospitals and even hospices within weeks to ease strain on England's stricken NHS.
In a statement to Parliament, Health Secretary Steve Barclay confirmed the emergency plan to free up beds - as he blamed a surge of flu cases.
He admitted: "I and the Government regret the experience for some patients and staff in emergency care has not been acceptable in recent weeks."
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Health secretary Steve Barclay announced that care bodies will receive £200m of immediate funding to buy care homes places to accelerate the discharging of patients into the social care sector to free up hospital beds.
Trusts will also receive £50m of capital funding to expand hospital discharge lounges and ambulance hubs, to help reduce ambulance queues – in which many patients are currently waiting for hours.
Care minister Helen Whately said: “Getting people out of hospital on time is more important than ever. It’s good for patients and it helps hospitals make space for those who need urgent care.”
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Thousands of Ukrainian refugees have been housed in hotels as councils struggle to deal with a rising number becoming homeless. Freedom of Information figures from 134 of 181 district councils in England show at least 668 households - 1,618 people - have been accommodated in hotels since March 2022, while a further 406 households have been placed in temporary accommodation. An LGA spokesperson said: “We have been raising concerns with government on the growing number of Ukrainians presenting as homeless to councils. There is a real crisis in the refugee and asylum system which is compounded by a housing crisis. We are pleased that the Government has been working with the LGA and councils on funding.”
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Up to half as much money is spent per mile on pothole repairs in the countryside compared to towns and cities, according to new analysis of council expenditure. The Asphalt Industry Alliance, which represents companies supplying materials and repairing roads, released its latest analysis of local authority expenditure which showed differences in funding for road repairs in rural and urban areas. It comes as motoring and cycling safety campaigners call for more to be done to repair potholes, after an 84-year-old cyclist suffered fatal injuries when the front wheel of his bike got caught in a pothole on a remote rural road. LGA transport spokesperson Cllr David Renard said pothole repairs have recently increased by about 25 per cent. He said: “Even before current inflation levels, existing government funding was insufficient to protect overall road conditions at current levels.”
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The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) has increased the allocation in the second round of the levelling up fund to “up to £2.1bn” compared to the expected figure of £1.7bn.
An announcement on the allocation for individual councils has been postponed and is now expected to be released by the end of January.
DLUHC suggested that the delay was due to the receipt of “so many high-quality applications” that extra time was required “to carefully consider the bids to allocate additional funds”.
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A swathe of new powers would be devolved from central Government under a Labour administration, leader Sir Kier Starmer has promised in a key speech.
Councils would be given more fiscal control and could benefit from devolution in sectors such as transport, energy and housing as part of a so-called Take Back Control Bill.
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There needs to be a “fundamental rethink” to how local government is funded, with a shift to five-year financial settlements and the possibility of further fiscal devolution, a sector body has told LGC.
The Society of Local Authority Chief Executives & Senior Managers (Solace) called for a commission on the future of local government finance as part of its submission to the latest finance settlement.
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Buckinghamshire Council faced “real uncertainty” when setting its budget in the face of rising inflation and ballooning demand for adult social care, its leader has said.
Speaking to LGC, Martin Tett (Con), said setting a balanced budget had been particularly difficult due to a “massive increase in inflation” over the past year.
Cllr Tett pointed out that last year, when the council set its budget inflation sat at around 4%. It is now at 9.3% and projected to rise to 11% in the coming months.
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Rishi Sunak has asked Michael Gove to draw up plans to tackle antisocial behaviour as he makes the problem a priority before the next election.
He said antisocial behaviour should not be treated as an “inevitable or a minor crime” as he pledged to crack down on disorder in communities.
In his speech yesterday, the prime minister said he wanted to introduce powers to ensure “these crimes will be quickly and visibly punished”.
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Labour will launch a “take back control” bill aimed at devolving sweeping powers to local communities in its first term if it wins the next election, Keir Starmer has promised. In a speech setting out his vision for a future Labour government, the Labour leader pledged a major push to devolve power away from Westminster as part of what he said would be an “end to sticking-plaster politics”.
In an attempt to capture the political centre-ground and rid Labour of its reputation as the party of big government, Starmer insisted the answer to the problems plaguing Britain’s public services was not to open “the big government chequebook”. Instead, he said his party would make sure power over those services was not being hoarded by a handful of people in Westminster.
Referring to issues such as the Brexit vote and the push for Scottish independence, Starmer said: “It’s not unreasonable for us to recognise the desire of communities to stand on their own feet – it’s what take back control meant.” But he added: “We will embrace the take back control message, but we’ll turn it from a slogan into a solution from a catchphrase interchange.
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Business groups are expecting government help with their energy bills to be halved after March, when the existing package of support expires, to reportedly protect the public finances from volatile energy markets. Gas and electricity prices have been fixed for firms until the end of March, but many want the support to continue, with the revised scheme expected to run for 12 months until March 2024
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Employers will be able to sue unions and sack staff under government plans to curb the right to strike, The Times has been told.
Rishi Sunak is poised to announce legislation to enforce “minimum service levels” in six sectors, including the health service, rail, education, fire and border security.
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Primary school pupils as young as five and six are to be the target of a new careers programme in England encouraging them to think about future jobs early, the government has announced.
Children in years 1, 2 and 3, between the ages of five and eight, will be given age-appropriate lessons designed to introduce them to different careers, training and skills, and inspire them about the world of work.
The £2.6m initiative will be introduced across 55 education investment areas, or “cold spots”, where school outcomes are the weakest, targeting 600,000 pupils in more than 2,200 primary schools.
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Government inaction squandered “a crucial window of opportunity” to protect consumers from the impact of surging energy prices by insulating homes on a massive scale, MPs have warned.
Parliament’s Environmental Audit Committee has recommended a “war effort” to insulate homes in 2023 – after officials failed to take the opportunity “during the warmer months of 2022” when it became clear that consumers would be facing a huge rise in energy costs this winter.
The UK’s housing stock is among the least heat-efficient in Europe.
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Rishi Sunak has pledged to boost the economy, cut hospital waiting lists and stop migrant crossings in the Channel in his first speech of 2023.
Speaking in Stratford, the prime minister laid out his priorities for 2023 and asked the public to judge his premiership on five promises.
These pledges are: to halve inflation; to grow the economy; to reduce debt; to cut hospital waiting lists; and to stop migrant crossings.
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A cash boost to help councils encourage people to walk and cycle more has been announced.
A new quango Active Travel England will hand out £32.9m for local authorities to train staff in the design ‘active travel’ schemes.
This would create a ‘national network of experts to work with communities, enhance high streets and make places truly walkable and cyclable for everyone’.
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Has the Government given up trying to save the high street? Ten years ago, it was one of the Coalition’s big ideas, combining what they thought was community populism with economic pragmatism. At the time, the online trade was only just beginning to make its presence fully felt and seemed less of an obstacle to the survival of physical shops than it does now, especially post-lockdown.
Mary Portas, the retail consultant, carried out an inquiry that found the shops and small businesses which provided the vibrant heart of any town were struggling. “Unless urgent action is taken much of Britain will lose, irretrievably, something that is fundamental to our society,” she concluded. In response, the then government announced dedicated “town teams” to manage high streets and a £10 million innovation fund “to bring life back to empty shops.” Yet the decline continues and is reaching crisis proportions.
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The Treasury’s former permanent secretary sacked by Kwasi Kwarteng has been given a top honour.
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The underlying cause is inadequate funding of our social care system. We must take issue with the claim by a Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson quoted in the report that the government is giving social care “the biggest funding increase in history” of “up to £7.5bn available over the next two years”.
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Details of a proposed mayoral devolution deal for the North East of England have been released.
Under the proposals, powers covering skills, transport and housing will be devolved, with the region due to receive funding worth £1.4bn over the next 30 years.
The new North East mayoral combined authority would cover Northumberland, Newcastle, North Tyneside, Gateshead, South Tyneside, Sunderland and County Durham.
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A temporary £2 cap on fares that the government hopes will reinvigorate some of England’s bus services starts on Sunday – but campaigners are already warning of more route cuts when the funding runs out.
The three-month “get around for £2” campaign, announced last month, will reduce single fares by more than 80% on some journeys, such as Plymouth to Exeter in the south-west, or Leeds to Scarborough.
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Rishi Sunak has shelved plans for a major overhaul of the childcare system aimed at saving parents money and helping them back into work.
Liz Truss had been looking at increasing free childcare support by 20 hours a week and ending mandated staff-child ratios in what her team described as a “big bang” shake-up of the system.
But The Telegraph understands the policy drive has been postponed indefinitely, with the scale of reforms now being considered expected to be much smaller.
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The Care Quality Commission (CQC) will delay the introduction of new adult care assessments as "providers continue to experience persistent pressures".
In an update yesterday the CQC said: "Our strategic ambition is clear and remains the same. We want to drive improvements across the health and care system, helping to tackle health inequalities. But we need to make sure that we’re able to do this as smoothly as possible, particularly as providers continue to experience persistent pressures. This means taking time to work in partnership with our stakeholders."
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The chief executive of troubled Slough Council is preparing to ask the Government for permission to increase council tax above the 5% legal limit.
Stephen Brown’s letter to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities is expected to ask for permission to levy a higher rate for the next two years without holding a referendum after senior councillors agreed.
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Teachers and social workers have experienced the worst pay growth in the UK in the last decade, which has seen public sector salaries falling significantly behind those in the private sector, according to research.
The years between 2010/11 and 2020/21 have been a “lost decade” for pay growth in the UK labour market, but new analysis tracking workers in different sectors over the period reveals some have fared considerably worse than others.
The median salary in the education sector has grown by just 4.3%, once adjusted for inflation, with only social work lagging even further behind with a 4.1% increase. For comparison, the median or typical worker saw pay grow by 15% over the same period.
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Children in temporary accommodation are living in cramped conditions and alongside former prisoners, in hostels up to 55 miles away from school, according to a leading housing charity.
One 16-year-old from Manchester, who is sharing a single room in an emergency B&B with her mother and two sisters, described having to study sitting on the toilet, her textbook propped on her knees, to revise for GCSEs. “It’s so cold in there my legs go numb after 10 minutes,” she said.
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Senior figures said the announcement in the final working days of December gave them little time to come up with the best solutions to tackle budget pressures.
There was also criticism that the deal had pushed too much onto council tax bills at a time of real hardship.
Patrick Melia, chief executive of Sunderland City Council said: "While providing some extra money is always welcome, this settlement still falls far short of what is required.
“This entirely avoidable delay in providing certainty increases financial risk and drives councils towards inefficient short-term focused decision-making.”
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The 2022 edition of CIPFA’s Resilience Index reveals that councils’ reserves have grown to £31bn, up from £29bn in 2020/21.
Of the £31bn of reserves, £27bn has already been earmarked for future use, leaving only £4bn unallocated.
Writing exclusively for The MJ, acting head of policy at CIPFA Joanne Pitt said councils are increasingly using their reserves to protect against further uncertainty.
She added: ‘It is worth noting that in the 2021/22 financial year, central government made grants to councils to be used over more than one year, which will also partly account for the increase in earmarked reserves for 2022/23.’
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Dragan Rajkovic, sustainability director for northern and eastern Europe at Tetra Pak, explains how the company will fund materials recovery facility (MRF) infrastructure changes to help local authorities begin collecting cartons at kerbside. Sponsored comment from Tetra Pak.
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The second round of the UK’s levelling-up fund has been delayed again until next year, it is reported. Councils had originally been told to apply for phase 2 of the £4.8 billion fund – intended to finance local capital projects – by 6 July, in the expectation of an allocation in October. Councils have now been told not to expect the announcement of successful bids until January. The LGA has estimated that the cost of applying to such funds amounted to an average of £30,000 per bid. Speaking to the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee’s Funding for Levelling Up inquiry last month, Cllr Kevin Bentley, Chairman of the LGA’s People and Places Board, said: “I just wonder how much money we spend filling out forms — and going literally backwards and forwards — that could go directly to people.”
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Almost 99% of the funding used to deliver the guaranteed 3% uplift in spending power will go to district councils, with more than half to those in the south east and east of England.
LGC analysis of data from the Department for Levelling up, Housing & Communities has found that of the £136m funding guarantee pot, just over £134.3m will go to districts. Wokingham BC and Rutland CC, the only unitaries to get a share, to receive £1.2m and £122,000 respectively. The remainder will go to fire authorities.
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Councils will see a 9% increase in core spending power in 2023-24, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has confirmed.
Today, the department published the provisional local government finance settlement, setting out its plans to fund local government, with tables indicating how much individual councils can expect.
This follows a policy paper released by DLUHC last week which set out its plans ahead of the publication of the provisional settlement.
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Concern over funding for districts has been voiced following the announcement of the provisional local government finance settlement for 2023-24.
The District Councils' Network has calculated the core spending increase for its members will be 5% - below the rate of inflation - if all authorities raised council tax to the maximum allowed without a referendum, compared to 9% for all councils.
It is expected to ask for the council tax referendum threshold to be increased from £5 to £10 to compensate in its consultation response.
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Local authorities that house child refugees who had to be removed from adult accommodation after being wrongly deemed adults are to be offered payment by the Home Office.
Councils have been spending thousands of pounds on emergency accommodation for such children. Brighton council recently had to find places for four unaccompanied refugees in 24 hours after concerns were raised at a Home Office hotel housing adults.
Hannah Allbrooke, the deputy council leader and chairwoman of its children and young people committee, said it was “incredibly tough” for the council to assess the ages of the children and suddenly move them.
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Officials have raised the risk level of school buildings collapsing to “very likely”, after an increase in serious structural issues being reported – especially in blocks built in the years 1945 to 1970.
England’s dilapidated school estate has been a cause of growing concern, but the dangers were laid bare in the Department for Education’s (DfE) annual report, which highlights school building safety as one of six key risks.
At time of publication there was no imminent risk to life, the report states by way of reassurance, but the situation was said to be “worsening”. As a result officials have escalated the risk level for school buildings collapsing from “critical – likely” to “critical – very likely”, with the issue now so urgent it is being overseen by a board of permanent secretaries from across government departments.
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The next Budget, setting out the government's tax and spending plans, will be held on 15 March 2023, the Treasury has announced.
In a statement, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said the Budget would also be accompanied by a forecast from the Office for Budget Responsibility.
The chancellor last set out his economic plans in November, including tax rises and a spending squeeze.
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Councils will be given a new legal duty to take the safety of women and girls into account with all new housing and planning projects.
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More than 130 bus operators outside London - including National Express and Stagecoach - will begin capping single adult fares at £2 next month as part of a government-funded scheme to help people save money.
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The Government is set to extend financial support on energy bills for British businesses by up to a year, it has been reported. The Government is expected to sign off on an extension of between six and 12 months for the energy bill relief scheme, which was introduced in October.
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Interest rates have been raised to 3.5 per cent from three per cent by the Bank of England, marking the ninth time in a row it has increased rates. The increase now sees UK interest rates at their highest level for 14 years as it battles to halt soaring prices. The rise will result in higher mortgage payments for some homeowners at a time when many are concerned about the rising cost of living.
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Local authorities should do more to promote support that is available for families, writes the children’s commissioner for England.
Family is central to all our lives, particularly children, for whom family is the prism through which the world is experienced. That is why I was so excited when the government commissioned me to conduct an independent family review, to explore what modern family looks like today.
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Leicestershire County Council has warned that it will have to cut around 250 posts over the next four years if it is to balance its budget.
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Councils have urged the Government to streamline ‘onerous’ guidance for an adult care fund that has been compared to a copy of War and Peace.
Local government experts have reacted with dismay to the huge list of bureaucratic grant conditions stretching over eight pages that must be met to secure the sector’s £200m share of the £500m Adult Social Care Discharge Fund (ASCDF), which the Government has designed to speed up hospital discharges.
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New Government plans to scrutinise council reserves have sparked fresh fears ministers are encouraging local authorities to ‘sail close to the wind’ with their finances.
A policy statement from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities launched on Monday – aimed at giving councils a steer on what to expect in next week’s provisional local government finance settlement – highlighted the growing levels of reserves held by councils.
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The local government finance policy statement is “not a panacea” for the difficult time that lies ahead for councils, CIPFA’s acting head of policy has said.
The statement from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC), released ahead of the local government finance settlement, outlined the plans for council finance in England over the next two years. It included measures to increase the Revenue Support Grant in line with the consumer price index and a 3% rise in local authorities’ core spending power.
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Some 239 schools and sixth form colleges have received funding to replace crumbling facilities, but critics say the cost will be enormous and classrooms are in a bad state due to "years of underfunding".
The schools and colleges named are in addition to 161 previously given the go-ahead by the Department for Education (DfE).
It means 400 out of a possible 500 projects have now been selected for overhauls, through the department's school rebuilding programme.
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Substantially fewer councils than predicted plan to increase council tax by the new maximum limit allowed next year, according to LGC research, as metropolitan boroughs warned they face an "impossible choice" between cutting services and raising tax on already hard-pressed residents.
The LGC council tax tracker has so far obtained 2023-24 council tax proposals for 48 councils. Of these more than a third (37%) are not currently planning to implement the maximum permitted rise for their authority.
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Research by the think tank concluded plans for delivering services will be partly covered by matching grants and business rates income to inflation.
A finance policy statement published in advance by Whitehall of the provisional local government settlement, pledged to increase the revenue support grant and business rates income by CPI inflation next year.
Economists at the IFS said the additional funding, combined with announcements in the Autumn Statement to increase council tax by up 5% and further support for social services, will result in an 8.8% cash-terms increase in 2023-24.
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The UK government is cutting the money it gives councils for helping Ukrainian refugees by almost half, blaming pressures on public finances.
Councils will receive £5,900 - down from £10,500 - for each Ukrainian refugee who arrives in their area.
The government said it faced tough decisions given the economic situation.
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The Bank of England has raised UK interest rates to their highest level for 14 years as it battles to stem soaring prices.
It increased them to 3.5% from 3%, marking the ninth time in a row it has hiked interest rates.
The rise will mean higher mortgage payments for some homeowners and those with loans at a time when many people are struggling with the cost of living.
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Price rises slowed last month but the cost of living remains close to its highest level for 40 years.
UK inflation, the rate at which prices rise, fell to 10.7% in the year to November from 11.1% in October.
The drop was due to petrol prices falling from record highs, but was offset by price rises for alcohol in restaurants, cafes and pubs.
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Fiscal devolution must be accompanied by reorganisation and growth incentives if councils are to become more than care providers, a sector expert has warned.
Addressing the All Party Parliamentary Group on Devolution this week, chief executive of the Centre for Cities think-tank, Andrew Carter, said devolution would be meaningful only if local authorities were given power over the likes of skills and transport.
He said: ‘Very clearly, incentives to pursue economic activity – that is to grow the tax base - will have to be given greater prominence.
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The Government has announced it will increase payments made to people who have opened their homes to Ukrainians fleeing ‘Putin’s appalling war’.
So-called thank you payments of £350 per month to hosts will be increased to £500 for guests who have been in the country for more than a year.
More than 100,000 Ukrainians have so far sought sanctuary in the UK through the Homes for Ukraine scheme.
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Districts are pushing the Government to allow them to increase council tax by more than 3% or £5 without a referendum.
The District Councils’ Network (DCN) has long believed the previous flexibility granted by ministers for their members to raise council tax by £5 is now ‘worthless to the vast majority’ of its members as this is less than 3% for only 30 local authorities and below inflation.
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Officers doing the ‘boring stuff’ are critical to ensuring money is not wasted and people can have faith in public services, writes the chief executive of Surrey CC.
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Almost a quarter of councils needed an extension to the deadline for paying council tax rebates to their residents to help with rising energy costs, the government has disclosed.
In October the deadline for distributing the £150 rebate to households in council tax bands A to D was extended by two months to 30 November.
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Downing Street has rejected calls to delay the implementation of the Government’s voter ID reforms. The LGA wants the changes to be postponed until after next May’s local elections. Cllr James Jamieson, LGA Chairman, said: “While we accept that voter ID has now been legislated for, electoral administrators and returning officers should be given the appropriate time, resource, clarity and detailed guidance to implement any changes to the electoral process without risking access to the vote. We are concerned that there is insufficient time to do this ahead of the May 2023 elections and for this reason are calling for the introduction of voter ID requirements to be delayed.”
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Ofsted’s Chief Inspector Amanda Spielman has said delays to support for children with special educational needs in England are an “acute concern”. Ofsted said half of councils inspected in the last school year had “significant weaknesses” in their special needs provision.
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Latest official figures from the Office for National Statistics show the UK recorded its second largest fall in real wage growth this year in October while the unemployment rate also rose.
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The government has confirmed that a long-awaited fair funding review and reset of business rates retention will not take place for at least two years.
The announcement, which follows similar comments from the local government minister in October, has been met with both disappointment and relief within different parts of local government.
First promised in 2016, the fair funding review is envisaged to create a fairer formula for the allocation of government funding. But it has been repeatedly delayed – as has a related reset of business rates retention to redistribute growth.
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Sector figures welcomed the certainty but highlighted underlying pressures after the government set out how it intends to fund local government over the next two years.
A policy paper setting out a two-year "blueprint" for local government spending was published yesterday, ahead of the publication of the provisional local government financial settlement later this month.
James Jamieson (Con), the chair of the LGA said: “It is good that councils have been given some of the certainty they need to set budgets next year and the increase in local government core spending power next year will help them deal with inflationary and other cost pressures.
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The body representing council directors of transport has expressed concerns that gritting services could be cut back in future years, as some local authorities prepare to do this.
Mark Kemp, chair of the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport, said that while he was not aware of many councils reducing their gritting routes this winter, there are concerns that this may happen in future.
“Following the autumn statement, it's not as widespread as we were originally thinking it might be,” he said. “[But] if we look at the way the government has set the budget, it gets worse when we get to years three, four, and five.
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The LGA has warned ministers that plans to force voters to present photo ID at polling stations for the first time in May must be delayed. It said there was not enough time to deal with all the risks that will be created by the new system. The plan will be voted on in Parliament this week. Cllr James Jamieson, LGA Chairman, said: “It is a fundamental part of the democratic process that elections can run smoothly and effectively, where every citizen is able to exercise their right to vote. While we accept that voter ID has now been legislated for, electoral administrators and returning officers should be given the appropriate time, resource, clarity and detailed guidance to implement any changes to the electoral process without risking access to the vote. We are concerned that there is insufficient time to do this ahead of the May 2023 elections, and for this reason are calling for the introduction of voter ID requirements to be delayed.”
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The lack of sufficient data on how much local authorities received from government grants makes it impossible to scrutinise the success of funding, Clive Betts, chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee has warned.
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The UK economy will get worse before it gets better, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has said after figures revealed it shrank further between August and October.
The economy contracted by 0.3% during the three months as soaring prices hit businesses and households and the UK is expected to be heading into recession.
He said: "These figures confirm that this is a very challenging economic situation here and across the world.
"And it will get worse before it gets better."
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The government is to discuss contingency plans for upcoming strikes, including using the military and civil servants to cover Border Force staff, at an emergency Cobra meeting later.
The armed forces will also be deployed to hospital trusts ahead of an ambulance strike, the government says.
But industrial action is still expected to cause major disruption.
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Spending on early years and higher education has been ‘seriously eroded’ by higher-than-expected inflation, financial experts have warned.
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More than 30 pubs, clubs, theatres and other venues at risk of closure have been placed in the hands of local people thanks to £6.67m of levelling up funding.
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The revenue support grant will rise in-line with inflation, the using the consumer price index (CPI) figure, as part of the core settlement for 2023-24, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has announced.
A policy paper setting out a two-year "blueprint" for local government spending was published this afternoon, ahead of the publication of the provisional local government financial settlement later this month.
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The government has allowed councils to keep ballooning deficits on spending for children with special educational needs and disabilities off their balance sheets for a further three years.
The government’s local government finance policy statement published today says that the statutory override for the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) will be extended for the next three years, from 2023-24 to 2025-26.
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A former levelling-up minister has warned that his former department’s bill will make the country’s housing crisis even worse.
Eddie Hughes MP, who was a minister for housing until September, said the Government must ensure that building affordable accommodation is helped rather than “hindered” by the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill’s reforms.
He has backed a report which highlights how the parts of the country most in need of affordable accommodation will in fact suffer as a result of the “infrastructure levy” that the bill proposes.
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Two Staffordshire councils facing budget shortfalls have agreed to share almost all their services.
Stafford Borough and Cannock Chase councils have shared several back-office services since 2011.
Councillors have now approved plans to join up all remaining services, apart from the running of elections and the council housing stock at Cannock Chase.
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Almost two thirds of councils in England are concerned they can’t recruit enough HGV drivers to drive gritters this winter, the LGA has warned. Government officials have said they expect local highways staff to have “sufficient contingency” operations in place throughout winter, but councils worry they’re unable to compete with private sector pay in a sector experiencing workforce shortages.
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Widespread delays in the completion of local government accounts are a “severe worry” and mean the sector cannot be sure more council failures will not emerge, the country’s most senior auditor has warned.
Yesterday it emerged only 12% of 2021-22 local authority accounts had been audited by the 30 November deadline with 630 still outstanding and 220 accounts from previous years still not signed off.
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Second home owners in Cornwall are set to be charged twice the normal rate of council tax under a proposal to give the local authority more powers to raise income from out-of-towners.
Councils would also be given powers to charge a 100 per cent council tax premium on people who leave their properties empty for one year or more.
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The rising backlog of historical council audits was a factor in continued late submission of local authority audit opinions, oversight body Public Sector Audit Appointments has said.
Only 12% of local government audits for 2021-22 were completed by the end of November, according to figures published today by PSAA.
This was only a small recovery on the 9% reported for the 2020-21 financial year, but the deadline for 2021-22 was two months later.
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The Department for Levelling up, Housing and Communities announced the proposed deals, for Suffolk and Norfolk, on Thursday that will “see money and power leave Whitehall” to directly elected leaders.
If approved, the deals would give Norfolk control of a £600m investment fund over 30 years, and Suffolk would receive £480m over the same period.
The deals will be dependent on both regions appointing a directly elected leader by April 2024 and subject to local consultation.
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A sustainable multi-year funding settlement is essential for helping local authorities support the arts, council chiefs say as report reveals a £2.4bn culture funding gap.
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It is “disappointing” that a flagship piece of education legislation has been dropped, the president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services has said.
The Schools Bill, which included measures to help with plans for all schools to join multi-academy trusts has encountered a number of issues since it was introduced earlier this year.
Education secretary Gillian Keegan has now confirmed that the legislation will not progress. However, Ms Keegan did reveal that parts of the government’s plan didn’t require legislation and would still be implemented including reforms to school funding in England.
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It is understood Baron Morse, who was appointed comptroller and auditor general in 2009 and served the full 10-year term, has been lined up to take on the chairmanship of the Government’s planned new Office for Local Government (Oflog).
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People are being advised to heat living rooms during the day and bedrooms before going to sleep as a cold spell hits the UK.
Health officials issued the advice to people who cannot heat every room or are struggling with heating costs.
Councils in England and Wales have stockpiled 1.4 million tonnes of salt to grit roads this winter, but many told the LGA they were struggling to recruit and retain gritter drivers.
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Worsening health in Britain has led the number of new disability benefit claims to double in the past year, according to a report.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies said claims for the personal independence payment (Pip) benefit had doubled to 30,000 a month between the summer of 2021 and July this year, with no sign of slowing.
Standing in stark contrast to years of relatively little change in the number of Pip awards made by the Department for Work and Pensions, it said the recent increase in recipients had taken place across medical conditions and ages, with the fastest rise among teenagers, where claim rates have tripled.
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The Government has approved plans to invest in a new £2.6 billion local development fund. The UK Shared Prosperity Fund, which succeeds EU structural funding, will be used by councils for initiatives to boost business and skills, regenerate high streets and improve local pride. Cllr Kevin Bentley, Chairman of the LGA’s People and Places Board said: “This vital funding and approval of investment plans is important recognition of local leadership in driving regeneration and transforming local places, which the LGA has consistently called for. The Government must now work with councils and combined authorities to overcome any additional local challenges caused by the delay and make the introduction of the fund a success.”
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The number of homeless Ukrainian refugees in England has risen by almost 30 per cent in a month, with 2,985 Ukrainian households presenting themselves as homeless to councils — up from 2,175 in October. This is placing significant strain on councils with a duty to ensure the refugees are housed. Councils are concerned there will be an increase in hosting arrangements ending in the coming months and thousands more Ukrainians will present as homeless. Cllr James Jamieson, LGA Chairman, said: “It is absolutely crucial that support to sponsors is enhanced as inflation and energy costs increase, so new or existing hosts are encouraged to sponsor in the longer term.”
[ more...]
Mandatory housebuilding targets have been scrapped by Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove, with targets only being “advisory” in a change to the Levelling-Up and Regeneration Bill. In another change to the Bill, councils will be allowed to introduce registration schemes for short-term holiday lets and there will be a consultation on allowing them to require a change of use planning application if there is a switch from residential to short-term “Airbnb-type” use.
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New government proposals mean employees will be given the right to ask for flexible working from their first day at a new job. The current laws says that workers have to wait for 26 weeks to seek flexible arrangements.
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Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) funds have reported a decline in value over the past quarter due to soaring inflation and “huge volatility” in the markets.
Over the last week, the pension funds of the London boroughs of Croydon, Hounslow and Westminster, plus Durham County Council, have all recorded that the value of their fund has decreased over the quarter to 30 September 2022.
The London Borough of Hounslow reported the highest decrease in the value of its pension fund at £114m, with the fund valuing £1.137bn at the end of September 2022. This is 9.1% lower than the fund’s value in March 2022 at £1.251bn.
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More than half of school leaders in England are seeing more pupils who cannot afford a meal at lunchtime yet are not eligible for free school meals, according to a survey.
Research by the Sutton Trust, an educational charity, found clear signs that the cost of living crisis was increasingly affecting young people’s education, with a growing number of pupils arriving at school tired, cold and hungry.
Nearly three-quarters (74%) of state school teachers who took part in the poll said they had seen an increase in the number of pupils who were tired or unable to concentrate, while more than half (54%) said more children were coming to school without adequate clothing, such as a warm winter coat.
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Emergency local council help for families in crisis has been slashed to just 98p per head, with one-quarter of authorities axing schemes altogether.
New research by poverty campaigners has exposed how badly funded and “chaotic” local welfare schemes are failing to reach residents in need, even as the cost of living crisis grows.
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A mayoral devolution deal for Cornwall has been agreed by ministers, and is now subject to local approval.
The provisional deal comes with an investment fund worth £360m over 30 years. If approved Cornwall will also directly elect a mayor who will sit as leader of the council.
With a population of 568,000 Cornwall’s investment fund is worth £634 per head. This is similar to the £660 per head deal announced for North Yorkshire and £593 per head for the East Midlands, which were both announced earlier this year.
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Recent guidance on severance pay gives CFOs a clearer role in finalising exit agreements.
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The government wants potential commissioners and inspectors to put themselves forward to help turn around failing councils in the next year.
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The Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) has launched a nine-month trial of a four-day week as it attempts to compete for talent.
CIPFA has traditionally struggled to offer salaries higher than the average salary for similar jobs.
An email by CIPFA’s company secretary and chief of staff Nicola Hannam, seen by The MJ, read: ‘Implementing a four-day week is a progressive, modern and positive change to improve work/life balance for our employees and ensure CIPFA is an attractive place to work.
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Somerset CC recently approached the government regarding a possible capitalisation directive for the new Somerset unitary due to launch on 1 April 2023.
But the county council now says it hopes to avoid this outcome, partly by dipping into reserves.
Last year, the government opted to reorganise all Somerset’s current five councils into a single unitary – backing the county council’s proposal for this over a rival two-unitary plan from the county’s districts.
A report to Somerset CC’s executive last month outlined the financial challenges facing the new council, with a £38.2m budget gap projected for 2023-24 even after current savings and income generation proposals are implemented.
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A dedicated group will be formed to provide advice to councils on how to streamline the information in their financial statements.
The move by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) to create a nine-member financial reporting hub comes weeks after the Financial Reporting Council raised fresh concerns about the timeliness of local audits in England.
Some in the sector believe shortening the length of council accounts and curbing CIPFA’s accounting code of practice will help restore timely financial reporting and audit.
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Local authority leaders today called for ‘clarity’ on the future of the delayed post-Brexit shared prosperity fund.
The Local Government Association (LGA) said councils urgently needed to know when they will receive their respective allocations from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF), which was introduced to replace the seven-year European Structural and Investment Fund.
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Tory governments have failed to cut the "catastrophic costs" of social care and should now look at an "insurance intervention", David Cameron has said.
The former prime minister told BBC News his government "looked at, but couldn't crack" the issue of people having to sell their homes in old age.
A cap on the amount people in England pay for their social care was due to be introduced in October 2023.
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Thurrock Council’s concentrated investment strategy was a failing that resulted in a £470m budget black hole, according to the official turnaround team.
The concentration of investments into one sector and the overstatement of their values were contributing factors to Thurrock Council’s huge funding gap, commissioners appointed to the authority have said.
A financial update report, the first since the government appointed Essex County Council as commissioners for the authority in September, outlined a £470m funding gap in 2022-23.
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A council has admitted a series of failed investments has led to a £469m budget black hole - one of the largest ever reported by a UK local authority.
In a report published on Tuesday, the Conservative-run Thurrock Council admitted £275m of taxpayers' money will be lost as a direct result.
The £469m funding gap is about three times the authority's annual budget.
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Town hall chiefs have reluctantly accepted a £1,925 pay increase for 2022 – a lower percentage increase than most staff.
A circular from the Joint Negotiating Committee (JNC) for Chief Executives of Local Authorities yesterday confirmed the individual basic salaries of all officers within scope should be increased by £1,925, backdated to April.
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MPs have heard fresh fears that the new Office for Local Government (Oflog) will lead to further centralisation.
Council chief executives have already privately expressed concerns that Oflog will lead to the creation of scorecards for councils and increased Government intervention.
Speaking to the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee, chairman of the Local Government Association’s people and places board, Kevin Bentley, said: ‘It feels like centralisation and another inspectorate for local government.
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A county council has threatened legal action against district authorities over funding for infrastructure.
Councillors at Gloucestershire CC heard at a meeting last week that funds from planning agreements for infrastructure such as schools and libraries, secured by lower-tier councils, had plummeted in recent years.
Officers have taken legal advice and suggested action against Stroud DC could form a ‘test case’.
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The NHS is having to pay back millions to families of seriously ill people who were wrongly charged for care. If someone is in care because of medical needs, the NHS is responsible for covering the cost, regardless of the individual’s wealth.
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Disabled care home residents are being evicted due to care charities and a number of local authorities being unable to agree on fees amidst soaring costs of care. Charity Leonard Cheshire said it had served 11 eviction notices on contracts that had been under negotiation without agreement since February.
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The most deprived councils will see the smallest uplifts in their core spending power as a result of the chancellor’s Autumn Statement, a report has warned.
A joint paper from The Institute for Government and CIPFA said that conversely the least deprived authorities – who typically finance more of their services through taxes – will see a greater increase in their core spending power.
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Ministers’ plan for implementing the recommendations of the children’s social care review has been delayed.
The independent review of children’s social care, which was published six months ago, called for a ‘total reset’ and made a wide range of recommendations for reform, which would cost more than £2bn.
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Over 65% of bids to the first round of the levelling up fund were unsuccessful, LGC analysis of new data shows.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has provided the Commons’ levelling up, housing and communities committee with a spreadsheet showing which councils applied for funding from the first round of the levelling up fund last year and whether they were successful.
Last year English councils put in 229 bids, most submitted one bid, but a handful put in more than one. The number of bids a council can submit is linked to how many parliamentary constituencies they cover.
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Over 65% of bids to the first round of the levelling up fund were unsuccessful, LGC analysis of new data shows.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has provided the Commons’ levelling up, housing and communities committee with a spreadsheet showing which councils applied for funding from the first round of the levelling up fund last year and whether they were successful.
Last year English councils put in 229 bids, most submitted one bid, but a handful put in more than one. The number of bids a council can submit is linked to how many parliamentary constituencies they cover.
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Rishi Sunak and Michael Gove are considering watering down their flagship planning bill in an attempt to head off a growing Tory revolt, rebels have claimed.
Downing Street officials, along with the Levelling Up Secretary and ministers have held a series of discussions with planning rebels in an attempt to reach a compromise, The Telegraph understands.
“The Government is making an effort to find where there is common ground,” a source involved in the discussions said. “There is no agreement yet, everyone is proceeding with caution.”
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The Government’s target of building 300,000 new homes this year will not be met, Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Michael Gove has confirmed. Mr Gove confirmed that delivering that many homes remains the Government’s ambition moving forward, but that rising costs and worker shortages will prevent them from hitting it this year.
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A new £1 billion fund will reportedly be announced by the Government next week, aimed at funding loft insulation, cavity wall insulation and smart heating controls. The new fund, named ‘eco plus’, is said to offer up to £15,000 in grants to people in council tax bands A to D, with the Government meeting 75 per cent of the cost of any upgrades.
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Land value capture mechanisms should be a key part of any fiscal devolution Greater Manchester CA secures as part of its trailblazer devolution deal, the mayor said this week.
Speaking at the LGC Summit in Manchester this week, Andy Burnham said Whitehall should give combined and local authority leaders, the powers “to go out and try and raise more” and suggested a “land value capture mechanism” could play an important part.
This means that when an infrastructure investment increases the value of land around it a proportion of that increase in value is returned to central government.
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Plans for an elected mayor in Cornwall could face a referendum in a bid to force the decision beyond county councillors.
A cross-party motion on the proposal will be debated by the council as the county revealed leader Linda Taylor was set to make a decision to accept a government devolution deal on a ‘minded to’ basis.
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Land value capture mechanisms should be a key part of any fiscal devolution Greater Manchester CA secures as part of its trailblazer devolution deal, the mayor said this week.
Speaking at the LGC Summit in Manchester this week, Andy Burnham said Whitehall should give combined and local authority leaders, the powers “to go out and try and raise more” and suggested a “land value capture mechanism” could play an important part.
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Councils and our communities deserved so much more than Jeremy Hunt had to offer, writes the local government finance spokesperson for the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives & Senior Managers.
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Progress on the Levelling Up & Regeneration Bill has been delayed after 47 Conservative MPs backed an amendment to scrap housebuilding targets.
The second day of the bill’s report stage on proposed planning reform - where potential changes are debated on the floor of the Commons before it is finalised - was due to take place next Monday.
But after former environment secretary, Theresa Villiers, tabled several amendments, including one that would make housebuilding targets "advisory" instead of mandatory, this was pulled. A new date has not been set.
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Despite being given additional power to raise council tax, and more money to provide adult social care services, a lack of long-term funding for local authorities in the Autumn Statement means that councils are “not out of the woods” and will have to make some difficult decisions, the chairman of the Local Government Association (LGA) has warned.
Prior to Jeremy Hunt’s statement on 17 November the LGA said that councils faced an “existential crisis”, with a £2.4bn shortfall in budgets due to inflation this year. The extra funding that councils will now have access to means, however, that the Autumn Statement proved “better than many of us councillors feared”, said James Jamieson, the chairman of the LGA and Conservative leader of Central Bedfordshire council.
The £3bn that will be made available to councils, said Jamieson, will be made up approximately equally of the additional funding for social care announced by the Chancellor, and the decision to allow local authorities to put council tax up by 5 per cent without the need for a local referendum.
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Government delays to fixing legal problems with its fraught public service pension reforms mean many scheme members have made life-changing decisions while in the dark about their consequences.
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The sector is braced for further section 114 notices after Croydon LBC this week issued its third financial alert since 2020 amid soaring debts.
Croydon’s latest s114 has been forced upon it by the authority’s historical debt – the south London borough owes some £1.6bn – while interest rates are at long-term highs.
The council is planning to renegotiate more than £400m of debts, which previously incurred lower interest rates.
Analysis by Croydon’s corporate director of resources and section 151 officer, Jane West, showed the council could end up paying around £60m in debt repayments: one-fifth of its net operating budget.
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Tens of thousands of homes are "not in the state they should be", Housing Secretary Michael Gove has said.
His comments come after a coroner ruled the death of toddler Awaab Ishak was caused by exposure to mould at home.
The government has since stripped the association involved, Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH), of £1m in expected funding.
Mr Gove said: "We are not giving money to organisations that are operating incompetently."
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The local government finance settlement is not expected until the week commencing 19 December, when school holidays have already started and many are already expecting to wind down for Christmas, LGC understands.
Last year the provisional settlement was published on Thursday 16 December and sources have told LGC they expect this year’s announcement to be even later.
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Tributes have poured in for one of the most influential local government academics of the 20th century after he died peacefully at home yesterday.
John Stewart, was a founder of Birmingham University’s Institute for Local Government, now known as Inlogov, in 1966 and ran it until the late 1990s.
During that time he taught many individuals who went on the become council chief executives and senior officers.
Announcing his passing, Henry Stewart said his father had died peacefully at home at the age of 93 on 23 November.
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The public sector has faced some extremely harsh challenges over the past few years. When the Covid-19 pandemic hit, local authorities had already been dealing with long-term funding challenges, coupled with rising demand for public services.
Now, as the pandemic recedes, soaring inflation and the energy crisis have left local authorities even more stretched.
The situation is not being helped by the government’s lack of a coherent economic vision and fears that savings will need to be made by public sector services.
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Michael Gove has admitted that 90 authorities submitted investment zones bids before the government changed direction and decided not to take any forward.
County councils and combined authorities were given a short window to submit expressions of interest during Liz Truss’s premiership, when Simon Clarke was levelling up secretary.
New prime minister Rishi Sunak brought Michael Gove back as levelling up secretary and last week’s autumn statement confirmed that the policy was being rethought and no bids would be taken forward.
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A leisure centre chain has said the rising cost of living is forcing it to reduce its opening hours with a "temporary winter programme".
Better Leisure, which runs 268 centres across the UK, said its energy costs had more than tripled since 2019.
The charitable social enterprise said it was not sustainable after the "recent struggles" of the pandemic.
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Local authorities across England could be owed at least £9.3m from unclaimed costs after property damage alone in the past five years, research by loss recovery firm Corclaim has revealed.
A freedom of information request to all 332 local authorities in England showed that between 2017 and 2022, an estimated £91m was spent repairing council-owned property that had been damaged by vehicles in more than 171,000 incidents – 60% of which was not recovered through either insurance policies or uninsured loss recovery (ULR) methods.
ULR is the process of recapturing costs and expenses – such as repairs, policy excess and other associated costs – that may be incurred if council-owned property has been involved in an incident that was not the fault of the local authority or its employees.
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Glasgow is the UK’s least green city, according to scientists, with Middlesborough, Sheffield, Liverpool and Leeds also in the bottom five.
In contrast, Exeter is the British city with the most green space, beating Islington, Bristol, Bournemouth and Cambridge to claim the top spot as Britain's greenest urban area.
Scientists from the University of Sheffield and Flinders University in Australia factored in tree cover and amount of vegetation as well as public green spaces such as parks and sports pitches in 68 city centres that were home to more than 100,000 people around the UK.
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Second home-owners in North Yorkshire will pay twice as much council tax once powers in the Levelling Up Bill are put into law, in a move the council has said could prove “transformational” for the area’s housing situation.
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The proportion of young people experiencing mental health issues has nearly doubled in just over a decade, a new report suggests.
More than four in 10 young people were above the threshold for "probable mental ill health", indicating high levels of psychological distress.
The study's 44% finding is up from 23% on a similar 2007 study and suggests a decline in the mental health and wellbeing of young people has likely been accelerated by the pandemic, researchers said.
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Rishi Sunak is facing a rebellion of about 50 MPs who are demanding an end to housebuilding targets for councils, via an amendment which campaigners say would further hinder affordable homes.
The amendment, led by the former cabinet minister Theresa Villiers, has backing from 46 MPs who have signed the bid to scrap mandatory local housing targets and make them advisory only.
The government is now set to pull the vote on the bill on Monday amid a standoff with rebels and promising further engagement on their concerns, though officially ministers say the vote has been delayed because of time pressures from the finance bill.
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The government has commissioned a review of the council tax system, the levelling up secretary has said.
Appearing before the Commons’ levelling up, housing & communities select committee yesterday, Michael Gove said he and chancellor Jeremy Hunt have asked local government finance minister Lee Rowley to review the operation of the council tax system.
Mr Gove told MPs that council tax is the “second most unpopular tax in the country”. He added that no one in government “would want council taxpayers to pay any more than is necessary for the provision of services”.
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The leader of Herefordshire Council yesterday wrote to the PM warning the local authority will have to make ‘difficult decisions’ about what services to cut to close a budget gap of more than £22m.
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Community libraries are seeing an "unprecedented" rise in the number of people using their services, but soaring costs could force some to make "drastic cuts" and even shut next year, according to a charity. Libraries Connected says many of its members have expanded their services to help people struggling with higher prices, but that some libraries are now considering cutting staff, services and the number of books they stock, with some even contemplating closure. The LGA said to save libraries, councils would require "adequate funding, in line with inflation and the demand for services". Cllr Gerald Vernon-Jackson, Chair of the LGA’s Culture, Tourism and Sport Board, said: “No council wants to reduce library services, but the dramatic increase in inflation alongside increases to the National Living Wage and higher energy costs has added at least £2.4 billion in extra costs onto the budgets councils set in March this year.”
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Steve Barclay has defended the delay to a cap on care costs in England, saying it will allow more funding for social care. The Health and Social Care Secretary said the delay to the plans, under which people would have paid no more than £86,000 towards their personal care during their lifetime, was a "difficult decision" but the Government was committed to the reforms.
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A woman struggling to pay for her husband's care has criticised the Government's plan to delay social care reforms, including the care cost cap, in the Autumn Statement. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said money earmarked for reforms so far would go to councils to pay for more care packages. In a briefing on the Autumn Statement, the LGA said it is good that councils can still use that funding to meet inflationary pressures but warned that it falls short of the £13 billion needed to stabilise and improve social care services.
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Local authorities in Devon, Cornwall, Norfolk, the Lake District and Yorkshire are among those reportedly planning to increase the council tax paid by people with second homes in the area but who do not live there permanently as soon as new legislation is passed by the Government.
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Since the end of the pandemic, the NHS’s ability to discharge such patients has “collapsed”, an in-depth feature concludes. Latest figures show that patients in 21,770 NHS beds “no longer meet the criteria to reside”. But of those, only 8,196 have been able to leave hospital. The feature explores the pressures facing social care, including a 55 per cent increase in unfilled vacancies.
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Retailers with bricks-and-mortar stores will pay significantly lower business rates, while operators of large warehouse and logistics facilities will see their bills increase, following a revaluation of commercial properties announced alongside the Autumn Statement. Shops will also benefit more quickly from any rate reductions after the Chancellor scrapped downwards transitional relief in England. This has seen lower bills phased in over three years and is a change expected to cost the Government £1.6 billion.
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Forty-one councils from across England are to receive a multi-million-pound boost to help them transform derelict land into new houses.
The £35m of funding, announced on Saturday by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC), will be drawn from the £180m Brownfield Land Release Fund 2.
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The roll-out of the £500m social care discharge fund is “too little, too late” as the sector approaches the winter, the president of the Association of Directors of Adults’ Social Care has said.
Speaking to LGC, Sarah McClinton, said that Adass had been calling for further funding for social care to help it get through the winter since July.
Last week the government announced that councils would received £200m of the £500m fund and that it would be distributed in the coming weeks.
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A cap on the cost of adult social care in England has been delayed for two years, with the move expected to save £1 billion in 2023, the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has announced. In his Autumn Budget, Mr Hunt said that due to the increasing number of over-80s in the system, there is a “massive pressure” on services and a fear that the cap cannot be delivered in the near future. LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson, said: “The Government needs to use the delay announced today to ensure that funding and support is in place for councils and providers so the reforms can be implemented successfully.”
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State schools in England are set to receive a funding boost of £2.3 billion a year for the next two years, according to the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt. In his Autumn Statement, Mr Hunt unveiled what the Treasury described as an “average cash increase for every pupil of more than £1,000 by 2024/25”, meeting a previous pledge of bringing core schools funding for students up to the age of 16 back to 2010 levels in real terms.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s Autumn Statement, which introduced additional funding for social care and a delay to charging reforms, has been described by local government finance leaders as “better than expected”.
In his statement to the House of Commons on 17 November, Hunt promised to prioritise “stability, growth and public services”. He chose to address inflationary pressures facing local authorities by committing up to £2.8bn of additional funding for adult social care in 2023/24 and £4.7bn for the following year.
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Jeremy Hunt sent a welcome strong signal to the markets but has not fixed any of the major problems facing the public sector, according to CIPFA chief executive Rob Whiteman.
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Increasing council tax bills next April will hit struggling residents, fail to lift the pressure on cash-strapped local authorities and will not prevent more cuts to key services, from social care to waste collection and libraries, local government leaders have said.
Average council tax bills could rise by as much as £100, to more than £2,000 for households in band D, from April, after the chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, confirmed in the autumn statement that the cap on how much local authorities could raise rates would be relaxed.
Higher council tax bills will be expected to part-finance a planned cash injection for adult social care budgets of up to £7.5bn over the next two years, an announcement welcomed as a recognition by the government of the crisis engulfing the sector, but offering it only short-term respite.
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State schools in England will receive a funding boost of £2.3bn a year for the next two years, Jeremy Hunt has announced, with the Treasury saying the extra funds amount to an “avera??ge cash increase for every pupil of more than £1,000 by 2024-25” compared with last year.
The extra cash would see core schools funding rise from £53.8bn this year to £58.8bn by 2025, meeting a previous pledge by the government to restore funding for pupils up to the age of 16 back to 2010 levels in real terms.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies noted that the extra money was funded “in large part by recycling £5bn previously earmarked for increasing overseas aid spending”. The £2.3bn also includes £300m that the Treasury will no longer claw back from schools, after being budgeted for the planned rise in national insurance that was reversed earlier this year.?
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A flagship cap on the cost of social care has been delayed for two years, Jeremy Hunt confirmed today.
The measure, which was due to come into effect next October, would limit the amount anyone will have to pay for care in later life to £86,000.
It would drastically reduce the pressure on people to sell homes that could have otherwise been inherited by family.
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The absence of any mention of public sector pay deals in Jeremy Hunt’s Autumn Statement leave disputes in the same position as before, with many public services facing crises and strike action, unions have warned.
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But there’s a critical issue that wasn’t talked about and many of the government’s problems won’t get better until they do.
Most children are told that if you’re lost, ask a police officer for help.
According to the Police Federation, the British population has gone up by the same number of people as live in Wales – roughly 5 million.
The UK census data shows a country that’s changed and increased demand on services as a result.
But the government’s announcements have yet to match that reality. The missing figures are people.
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Higher borrowing costs and spiralling inflation amid weaker economic growth mean public finances have “materially worsened” since March, the Office for Budget Responsibility has said.
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Senior local government figures have warned flexibility over powers to set council tax will not be enough to tackle rising inflationary and demand pressures, following the chancellor's autumn statement this morning.
Jeremy Hunt announced a raft of measures in parliament this morning, including giving councils more flexibility over setting council tax rates as part of additional £2.8bn for adults’ social care.
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Analysis by the LGA warns that councils are facing a £3.4 billion gap in the next financial year and would need to increase council tax by 20 per cent over the next two years to address the funding shortfall, which it said is neither "sustainable nor desirable". It comes amid growing reports that the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt will increase council tax referendum limits. Ahead of tomorrow's Autumn Statement the LGA said council tax is not the answer to the funding crisis facing councils, which will have to make "significant cuts" without adequate funding. LGA Chairman, Cllr James Jamieson said: "Local government remains the fabric of our country but many of the vital services we provide face an existential crisis.”
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Inflation has risen to a 41-year high of 11.1 per cent, led by the latest rise in energy bills. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said the increase, from 10.1 per cent in September rose further despite the Government's energy price guarantee.
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Ministers should consider scrapping the final round of the Levelling up Fund and use the money to provide funding to current projects that risk being cut because of inflation, an expert has told MPs.
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Mr Hunt is thought to be seriously considering allowing council tax to increase by around 5% without the need for a referendum.
The Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities (Sigoma) today warned that although this could raise £1.4bn for social care authorities, there will be significant variation across the county. The analysis is based on last year’s settlement and excludes combined authorities and the Greater London Authority.
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Ministers should implement the 2013-14 funding formula which promised to improve rural finances before measures were dampened or risk losing key countryside services, experts have argued.
Speaking to The MJ, Graham Biggs, chief executive of the Rural Services Network, said he feared many discretionary services in rural areas could be lost if the Treasury announces fresh austerity measures in the Autumn Statement without acknowledging its initial plan to improve rural finances eight years ago.
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Local government has asked Whitehall to reprofile cash from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF), allowing greater flexibility over when money is spent following delays to allocations.
Ministers at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) have still not signed-off the first tranche of cash from the three-year £2.6bn UKSPF – a central pillar of the Government’s levelling up agenda.
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The Autumn Statement will herald tough times for public services as they struggle with high inflation, increasing demand and constrained funding, CIPFA chief executive Rob Whiteman has said.
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Jeremy Hunt’s much-trailed “difficult decisions” have led to real-terms cuts to public investment and seemingly very little for local government and most other services as interest payments eat into the public finances.
In a lengthy Autumn Statement in Parliament, the chancellor announced £25bn of tax rises and £30bn of spending cuts in order to comply with his fiscal rule that compels him to show debt will fall as a percentage of GDP within five years.
Attempting to distance the new government from that run (briefly) by Liz Truss and her (even more brief) chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng, he has sharply brought the government’s tax and spending plans back towards the pre-pandemic, austere, norm.
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Higher borrowing costs and spiralling inflation amid weaker economic growth mean public finances have “materially worsened” since March, the Office for Budget Responsibility has said.
Support packages announced earlier this year, including council tax rebates and the energy unit price cap, will increase borrowing by £64.2bn compared to forecasts in March, the OBR said in a report accompanying the Autumn Statement.
As a result, the deficit is forecast to hit £177bn this year – equal to 7.1% of GDP, a 32% rise on the £133.3bn recorded in 2021-22 (5.7% of GDP), the OBR said.
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Until the centre understands the reality of how public services actually work in reality, the cycle of crisis and cuts will continue.
But there’s a critical issue that wasn’t talked about and many of the government’s problems won’t get better until they do.
Most children are told that if you’re lost, ask a police officer for help.
According to the Police Federation, the British population has gone up by the same number of people as live in Wales – roughly 5 million. The UK census data shows a country that’s changed and increased demand on services as a result.
But the government’s announcements have yet to match that reality. The missing figures are people.
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Rishi Sunak is being warned that a council tax hike of 20% would be needed to address the "existential crisis" facing key services.
An analysis by the Local Government Association claims councils across the country are facing a £3.4billion funding shortfall in the next financial year.
A snap survey of local authorities also reveals all councils that responded said they are facing additional cost pressures from inflation and surging energy bills.
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Council tax will surge past £2,000 for the average household under plans drawn up by Rishi Sunak.
The Prime Minister and Jeremy Hunt, the Chancellor, are preparing to allow town halls to put up the levy by five per cent without a local referendum.
The move would mean millions of households in Band D face paying up to £100 extra, which would take their annual bills above £2,000 for the first time.
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Rishi Sunak will announce a significant rise in the national living wage and give eight million households cost of living payments worth up to £1,100 as he prioritises support for the poorest over universal measures.
The Times has been told that the prime minister and Jeremy Hunt, his chancellor, will accept an official recommendation to increase the living wage from £9.50 an hour to about £10.40 an hour — a rise of nearly 10 per cent. The move will benefit 2.5 million people. One government source suggested that the increase could be even higher.
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The majority of councils do not have the funding or staff to meet the care needs of older and disabled people this winter, a new survey has warned today.
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An inquiry into funding for levelling up has heard ‘left behind’ areas are at risk of losing out.
The Levelling Up Fund and other pots based on a bidding process risked allocating money according to areas’ ability to bid instead of their need, experts have told the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee.
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Campaigners have warned the chancellor that the country ‘cannot afford’ to lose more bus routes and called for more cash support, including targeted funding for councils that missed out on recent funding to improve bus services.
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October got off to a blustery start for the Conservative Party. Reeling from the blow of a mini-budget that spooked the markets, ushering in the prospect of budget cuts, the party’s annual conference in Birmingham was a chaotic affair.
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The Government has “abandoned” the social care sector by delaying a key Conservative manifesto policy to cap care costs until after the next general election, the head of the National Care Association has said.
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There has been a higher than expected leap in the rate of inflation, to a 41-year high of 11.1% last month, led by the latest rise in energy bills.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) revealed the increase, from 10.1% in September, as the cost of light and heating for homes rose further despite help from the government's energy price guarantee that limits wholesale charges for gas and power.
Food was cited as the other major element adding inflationary pressure during October, rising at the fastest annual pace since 1977.
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Proposals to let councils impose further increases in council tax next year are now “more likely than not”, as Jeremy Hunt looks for ways to ease inflationary pressures on social care. The Chancellor is understood to back increasing the amount that councils are able to increase bills each year to pay for care home places and home help.
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Analysis shows that as many as one in three hospital beds in parts of England are occupied by patients who are well enough to be discharged, with a chronic lack of social care meaning many do not have suitable places to go.
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Many public sector services are in crisis and have very little fat left to trim, writes the local government policy manager at the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy.
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Hampshire and Kent CC leaders have said they will be forced to issue Section 114 notices within two years without immediate financial assistance from the Government.
In a letter to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, Hampshire’s Rob Humby and Roger Gough of Kent laid out the challenges facing upper tier authorities.
With no fair funding review or two-year settlement, council tax and business rates are insufficient to keep pace with growing demand in adult’s and children’s social care, it warns.
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The number of children with mental health problems being seen by social workers has reached record levels, new analysis has revealed.
The figures, published by the Local Government Association (LGA), found the number of children needing help with mental health issued has increased from 57,410 in 2018 to 87,750 in 2022.
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Campaigners have warned of a “national child protection emergency” in England with vulnerable and disturbed children languishing for months in unsuitable placements while social workers attempt to find them secure homes.
According to figures obtained from the Department for Education after a freedom of information request, the average time a child who has been deprived of their liberty for their own protection will spend waiting for a secure placement is currently 65 days. In the two years to 19 October, the longest time a child had to wait for a secure placement was 211 days.
The DfE said there were just 128 beds in 13 secure children’s homes in England available to local authorities, who hold the statutory duty to care for and protect children who have been assessed as needing this type of specialist home.
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Jeremy Hunt will unveil his long-awaited Autumn Statement on Thursday, which he has confirmed will include tax rises and spending cuts.
The Chancellor has admitted “we will be asking everyone for sacrifices” as he said everyone will have to pay higher taxes to get the country’s finances back on track.
He hopes the measures will bring down inflation, control soaring energy prices and “get our way back to growing healthily”.
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The UK has changed prime minister twice this year, leading to a backlog of legislation waiting to get through Parliament. Some long-planned new laws - containing key government promises - are unlikely to make it and others could be watered down.
Of the 33 bills included in May's Queen's Speech - when Boris Johnson's government set out its plans for the year ahead - eight are yet to be introduced in Parliament at all.
Bills in May's Queen's Speech:
Not introduced: 8
Less than halfway through Parliament: 15
More than halfway through Parliament: 8
Finished all parliamentary stages: 2
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The UK appears to be heading into recession after the latest official figures showed the economy shrank between July and September.
The economy contracted by 0.2% during the three months as soaring prices hit businesses and households.
A country is in recession when its economy shrinks for two three-month periods in a row. The UK is expected to be in one by the end of the year.
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The LGA has called for hosts in the Homes for Ukraine scheme to be given an additional payment to help with the cost of living, as concerns are expressed about a growing number of Ukrainian refugees presenting to their local council as homeless. The number of refugee households at risk of homelessness jumped 22 per cent between August and September, from 1,565 to 1,915, and another 14 per cent in October. Of those, 70 per cent had dependent children. Cllr James Jamieson, Chairman of the LGA said, “Lots of hosts have been very generous. But it’s costing them money. The data says that 75 per cent of sponsors are willing to carry on, but anecdotally that number is going down.”
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Three out of five drivers believe the condition of local roads has deteriorated in the past year, a survey by the RAC has found. Just 4 per cent of the 3,102 motorists polled for the RAC said the roads in their area have improved. Cllr David Renard, Transport spokesman for the LGA said: “Despite the efforts of councils, which repair a pothole every 19 seconds, our local roads repair backlog is rising, with latest estimates showing it would take over £12 billion and 10 years to clear. Councils across the country are facing unprecedented increased costs to repair our local roads, keep our street lights switched on and invest in improved local infrastructure.”
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The Government is planning to cut spending with reductions in budgets for schools, policing, transport and councils in the upcoming Autumn Statement, it has been reported. Reports suggest that the Government intends to slow increases in spending after 2025 from the planned 3.7 per cent to 1 per cent, leading to reductions in funding for non-protected spending areas.
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Speculation is growing that Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is considering lifting the 2.99 per cent limit on increases in council tax without holding a referendum, and has even discussed the possibility of the threshold being removed entirely. The LGA has warned that council tax income would need to rise “well over 10 per cent” if funding gaps are to be met by tax rises alone, which would be “neither sustainable nor desirable given the current cost of living crisis”. It said councils are already facing a £2.4 billion gap in their budgets this year since they were set in March, due to inflation and rising minimum wage. An LGA spokesperson said: “While council tax is an important funding stream, it has never been the solution to the long-term pressures facing councils.”
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Six in 10 drivers believe the condition of the local roads they use regularly is worse than a year ago, with almost as many (55%) saying the standard of pothole repairs is ‘poor’, according to the latest RAC annual survey.
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Council chiefs warn ‘everything is on the table’ when it comes to cuts as poll reveals only one in five of England’s county councils are confident of setting a balanced budget next year.
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Today, ahead of next week’s Autumn Statement, the County Councils Network (CCN) has released new research showing that only one in five of England’s largest councils are confident they can meet their legal obligation of setting a balanced budget next year, with a new survey revealing the extent of planned service reductions due to soaring inflationary pressures.
CCN is warning that ‘everything is on the table’ in reducing local services if the Chancellor does not spare councils from further cuts and provide more funding for local government in Thursday’s Autumn Statement as they grapple with £3.5bn of additional costs this year and next.
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Library professionals doubt councils doubling-up their buildings as ‘warm spaces’ this winter will save them from closure with spending cuts widely expected. Many councils have decide to open public buildings - mainly libraries - to people who are unable to afford to heat their homes.
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Britain is in the grip of a mental health crisis that is causing workers to drop out of the labour market and fuelling staff shortages.
The number of people neither working nor seeking work has ballooned since the pandemic to almost nine million.
Figures analysed by Sky News show that this is being driven by long-term sickness and, in particular, mental health conditions.
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The worsening health of the British people is holding back economic growth for the first time since the Industrial Revolution after years of underinvestment in services, Andy Haldane has warned.
The chief executive of the Royal Society of Arts (RSA) said more than a century of progress on health and wellbeing was going into reverse, with a direct impact on the economy and the cost of living emergency.
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Rishi Sunak’s government has been warned that Britain’s creaking public services will require at least £43bn a year in additional funding just to “stand still” amid the fallout from soaring inflation.
The Trades Union Congress said next week’s autumn statement needed to protect both public services and workers’ pay from the highest rates of inflation since the early 1980s to avoid a further collapse in the quality of support for health, social care, education, justice, and the environment.
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Rishi Sunak is imposing a further delay to a cap on care costs after suggesting that the policy be kicked into the long grass to avoid deeper cuts being made elsewhere.
Boris Johnson’s social care policy will not now be introduced before 2025. Some officials believe that such a delay will be a way to kill it off.
The prime minister is understood to have suggested an “indefinite” delay last week, but accepted an initial postponement of two years after being warned that explicitly scrapping the policy would be politically damaging.
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Higher demand in the wake of Covid-19, combined with pay rises and higher costs because of inflation have piled pressure on already-squeezed local authority budgets, Chris Munday, chair of Association of Directors of Children's Services resources and sustainability policy committee said.
About half of councils have already needed exceptional government support to manage overspends in their special educational needs budgets.
And the sector fears further funding cuts in the upcoming Autumn Statement, ahead of which chancellor Jeremy Hunt has repeatedly warned of upcoming “difficult decisions”.
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Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt are weighing up plans that would increase council tax and pull more people into the top rate of income tax as they “think the unthinkable” to balance the books.
The prime minister and his chancellor are expected in next week’s budget to prioritise increasing benefits and pensions in line with inflation, which will cost £11 billion next year.
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MPs from the Home Affairs select committee have visited the Manston immigration processing centre in Kent, amid concerns about conditions and overcrowding.
The Home Office says the situation there has improved, although the MPs said they’d seen families who had been sleeping on the floor for weeks.
Rishi Sunak, who met the French president yesterday, says the two countries are in the “final stages” of a deal to tackle illegal migration across the channel.
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Benefit fraud is running at record levels, MPs warn today, part of an “eye-watering” £8.5 billion of overpaid benefits last year.
The Department of Work and Pensions has been accused of a “complacent attitude” towards taxpayers’ money after saying fraudulent claims were rising because Britain was becoming more dishonest.
The Public Accounts Committee says the government has no clear plan to deal with “unacceptably high” levels of benefit fraud and urges ministers to set firm targets for reducing it.
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Victims are being let down by an “ineffective” system which has failed to retrieve billions of pounds from criminals, a review has found.
The Law Commission called for a complete overhaul of the procedures used to recover the proceeds of crime, recommending tougher court powers to enforce confiscation orders.
It concluded the current method of recouping criminal gains under the Proceeds of Crime Act was “inefficient, complex and ineffective” and enforcement was “weak”, leading to an outstanding debt of more than £2 billion in unrecovered funds as of March last year, failing victims as a result.
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Whitehall officials are not expecting returning local government secretary Michael Gove to make changes to next year’s referendum limit for council tax rises, The MJ understands.
The Local Government Association (LGA) accepts that increasing council tax beyond current limits will be hard in the current economic climate but has argued democratically-elected councillors should be allowed to make such decisions.
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The Government should improve the way transport projects are funded as the current system of local authorities bidding for capital funding is 'costly and inefficient', according to a new report.
The Built Environment Committee has warned 'wasteful' bidding processes, cuts to bus services and inadequate transport planning processes are hindering the delivery of high-quality public transport services outside London.
The report calls on the Government to move towards a system of periodic block grants to encourage more coherent and long-term transport delivery.
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Newcomer to the department Lucy Frazer has been appointed minister for housing and planning.
Felicity Buchan, another Sunak appointee, takes over the junior ministerial role for housing and homelessness from Lee Rowley, who has been given the portfolio for local government and building safety.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook retains the brief for faith and communities she held under Ms Truss while fellow survivor of the change in Prime Minister, Dehenna Davison, also continues as junior minister for levelling up.
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A survey of more than 11,000 school leaders in England by the NAHT union has found the majority of schools face having to lay off staff or reduce hours to stay afloat. It found more than 9 in 10 schools won’t be able to balance the books without drastic cuts. Cllr Louise Gittins, Chair of the LGA's Children and Young People Board, said: “Many schools have been raising concerns about their financial stability with councils as the rising costs of fuel, energy and food for school meals have an impact, alongside the need to fund agreed pay rises, including for teachers. At the same time, councils and local services are facing massive financial challenges, following the sharp rise in inflation.”
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Rishi Sunak is reportedly expected to increase pensions and benefits in line with inflation in an effort to ensure the Autumn Statement is seen as “fair and compassionate”. The Government is also expected to freeze the “nil rate band” of inheritance tax – the rate at which people start paying the levy – for another two years until 2028.
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The latest plans for a major shake-up of parliamentary constituencies across the UK have been revealed. The Boundary Commission is changing the number of seats meaning England will get 10 more, while Scotland and Wales will have fewer.
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The majority of schools face having to lay off staff or slash hours in a desperate bid to stay afloat.
A survey of more than 11,000 school leaders in England by the NAHT union laid bare the brutal cuts that schools are grappling with in the face of rising costs and funding cuts.
Two thirds (66%) of heads warn they will have to sack teaching assistants or reduce their hours, while half (50%) are looking at reducing the number of teachers or teaching hours.
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Councils have paid out more than £32 million in compensation to people injured by potholes in the past five years.
Local authorities in England and Wales have been forced to settle thousands of personal injury claims to cyclists and other road users injured by defective surfaces, newly disclosed figures show.
In total, 157 councils in England and Wales who responded to a freedom of information request settled 5,596 personal injury claims due to potholes between 2017 and 2021. The total compensation bill comes to £32,153,190 — an average of £5,746 per case.
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Low investor confidence in the UK and the need to direct domestic money to development projects mean the UK Infrastructure Bank wants to work “much harder” to bring sources of public finance together, including Local Government Pension Scheme pools.
The bank opened in June 2021, and was set up with the aim of investing in green ‘levelling up’ projects, backed with £22bn from central government comprising £12bn of equity and the ability to issue £10bn of guarantees.
This investment is hoped to encourage large investment from other sources, both public and private, into development-boosting UK infrastructure.
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Fears of piling more pressure onto residents during the cost-of-living crisis have led Leicester City Council to scrap a proposed levy on workplace parking, but the council has warned that doing so will leave its transport services struggling.
The authority in 2019 proposed a workplace parking levy that would have placed an annual charge for employers with staff who park in the city, to fund the delivery of transport improvements.
A consultation launched by the council earlier this year said that alongside reducing congestion, the levy could (along with “leveraged funding from the government and other sources”) help to finance up to £450m over a decade to invest in transport services.
However, the council has shelved the proposals after the majority of respondents said the extra tax would not be appropriate given the cost-of-living crisis.
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It is reported that most of the estimated £55 billion shortfall in the public finances would be met by making deep cuts to services. Treasury sources suggest Prime Minister Rishi Sunak plans to cut £33 billion by 2027/28 while raising £21 billion from taxes. Early drafts of the Autumn Statement, to be delivered on November 17, are said to be being presented to the Office for Budget Responsibility today.
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Nurses are set to strike in the first ever national action over a pay dispute. The exact nature of the strike action is not yet known, but the Royal College of Nursing is campaigning for a pay rise of 5 per cent above inflation.
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The plan could allow local authorities to impose the first double-digit hikes in council tax for more than ten years. The cap that prevents council tax from being raised by more than two per cent a year without a local referendum could reportedly be relaxed by Chancellor Jeremy Hunt. The Government are looking to find around £50 billion in tax rises and spending cuts ahead of the Autumn Statement. It is reported that government could give councils greater tax rising powers to bring in money to compensate for government spending cuts. The LGA has warned ministers that councils already face a £3.4 billion funding gap next year to “maintain services at pre-Covid levels.” It said council tax would need to rise by more than 10 per cent just to plug that gap, which would be neither “sustainable or desirable.”
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The Treasury will this week submit plans to cut the deficit by as much as £60bn – more than previously thought necessary – to the UK’s budget watchdog, i understands.
Jeremy Hunt is set to cut spending by more than he increases taxes in next week’s Autumn Statement after Cabinet colleagues warned that tax hikes can only be a “last resort”.
But the Chancellor is also under pressure from senior Conservatives to limit public spending cuts as much as possible.
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Councils and campaigners are concerned that funding to repair potholes could be reduced as the Government look to make spending cuts across all departments in this year’s Autumn Statement. The Pothole Repair Fund was set up to deliver £2.5 billion to councils between 2020-21 and 2024-25 to tackle the backlog of roads across the country that the AA confirmed are in an “awful state.” Cllr David Renard, transport spokesperson for the LGA, warned that the cost of filling potholes has already risen by around 25 per cent due to higher costs of production materials. He said: “The Government should meet these increased costs in the upcoming Autumn Statement, otherwise they risk the current pothole repair backlog growing even longer and councils being forced to cut back on essential road repairs.”
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Leisure services are expected to be reduced or lost entirely in 40 per cent of council areas before the end of March 2023, according to a survey by UKactive. The non-for-profit organisation said that its members are facing bills up to 200 per cent higher this year compared with 2019, and Swim England warn than more than 100 pools are under threat in the next six months. Cllr Gerald Vernon-Jackson, Chair of the LGA’s Culture, Tourism and Sport Board, said: “This research reveals the precarious future of our leisure services, which have a critical role to play in helping our communities recover from COVID-19 – both physically and mentally – and tackle issues like obesity, heart disease and diabetes, reducing the burden on the NHS and social care.”
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The availability of free school meals must be expanded to include all children in households on universal credit, more than 35 healthcare leaders and charity bosses claim. In a letter to the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt and Education Secretary Gillian Keegan, leaders demand an “urgent” extension of the Free School Meals Scheme to “improve children’s nutrition and protect their health.”
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Councils have called on the Government to delay new adult social care reforms, warning that the reforms were underfunded. Addressing delegates in Manchester at the National Children and Adult Services Conference (NCASC), Cllr James Jamieson, Chairman of the LGA said, “It’s important we get the reform and the funding for social care right and we’re calling yet again for Government to sit with councils, people with lived experience and our partners, working-age adults, old people, unpaid carers, all, in order to develop a system that works for us all.
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Onward’s director Will Tanner is set to become deputy chief of staff to Rishi Sunak at Number 10, according to Politico’s morning briefing.
Mr Tanner set up the centre right think tank Onward with the MP Neil O’Brien, and its work programme around levelling up laid the ground for much of the government’s own levelling up agenda.
Last week Onward published a report with suggestions for how the Conservative party could regain support from voters to avoid a Labour landslide at the next election.
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Labour will push the ‘increasingly strong’ economic case for investing in social care, a shadow minister has said.
Speaking at the National Children and Adult Services Conference in Manchester last week, shadow social care minister Liz Kendall said: ‘I’m sure all of us here would always make the moral case for social care, but I believe there is an increasingly strong economic case too, and this is going to have to be our priority in the weeks and months ahead.
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There were an “unacceptable” number of local audits identified as requiring significant improvement in the latest inspection results from the Financial Reporting Council (FRC).
The regulator said that four inspections highlighted the need for significant improvement across three firms (BDO, Deloitte and Grant Thornton). Three of the inspections were of financial statement audits and one was a review of auditors’ work on value for money (VfM) arrangements.
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Dorset Council is holding talks with Whitehall as it expects to breach an agreement to pay off its dedicated schools grant (DSG) deficit. The council has a so-called safety valve agreement in place with the Department for Education (DfE) under which the Government had pledged to provide £42m to balance Dorset's DSG deficit by 2026-27.
Dorset's deal hinges on it overspending no more than £10.4m this year. However, a council officers' report warned the deal was now in 'jeopardy' as Dorset was expecting to overspend by £15.1m.
Section 151 officer Aiden Dunn told senior councillors Dorset was attempting to expand its capacity but ‘frankly, we haven’t been able to build places fast enough’. Mr Dunn said he hoped an agreement could be reached to extend the timescale of the agreement.
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There is a ‘strong link’ between children living with obesity and deprivation, new NHS figures have revealed.
The prevalence of reception-aged children living with obesity in England during 2021-22 was over twice as high in the most deprived areas (13.6%) than in the least deprived areas (6.2%), according to NHS Digital.
This difference is also seen in year 6 children – with 31.3% living with obesity in the most deprived areas compared with 13.5% in the least deprived areas.
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Birmingham City Council has been warned by its commissioner that if it does not show “absolute commitment” to making the required improvements to its Send services, it will face losing control of services to a separate children’s trust.
Birmingham Children’s Trust already runs the council’s children’s services department, after similar failings emerged in the council's running of children's services.
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Lee Rowley has become the local government minister at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities.
He has been housing minister at DLUHC since September. He confirmed the appointment on Twitter this morning and said: “Delighted to become the local government minister at @luhc - looking forward to working with councillors, officers and communities across the UK to show the difference that excellent local government makes to all of our lives.”
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Secondary school heads across England are warning MPs of cuts to mental health provision, school trips and essential building repairs because rising costs and energy bills are wrecking their budgets.
Ahead of the government’s autumn statement on 17 November, headteachers are telling local MPs and councillors about their struggles to adjust their budgets to cover unexpected costs of hundreds of thousands of pounds in higher pay and bills.
The Westminster secondary schools improvement collaborative – which represents 12 state schools in the London borough of Westminster – has written to MPs warning of “a funding crisis which will seriously impede our ability to provide for our students and their families”.
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An increase in migrants from Romania has helped push the number of people in England and Wales born outside the UK to ten million — or one in six of the population — for the first time.
Figures from last year’s census, released by the Office for National Statistics, showed that the number born in Romania and living in England and Wales had grown by 576 per cent since the previous census, from about 80,000 in 2011 to 539,000 in 2021. Working restrictions on those arriving from Romania had been lifted in 2014.
The total number of people in England and Wales born outside the UK rose from 7.5 million (13.4 per cent of the population) to ten million (16.8 per cent). However, there was a slower rate of growth in the migrant share of the population from 2011 to 2021 than during the previous decade.
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A “staggering” number of older and disabled people are not getting the social care and support they need, according to the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (Adass).
This is despite adult social care being “as vital as our Victorian rail network or modern broadband”, Adass president Sarah McClinton said.
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Around 10% of over-60s have reduced or stopped their social care or expect to do so in the coming months because of the cost-of-living crisis, charity reveals.
New polling from Age UK has found that 10% (1.6 million) of over-60s in the UK are already cutting back or stopping their social care, or expect to do so in the near future, because they can’t afford the cost.
The poll also found that 22% (3.6 million) of older people are already reducing or stopping spending on medications or specialist foods or expect to do so in the coming months. Fifteen percent (2.5 million) are already skipping meals, or expect to do so.
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Around 10% of over-60s have reduced or stopped their social care or expect to do so in the coming months because of the cost-of-living crisis, charity reveals.
New polling from Age UK has found that 10% (1.6 million) of over-60s in the UK are already cutting back or stopping their social care, or expect to do so in the near future, because they can’t afford the cost.
The poll also found that 22% (3.6 million) of older people are already reducing or stopping spending on medications or specialist foods or expect to do so in the coming months. Fifteen percent (2.5 million) are already skipping meals, or expect to do so.
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A number of councils are taking High Court action against the Home Office after local hotel rooms were block-booked for asylum seekers without any prior consultation. Minister for Immigration Robert Jenrick said that more hotel rooms are being procured at pace to temporarily accommodate migrants, but councils said the plans affect tourism revenue, put pressure on stretched services, risk local jobs and breach planning rules. The LGA said it has been "raising increasingly urgent concerns" over the issue and claims there has not been "adequate time for consulting - or even sometimes informing the local councils in advance".
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Millions of people face “eye-watering” tax rises and spending cuts to services to fill an up to £50 billion black hole in the upcoming Autumn Statement, scheduled for 17 November. The likes of foreign aid, NHS spending and the cap on social care costs are expected to be addressed, with 86 per cent of council chiefs believing some or all care reforms should be delayed in June, according to an LGA survey.
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Public sector workers face a real-terms pay cut next year, with the Treasury reportedly looking at pay rises of two per cent across the board for 2023-24. The average public sector pay rise was around five per cent this year, and with inflation forecast to remain at up to 9.5 per cent for much of next year, a two per cent rise could see an overall reduction for nurses, teachers, police officers and more.
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Four local authorities have taken out interim High Court injunctions against the Home Office over the placement of asylum seekers in hotels in their area.
Stoke on Trent City Council, Ipswich BC and East Riding of Yorkshire Council have all successfully won their respective cases, with each council awaiting further hearings on their cases. Last month Great Yarmouth BC also secured an interim injunction.
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There is “no more fat to trim” in children’s services budgets which now require £778m just to “stay still” amid soaring demand, England’s most senior children’s services director has warned.
The president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services Steve Crocker told the National Children and Adult Services Conference this morning that his colleagues are “staring down the barrel of an incredibly difficult winter”, and has warned that the “elephant in the room is profit”.
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Devon County Council’s leader has warned that the local authority will have to make ‘deep cuts’ to the county’s local services unless the Government provides more help.
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Cornwall Council has warned that it may be forced to cut spending on discretionary services as it seeks to fill a budget gap of £62m.
The council’s cabinet is set to discuss a report next week which addresses what it describes as a ‘challenging financial climate’ caused by rising inflation and increasing demand for services.
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Local government trade unions have accepted a pay offer that equates to a 10.5% increase for the lowest-paid workers.
UNISON and GMB have agreed to accept the offer, which is the highest offered in over a decade. The deal will see hundreds of thousands staff paid an extra £1,925 this year.
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Four-fifths of district councils have warned of shortages of temporary accommodation to meet a rising tide of homelessness fuelled by the cost of living crisis, new research has found.
A survey by the District Councils’ Network (DCN) found 79% of lower-tier authorities cannot meet current demand for homelessness-related accommodation.
One unnamed district said it had been unable to find accommodation for 193 households – indicating the scale of the problem now facing some councils.
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Hundreds of thousands of health care professionals have written to the Chancellor and health secretary urging them to offer free school meals to thousands more children to help fight malnutrition.
The Food Foundation has revealed that four million children now live in households affected by food poverty. The charity has also found that 800,000 children in families on Universal Credit (UC) are still not getting access to free school meals.
In a letter sent today to the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt and the health secretary Gillian Keegan, leaders representing more than 150,000 doctors and medical students, and over half a million nurses, midwives, dieticians and support staff called for the expansion of free school meals.
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The Bank of England has warned the UK is facing its longest recession since records began, as it raised interest rates by the most in 33 years.
In warned the UK would face a "very challenging" two-year slump with unemployment nearly doubling by 2025.
Bank governor Andrew Bailey warned of a "tough road ahead" for UK households.
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The Treasury has warned of "inevitable" tax rises as Prime Minister Rishi Sunak seeks to fill a "black hole" in public finances.
Mr Sunak and Chancellor Jeremy Hunt met on Monday to discuss options for the financial statement on 17 November.
They agreed "tough decisions" were needed on tax rises, as well as on spending.
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The Government has extended the deadline for claiming a £150 cost of living rebate on council tax, as nearly 200,000 households had missed out on the payment. The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities announced it had extended the deadline for claiming the rebate to November 30.
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At least £40bn of ‘fiscal tightening’ including tax rises such as the restoration of the health and care levy will be needed to restore the public finances, new analysis from the Resolution Foundation think-tank has found.
The gloomy news provoked a warning from the Local Government Association (LGA) that the ‘future financial sustainability of councils and local services is on a cliff-edge’.
Treasury insiders suggest that following a meeting between chancellor Jeremy Hunt and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak yesterday, fiscal tightening will be made up of 50% tax rises and 50% spending cuts.
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Deep cuts to Devon’s vital local services are inevitable unless the Government provides more support, county council leader John Hart warned today. Mr Hart said he fully agreed with new Prime Minister Rishi Sunak that the country faced a “profound economic crisis”.
But he urged Mr Sunak and Chancellor Jeremy Hunt to use the extra time they now have to produce their economic recovery plan to ensure the balance between tax rises and spending cuts was fair and equitable. And that local government is not singled out for cuts.
Mr Hart said: “I have been a county councillor for more than 30 years and leader of Devon County Council for nearly 14 years during which time we have been through the austerity years and the pandemic. But our financial situation has never been so bleak as it is now."
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The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is understood to be pushing to delay the social care reforms introduced by Boris Johnson, including the £86,000 cap on lifetime care costs, by a year to 2024, in the Autumn Statement. Meanwhile it is reported Liz Truss’s low-tax, deregulatory investment zones are likely to be scaled back or scrapped, after warnings they could cost the Treasury up to £12 billion in lost tax. Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove is understood to have been presented with several options, including the possibility of reducing the tax and regulatory perks in the zones, or finding a way to incorporate them into 20 regeneration areas set out in the Levelling Up White Paper this year.
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The trade union Unison has collected data showing libraries and children’s centres are closing and home pick-ups for young disabled people being cancelled as councils try to meet a £3.2 billion budget shortfall next year. It found almost nine in 10 councils have a predicted budget gap in the 2023/24 financial year. The LGA has warned the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt in a letter that the £3 billion-plus shortfall facing councils will lead to cuts, particularly as inflation has worsened since the last Local Government Finance Settlement was announced.
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In an exclusive interview with PF, Unison’s general secretary Christina McAnea called on the government to end the hostile environment with public sector workers and negotiate pay deals that can help members deal with the cost-of-living crisis.
She said: “If you really want to tackle some of the problems we’ve got in our industries, ministers have got to step up to the plate. They will intervene when it suits them so why not make it in a constructive way?”
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The Government are set to review their new Investment Zone plans, as concerns are raised about weakened environmental protections. In an interview with Times Radio, Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove said, “I will be looking with the Chancellor, with the Environment Secretary and with the Prime Minister at the proposals that were drawn up when Liz was Prime Minister . . . and anything that might in any way undermine environmental protections is out.” Gove also suggested that “capital spending”, including HS2, could have to be cut in order to bring down inflation.
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Two million public sector workers could be close to leaving over substandard pay, a survey by the Trades Union Congress has suggested. The TUC has warned that below inflation pay awards and a rise in the cost of living was forcing some people to move away from the public sector.
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Levelling up secretary Michael Gove has said he is “reviewing” investment zones, days after rejoining the government.
Asked during Sophy Ridge on Sunday whether investment zones are still happening, Mr Gove said: “I’m reviewing them.”
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Governance and funding arrangements in England are too confusing and too centralised, while the government’s devolution plans do not go far enough, MPs have warned.
The Commons’ public administration and constitutional affairs committee published the findings of its inquiry into English devolution today. MPs found that areas are missing out because power is too centralised and local government is underfunded.
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Ministers must scrap the patchwork system of bidding pots for local government and consider allowing councils to raise their own taxes, a parliamentary committee has said.
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There is a growing gap between private rents and housing benefit, new analysis has found. Research by Sky News has found that the gap between housing benefit and the actual cost of private rent has risen by 40 per cent in five months. The LGA have called for the freeze on housing allowance to be lifted. Cllr David Renard, Housing spokesperson for the LGA said, "Councils need more resources in terms of being able to fund homelessness services and to recruit the necessary housing officers to provide that support. Local authorities are very short of resources these days because of the increased demand."
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The Government is facing ‘sober’ decisions about spending cuts in the upcoming Autumn Statement, it has been reported. New forecasts have revealed that economic growth is slower than predicted, with £50 billion through tax rises and spending cuts needing to be found. Speaking to BBC News, Cllr Shaun Davies, Senior Vice-Chair of the LGA said, “Nine out of ten councils in our snap survey have said that services may need to reduced or cut if there is no further funding from the Government. We need the Government come up with a long term solution so services can continue to be effective.”
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New Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has demoted two allies of his predecessor Liz Truss, as he puts the final touches to his ministerial team.
Anne-Marie Trevelyan has been moved from transport secretary to be a minister in the Foreign Office.
Chris Philp, who was paymaster general, is now a Home Office minister.
On Tuesday, Mr Sunak overhauled the cabinet, removing key allies of his predecessor and rewarding some loyal supporters with top jobs.
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Inflation and increasing demands on services are expected to cost counties £3.5bn over the next two years – more double the amount projected earlier this year. The County Councils Network has now told the new chancellor that he should be “under no illusion” about the likely impact of any funding cuts to council services, which will be “worse than austerity”.
New CCN analysis projects that for 40 of England’s largest county and unitary authorities, inflationary and demand pressures will add £3.5bn to their costs. This is more than double a previous figure produced for CCN in June, which had placed cost pressures at £1.5bn over the same two-year period.
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The shadow levelling up secretary has written to Michael Gove calling for an independent inquiry into comments Rishi Sunak made in the summer about changing funding formulas.
On 29 July, the now prime minister was filmed telling a group of Conservative members in Tunbridge Wells: “I managed to start changing the funding formulas, to make sure areas like this are getting the funding they deserve because we inherited a bunch of formulas from Labour that shoved all the funding into deprived urban areas and that needed to be undone. I started the work of undoing that.”
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England’s largest councils today warn that any moves to cut their budgets next year would be ‘worse than austerity’ and result in ‘devastating’ reductions to local services – with local authorities offering just the bare minimum.
With the new Chancellor Jeremy Hunt reportedly asking all government departments to look for further savings, the County Councils Network (CCN) warns in a letter to the Treasury that prospect of funding reductions on top of soaring inflation would be ‘unthinkable and devastating’ for services.
New analysis from the CCN reveals that county authorities in England are grappling with £3.5bn in inflationary and demand costs this year and next – which is more than double the expected rise.
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Rishi Sunak is considering a delay to next week’s planned statement setting out how the government will close a £40 billion black hole in the country’s finances, The Times understands.
The prime minister is expected to meet Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, today to discuss his proposals to increase taxes and squeeze public spending that are due to be unveiled to MPs and markets on Monday, which is Halloween.
But amid concerns that the plans will define his premiership, Sunak is considering postponing the update until next month to allow more time to scrutinise the options. The statement had been brought forward by the previous government from November 23 because of the market reaction to Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget.
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It is too expensive for governments to help everyone with their soaring energy bills, the World Bank has warned.
The bank's president said Covid support schemes had not been targeted enough towards the most vulnerable and the debt will take decades to pay off.
David Malpass told the BBC the same policy was being adopted to help people cope with rising energy bills.
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Cuts to public health budgets will hit poorest communities the hardest, the new government is being warned.
Directors of public health say local authorities - which pay for initiatives such as smoking cessation services - are on a financial cliff edge.
Rising inflation means ventures will cost more to run.
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Michael Gove has made a sensational return to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) as part of new Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s cabinet reshuffle.
Mr Gove had announced his retirement from frontline politics after being sacked as levelling up secretary in the final days of Boris Johnson’s premiership last July.
However, he backed Rishi Sunak in the subsequent leadership race with Liz Truss and was widely tipped to be reinstalled at DLUHC after Truss’ demise and Sunak’s eventual rise to No 10.
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Extra tuition designed to help children in England catch up on learning lost during the Covid pandemic was often “haphazard and poorly planned”, and in some cases disrupted the school day, an independent review by Ofsted inspectors has found.
The Ofsted review said that while the tutoring given through the government’s national tutoring programme (NTP) was “strong” in just over half of the 63 schools visited, “the quality of tuition varied greatly depending on the school or provider, and most teachers did not know the extent to which tutoring was having an impact”.
Amanda Spielman, Ofsted’s chief inspector of schools in England, said: “The government’s tutoring programme is potentially an important part of helping pupils catch up after the pandemic. There is evidence of tuition working effectively, but most schools and colleges lack a system to assess it properly and so do not know if that’s the case.”
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Rishi Sunak is preparing a radical set of reforms to transform the nation’s education system.
The prime minister is planning far-reaching changes including a new “British baccalaureate” and a network of elite technical institutes to transform vocational training.
A Downing Street source said Sunak believed that if there were “one silver bullet in public policy” that would improve lives, it was likely to be investment in education and skills. “This is an absolute priority for the prime minister,” they said.
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The government has put off telling us how it intends to tax and spend.
But for those on the lowest incomes, there’s no putting off the cost of living crisis.
In Wolverhampton, the council has opened 38 warm spaces across the city where people can come this winter to keep down their energy costs at home.
Some of the people attending are already grappling with the hard choices that come with fuel poverty.
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Rishi Sunak is reconsidering tax rises and major public spending cuts after a dramatic improvement in the state of the nation’s finances.
The new Prime Minister on Wednesday delayed the medium term fiscal statement from next Monday to November 17 to allow Jeremy Hunt to rework the plans.
An analysis to be published on Thursday shows that the fortnight delay is expected to shrink the size of the black hole in the public finances by up to £15 billion.
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Almost half of UK adults are finding it difficult to afford their energy bills, rent, or mortgage payments, new figures have shown.
The data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show a rising percentage of the population is struggling amid the cost of living crisis.
In September 45% of adults who paid energy bills were finding it very, or somewhat, difficult to afford them - up from 40% in June.
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Rishi Sunak has reiterated the 2019 Conservative manifesto commitment to “levelling up” in his first speech as prime minister.
Speaking on the steps of Downing Street after having been invited by King Charles III to form a government, Mr Sunak said that at the “heart” of his party’s mandate “is our manifesto”.
“I will deliver on its promises. A stronger NHS, better schools, safer streets, control of our borders, protecting our environment, supporting our armed forces, levelling up and building an economy that embraces the opportunities of Brexit, where businesses invest, innovate and create jobs,” Mr Sunak said.
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Senior Conservative figures in local government have said they will be clear with the new prime minister about the financial pressure councils are under.
Former chancellor Rishi Sunak was named as the new leader of the Conservative party and will become the UK’s third prime minister in just seven weeks.
Mr Sunak won by default after fellow competitors, Penny Mordaunt and former prime minister Boris Johnson withdrew from the Conservative Party leadership race. He had secured more than the required 100 MP nominations with support of more than half of Conservative MPs.
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CIPFA and the ICAEW have called for a time-limited extension to the IFRS 9 statutory override, with the standard then fully applied after two years.
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The Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee has launched an inquiry into levelling up funding following a “lack of information” on the financing available to councils.
Committee chair Clive Betts said that the inquiry would examine questions involving the allocation of levelling-up resources and the aim, size and focus of the many different funds available. This includes the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) and the European Structural and Investment Fund (ESIF).
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The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has been told by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) that there is still a £40 billion black hole in the nation’s finances. It is reported that Mr Hunt is looking to raise as much as half that amount from putting up taxes, reducing the need for as many cuts to public spending.
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Nine out of 10 schools will have run out of money by the next school year as increased energy and salary bills takes its toll, according to data from the National Association of Head Teachers. Results of a survey of its members - due to be released in full later this month – shows that 50 per cent of heads say their school will be in deficit this year.
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Hundreds more homeless households across England are being uprooted and rehoused miles from their jobs and schools amid mounting concern about the legality of the practice and the number of lives it is disrupting.
Figures obtained by the Guardian under freedom of information (FoI) reveal more than 6,000 households were shunted more than 20 miles from their local neighbourhood in out-of-area placements by 53 councils in the last four years. However, this is probably an underestimate given that the majority did not provide 2021-22 figures.
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The UK faces a "more difficult" era of austerity than the one after the 2008 financial crisis in order to stabilise the economy, a former governor of the Bank of England has warned. Lord Mervyn King said the average person could face "significantly higher taxes" to fund public spending, with Chancellor Jeremy Hunt scheduled to set out his economic plans on 31 October.
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Rishi Sunak will become Britain’s youngest prime minister in modern times and the country’s first non-white leader after Conservative MPs overwhelmingly backed him to succeed Liz Truss.
The former chancellor’s path to office was cleared on Sunday when ex-prime minister Boris Johnson abandoned his hopes of a comeback, after securing the public backing of just over 50 MPs.
Penny Mordaunt, House of Commons leader and Sunak’s last remaining rival for the Conservative party leadership following Truss’s resignation last week, pulled out of the contest at the last minute ahead of the deadline for nominations at 2pm on Monday.
Mordaunt’s withdrawal meant that Sunak was the only leadership candidate and the contest ended without the need for an online vote by Conservative party members.
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Liz Truss has welcomed her successor as prime minister, Rishi Sunak, as the Conservatives seek to reunify around their new leader – while opposition figures demand a general election.
Mr Sunak is expected to take office within 24 hours after he claimed victory in the accelerated contest to replace Ms Truss – after Boris Johnson opted not to stand and Penny Mordaunt failed to reach a key nominations threshold.
Ms Truss said in a tweet: “Congratulations Rishi Sunak on being appointed as Leader of the Conservative Party and our next Prime Minister. You have my full support.”
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The level of council reserves rose by almost 10% in 2021-22 before the onset of the cost-of-living crisis, according to provisional outturn figures published by the government.
Local authorities in England added an additional £2.5bn into reserves at the end of March 2022 – a 9.9% year-on-year increase, the government report said.
David Phillips, associate director at the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said the reserve position was improved due to government funding outstripping spending needs.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt will reportedly propose a rise in income tax for millions of people after the next election to help fill a fiscal hole of £40 billion, but his debt-cutting fiscal statement due on October 31 could be delayed.
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A feature examines the experiences of paramedics, nurses and hospital staff across London as they manage acute NHS demand and explain how the social care sector in the capital is struggling to relieve the pressure because of the challenge of people being unable to leave hospital due to the lack of community services.
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Net migration is set to hit more than 300,000 this year, returning it to the record levels of the mid-2010s, it is reported. Official figures next month are expected to reveal net migration has increased by more than a quarter in a year.
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Britain’s current wave of Covid-19 cases appears to be peaking at a lower level than previous outbreaks of the Omicron variant of the disease, researchers have revealed.
The news is encouraging – though scientists have also warned that a further wave of the disease could sweep the nation before the end of the year. “We need to be vigilant and monitor the data with great care, all the time,” said Professor Mark Woolhouse, of Edinburgh University.
According to last week’s ONS survey, Covid case numbers have flattened out or are falling in five of nine English regions, as well as in Northern Ireland and Scotland. At the same time, children now have the lowest prevalence of the disease for some weeks.
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The UK faces a "more difficult" era of austerity than the one after the 2008 financial crisis in order to stabilise the economy, a former governor of the Bank of England has warned.
Lord Mervyn King said the average person could face "significantly higher taxes" to fund public spending.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is scheduled to set out his economic plans on 31 October.
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Tens of thousands of new homes face being delayed or scrapped because of river pollution that could cost the economy £16bn.
Experts say more phosphate, found in animal and human waste, is getting into rivers and affecting water quality.
Tougher rules on phosphate river pollution targets have been brought in - but that could affect 100,000 new-build homes in England and Wales.
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A workforce the size of the population of Newcastle needs to be recruited urgently to ease the "gridlocked" health and care system and to prevent serious harm to patients, the country's care regulator has warned.
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) says it is getting "tougher and tougher" to access care because of a massive shortage in the workforce.
There are around 132,000 vacancies in the NHS and 165,000 across social care, about the same size as the population of the north east city.
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Financial market instability caused by the government’s mini-budget has created an opportunity for the Local Government Pension Scheme to boost investment, with funds generally weathering the storm.
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Public sector net borrowing totalled £20 billion last month, £3 billion more than economists had predicted, according to the Office for National Statistics. The latest data pointed to a record debt interest payment total of £7.7 billion in September, mostly attributed to rising inflation. At the same time, retail sales have been reported to have fallen 1.4 per cent on the previous month, revealing that “consumers were now buying less than before the pandemic.”
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Committee chair Clive Betts announced the probe on Thursday, to examine how funding has been allocated to councils, and how policies including the newly announced investment zones will contribute to the ‘levelling up’ agenda.
Betts has taken aim at how the UK Shared Prosperity Fund, which replaces European Union structural funding, has been allocated.
In a letter to new chancellor Jeremy Hunt, Betts raised concerns over the lack of clarity surrounding the fund and how much of the earmarked money will be used by 2024-25.
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Committee chair Clive Betts announced the probe on Thursday, to examine how funding has been allocated to councils, and how policies including the newly announced investment zones will contribute to the ‘levelling up’ agenda.
Betts has taken aim at how the UK Shared Prosperity Fund, which replaces European Union structural funding, has been allocated.
In a letter to new chancellor Jeremy Hunt, Betts raised concerns over the lack of clarity surrounding the fund and how much of the earmarked money will be used by 2024-25.
“It is crucial that ministers are held to account for levelling up policies and the effectiveness of the myriad of money pots available, Betts said.
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The government has launched a non-statutory independent review of Woking Borough Council’s finances amid concerns over the authority’s “disproportionate” debt levels.
The Department for Levelling up, Housing and Communities initially wrote to the council in May over concerns the authority’s £1.8bn debt was unsustainable.
The correspondence came just a week after it emerged the government was proposing borrowing caps for councils that have been judged to have taken on excessive debt.
In a follow up letter, levelling up minister Paul Scully said the department is concerned over the high level of long-term debt and the current arrangements for supporting subsidiary companies.
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The overall business rates bill for companies in England is projected to rise by £2.7 billion to £30 billion from April as rates increase with inflation, according to property experts Altus Group. Business membership bodies have called for the Government to halt the increases.
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The Home Secretary, Suella Braverman, has resigned due to breaching the ministerial code. In her resignation letter, she admitted to sending a government document to someone not authorised to receive it. She has been replaced by former Transport Secretary Grant Shapps.
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Financial market instability caused by the government’s mini-budget has pushed Public Works Loan Board borrowing rates up to their highest point in a decade, piling more pressure on council finances.
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Local authorities and their partners face a legal requirement to report child sexual abuse and exploitation (CSA) under hefty proposals outlined by an independent inquiry.
Mandatory reporting by ‘those involved in regulated activity’ or a ‘position of trust’ - with potential criminal sanctions for failure - is one of three major recommendations within the final report the £180m Independent Inquiry into Chid Sexual Abuse (IICSA) published on Thursday.
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Chief executives have demanded a minimum percentage pay increase of between 3.5% and 4% from local government employers to avoid councils being in the ‘bargain basement’ for public sector salary rises.
Employers offered council chiefs a flat rate pay rise of £1,925 to all staff in July but the Association of Local Authority Chief Executives and Senior Managers (ALACE) said the proposal did not heed its call for senior salaries to remain competitive.
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The local government funding system is ‘out of date and arbitary’ and it threatens levelling up, new research from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said.
Evidence produced by the IFS shows the most deprived areas in the country get 10% less funding than their assessed need, while the least deprived are funded 20% higher than their assessed need.
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Liz Truss has dramatically resigned as prime minister after just 45 days in the job.
The PM said her successor will be elected in a Tory leadership contest, to be completed in the next week.
Ms Truss will become the shortest-serving PM in British history when she stands down.
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The allocation for core local authority funding has been unchanged since 2013 and fails to account for population growth and general need, meaning the most deprived councils have seen sharper spending cuts, an IFS report said.
As a result, the most-deprived tenth of councils received only 18% (£134) more per person than the least-deprived tenth in 2019-20, a “stark difference” from 2013–14 where these areas received a third (£271) more, the IFS said.
It added that the funding change resulted in a 13% (£116) real-terms per person funding reduction for council services, with larger cuts falling on more-deprived areas that were more dependent on government grants.
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Financial market instability caused by the government’s mini-budget has created an opportunity for the Local Government Pension Scheme to boost investment, with funds generally weathering the storm.
The uncertainty surrounding the doomed Growth Plan published on 23 September, which included £45bn of unfunded tax cuts, pushed financial markets into turmoil.
Government gilt yields leapt to around 6%, increasing commercial borrowing rates and reportedly pushing pension funds to the brink of collapse.
This led to the Bank of England implementing a two-week bond-buying programme to ease market concerns, aiming to stabilise pension funds.
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Nearly 1,000 Ukrainians have been made homeless as British families who offered up their houses struggle with the cost of living crisis.
New figures show 955 Ukrainian families had been made homeless under the Homes for Ukraine scheme by the end of September following its launch in February. This represents a 40 per cent rise on the 680 at the end of August.
They have been found alternative accommodation by councils but the local authorities have warned there is a “significant risk” of more Ukrainians being made homeless as the six-month deadline for sponsorship loomed for more families.
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The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is reportedly set to delay at least some aspects of the social care reforms, including the care cost cap, by one year. The reforms were due to be implemented from next October, but councils have been calling for the reforms to be held back due to insufficient funding and capacity to deliver them.
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Inflation rose to 10.1 per cent in September as living costs continued to increase. The Office for National Statistics said Consumer Prices Index inflation had returned to the 40-year high after a slight dip to 9.9 per cent in August.
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A writer who has hosted four Ukrainian women has called on the Government to provide more “clarity” to hosts on the future of the Homes for Ukraine scheme and “dramatically increase” their monthly payment, amid concerns that more Ukrainians may end up homeless. The LGA has said it is “deeply concerned” about the growing number of Ukrainians presenting as homeless to councils and also called for clarity around the scheme and for a plan for how to provide long-term housing to Ukrainians. This is also reported by the Evening Standard and Mail.
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The public sector has reacted warily to new chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s stated commitment to finding “savings” in departmental budgets.
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The government will need to spend £6bn over the next three years to help implement care reforms or risk the sector falling into a “state of collapse”, the author of an independent report has warned.
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Councils could need to shrink projects they have submitted to the Levelling Up Fund because the government has refused to adjust the pot for inflation, a senior minister has said.
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County councils have welcomed reports that the Government is to delay social care reforms by at least a year.
The Times claims that the flagship reforms, including a £86,000 cap on costs, will be postponed as part of Treasury efforts to reduce spending.
The County Councils Network (CCN) has backed the move, and said that the reforms would have been ‘impossible’ to implement amid a cost of living crisis, and pressing ahead would have ‘run the risk of them falling at the first hurdle’.
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Future pensioner payments into local government pension schemes could be higher than assumed due to most LGPS Fund liabilities being uncapped to inflation, new report says.
A new report from Alpha Real Capital, the specialist manager of secure income real assets, has found that UK Local Government Pension Schemes (LGPS) in England and Wales see contributions from members as their main source of cashflow to pay benefits. This is followed by income from bonds, selling assets, income from equities and then from private markets.
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Retailers face paying an extra £3bn next year in business rates, piling further pressure on the high street as costs soar and shoppers cut back on spending.
Business rates, which are a tax on company properties, are due to rise in line with inflation, which hit 10.1pc in September.
It means the overall business rates bill for companies across England is projected to jump by £2.7bn to £30bn from April, when the tax rises, according to property experts Altus Group.
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A long-delayed law was going to cap the amount each person pays for care to £86,000 from October 2023. But it's understood new Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has looked at delaying this by a year
Jeremy Hunt is drawing up plans to delay the Tories’ flagship cap on care home fees in a blow to hundreds of thousands of frail Brits.
Treasury sources confirmed “nothing is off the table” as Mr Hunt looks to hack tens of billions off public spending in a new era of austerity.
Government sources pointed out councils had already pleaded for a delay because they were not ready.
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The Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has said he is reversing “almost all” of the tax cuts announced in his predecessor’s mini-budget and is scaling back support for energy bills. In an emergency statement, Mr Hunt said a 1p cut to income tax will be delayed “indefinitely” until the UK’s finances improve instead of being introduced in April 2023. Mr Hunt also said the Government’s energy price guarantee will only be universal until April – not for two years as previously planned. He also said the Government faced difficult decisions ahead on spending and savings. On BBC News at One, the LGA has warned about the impact of unfunded extra cost pressures on council budgets, alongside any further potential cuts, after the Chancellor’s announcement. It said that the prospect of further efficiency savings has sent a “collective shiver down the spine of local government”, with councils facing a £3.4 billion funding gap already next year. The LGA says if there are further savings to be made that would mean "significant cuts to services including to those for the most vulnerable in our society".
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The National Grid Chief Executive, John Pettigrew, has told households to prepare for blackouts between 4pm and 7pm on weekdays during “really, really cold” days in January and February if gas imports are reduced
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Councils and combined authorities have submitted “hundreds” of investment zone bids the levelling up secretary revealed, as he promised that the Treasury would find new money to support their implementation.
The deadline to formally express an interest in having an investment zone in their area was Friday, and LGC has so far identified 14 councils, which have collectively put forward 82 sites (see table below). At least two other councils have declined to bid, and some of those which did bid have said they will pull out if the plans are not right for their areas.
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Around 143,000 families eligible for the Healthy Start Scheme, which helps low-income families pay for milk, vegetables and fruit, failed to make a claim this year. The LGA is encouraging take-up and asking for further government support of the scheme which is administered by councils. Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, Cllr David Fothergill said: “At this challenging time of rising food prices and overall cost of living, we need government to ramp up efforts to ensure all eligible families can access healthy and nutritious food to give children and babies the best start in life.”
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The Government will raise corporation tax despite promising not to do so in the mini-budget last month. Prime Minister, Liz Truss confirmed the change at a news conference shortly after dismissing Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt released a statement on Saturday night saying his focus is on "growth underpinned by stability". He said the Government went "too far, too fast" and that he will have to take some "very difficult decisions" on spending and tax to get the economy back up and running.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is expected to delay the 1p cut to basic income tax, which was the flagship announcement in Kwasi Kwarteng's mini-budget at the end of September. He said he had scope to overturn the policy, which caused a drop in the value of the pound.
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The Governor of the Bank of England has warned interest rates may need to rise by more than previously expected. The next rate rise decision is on 3 November, days after the Government lays out its economic plans following the reversal of many decisions in September’s mini-budget.
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Jeremy Hunt will deliver parts of his medium-term fiscal plan later today, two weeks earlier than planned. The Treasury said the Chancellor was fast-tracking the plans, which will be released in full on 31 October and that the decision followed conversations with the Prime Minister over the weekend and a meeting with the Governor of the Bank of England and the head of the Debt Management Office on Sunday night.
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Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said every government department would be asked to make savings, ahead of the 31 October economic statement. However, he insisted the changes would not be "anything like" the period of austerity which began in 2010, when predecessor George Osborne oversaw large cuts in public spending.
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Councils in the north of England have spent millions of pounds preparing bids for government Levelling Up grants. Freedom of Information requests reveal 22 councils in the North East and Cumbria spent a total of more than £4.6 million.
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Confirmation that the government will look to cut public spending has “sent a collective shiver down the spine of local government,” the chair of the Local Government Association has warned.
This morning, new chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced that the government would reverse almost all of the tax cuts announced in the former chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng’s September mini-budget and said spending cuts will be needed.
Mr Kwarteng was sacked on Friday by prime minister Liz Truss and Mr Hunt has spent the last three days unravelling his predecessor's economic strategy in a bid to reassure financial markets.
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There has been a notable increase in government intervention. LGC explores why this might be
While the prevailing rhetoric from ministers lately may be around devolution, the reality is the government is intervening directly in struggling councils’ affairs more regularly than ever.
In the wake of years of austerity, financial fragility seems to be a factor in new interventions, while some suspect there is a political element to decisions. And intervention is predicted to gather pace as budgets are squeezed and statutory responsibilities become harder to meet.
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The scale of the Government’s challenge to curb public spending against a backdrop of soaring demand has been laid bare by a report examining the state of key public services.
In the seventh edition of its Performance Tracker, the Institute for Government and the Chartered Institute for Public Finance and Accountancy warn: ‘Public services are now in a more fragile state than before the pandemic.
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Any cuts to public services will be “almost certain” to damage performance, which is already struggling in the wake of a decade of austerity and the Covid-19 pandemic, the government has been warned as it promised “tough decisions” on spending
The annual ‘Performance Tracker’ report from CIPFA and the Institute for Government looked at the state of nine public services, and found them lacking in funding.
The report was published on the same morning as new chancellor Jeremy Hunt made an emergency statement in which he said government departments will need to “redouble their efforts to find savings”.
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Recruitment and retention issues have led to a 3% reduction in the social care workforce – the first decline in the sector since 2012, experts have said.
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Ministers are set to introduce a cap on renewable energy revenues, aiming to “reduce the impact of unprecedented wholesale prices on consumers” in a move labelled a windfall tax by Labour.
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The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has warned that accounting for public spending across government is “increasingly unreliable and incomplete” partly due to ongoing delays in council audits.
In a report published today (14 October), it said that delays in publishing the 2019-20 Whole of Government Accounts (WGA) undermined the value of a “uniquely comprehensive view of how government manages taxpayer’s money and of the position of public finances”.
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Prime Minister Liz Truss is reportedly considering a U-turn on corporation tax in an attempt to stabilise the markets. No 10 said this morning that their position “has not changed”, but an announcement is reportedly planned ahead of Monday’s reopening of markets to restore the corporation tax hike to 25p.
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The Local Government Association is set to make a bid to broaden its representation to other areas of local government, as part of an overhaul of its business plan.
Under the terms of the LGA’s new business plan, LGC understands that for the first time in its 25-year history delivering economic growth will be a key part of its offer to Whitehall.
A senior source said the quid pro quo would be for it to be permitted to "look after people in the wider sector". The LGA’s new three-year business plan is understood to include a bid for full representation of PCCs, mayoral combined authorities and also town and parish councils via the National Association of Local Councils.
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Liz Truss today sacked her Chancellor and friend before appointing Jeremy Hunt in his place. She then went on to u-turn on her plans to cancel the planned rise in corporation tax, announced in the mini-budget.
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Electoral administration teams at councils could need to make changes to the 2023 local election timetable after the date for the coronation of HM King Charles III was announced.
The date for His Majesty’s coronation was set yesterday for Saturday 6 May 2023, two days after the local elections which are currently scheduled for Thursday 4 May.
The Association of Electoral Administrators has said council election teams will need to wait for further detail as to how this will affect the current electoral timetable.
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Local government spends more of its procurement budget with SMEs than central government or the NHS, new research has revealed.
The report, published by the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) in partnership with Tussell, shows local government bodies spent 38% of their overall procurement budgets directly with SMEs in 2021.
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Council staff are leaving the sector because they can no longer afford to work in local government amid the cost of living crisis, a chief executive has warned.
Speaking as councils co-ordinate the response to the crisis, joint chief executive of Brentwood BC and Rochford DC, Jonathan Stephenson, said local government staff were themselves being hit by the squeeze.
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A Conservative metro mayor said "rogue" ministers who criticise devolution should be brought in line, and expressed frustration at the pace of devolution deals.
Andy Street (Con), mayor of the West Midlands, speaking at the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives & Senior Managers conference via video link yesterday, also said he would have a "heavy heart" if anticipated public spending cuts go ahead.
He told the audience that when he backed Liz Truss to be prime minister he had not believed public sector funding cuts would be needed to fund the growth-focused agenda.
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Soaring inflation is likely to put two-thirds of the government’s missions outlined in the Levelling Up White Paper at risk of failure, academics have warned.
February’s white paper outlined 12 missions to reduce inequalities, including improving pay and productivity, transport links, health outcomes and education levels across the UK by 2030.
However, a report by the Centre for Inequality and Levelling Up at the University of West London, said the cost-of-living crisis is likely to widen regional inequalities and reduce funding to improve outcomes, with eight of the 12 missions at risk of failure.
It said there is evidence that economic contractions and recessions negatively affect employment, investment, educational attainment, health outcomes and crime levels.
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Michael Gove has urged Liz Truss to “keep faith” with Boris Johnson’s commitment to ending no-fault evictions amid concerns that she is poised to scrap the plans.
The Times disclosed yesterday that Truss is planning to shelve or drop the plans entirely because they are not considered a priority as she pushes for more growth.
Speaking at the Conservative Party conference last week, Gove said that Johnson had given his “explicit insistence” that the measure should be included in the 2019 manifesto.
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The UK economy unexpectedly shrank in August, strengthening predictions that it will fall into a recession.
The surprise 0.3% drop came as factories and consumer-facing businesses struggled, according to official figures.
Analysts thought the economy would stall in August but not shrink as costs mount for businesses and households.
Prices are rising at their fastest rate for 40 years, eating into people's budgets, and outpacing growth in pay.
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Liz Truss has pledged not to cut public spending to balance the books in her first PMQs since the chancellor's contentious mini-budget - despite a leading economics-focused think tank warning the government is billions short of the sums needed.
The prime minister insisted she was "absolutely" not planning public spending reductions, but vowed that taxpayers' money would be used well.
It comes as cabinet minister Jacob Rees-Mogg suggested that Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng could ignore potential forecasts of low growth and rising debt in order to press ahead with his plans.
Ministers continue to be under pressure for the market turmoil that erupted after the government announced its £45bn package of unfunded tax cuts last month.
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Government is not currently going ahead with a proposal to double payments to UK households hosting Ukrainian refugees to £700, despite hopes that it would encourage people to prolong participation in the Homes for Ukraine scheme.
Under the scheme which began in March, participating UK households are expected to provide free accommodation to Ukrainian refugees fleeing Putin's invasion for six months, and are entitled to a payment of £350 per month to help cover additional expenses.
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A senior Conservative MP has suggested the government should row back on more of the tax cuts outlined in last month’s Growth Plan to “reassure the markets” after weeks of turbulence.
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Oxfordshire County Council’s cabinet are set to meet next week to agree next year’s budget as the council estimates it needs to make savings of around £50m.
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The underfunding of adult social care services has meant that the cost of providing care has become an increasingly common theme in complaints against councils, according to a new report.
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Norfolk CC can plug just over half of its £60m budget black hole for next year - but is warning that the savings it has identified could be cancelled out by "ongoing economic shockwaves" in the coming months.
The county council announced in July the first £13m of savings to meet the budget gap it is facing for next year, with cuts including closing recycling centres one day a week and reducing mobile library provision.
A further £19.5m of savings proposals are set to be looked at by its scrutiny committee next week, taking the total to £33.2m and leaving it with a further £26.8m still to find. But a report to the committee warns that “very severe headwinds” such as inflation would “inevitably" widen its budget gap.
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The chancellor will need to make "big and painful" spending cuts to put the country's finances on a sustainable path, the Institute for Fiscal Studies think tank has warned.
With a weaker economy and promised tax cuts, there will be a large shortfall in revenue, the IFS predicts.
It calculates the government would have to spend £60bn a year less by 2026-27.
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Derbyshire CC will offer extra cash incentives to existing and new frontline care staff in a bid to improve recruitment and retention.
Under the plans will see existing care worker community staff offered will get £500 immediately and a further £500 in one year's time if they have stayed with the council.
The council has set aside £270,000 for the new scheme and currently employs around 500 people in care worker community posts.
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The government could phase in investment zones if the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities receives a very large number of expressions of interest.
Dozens of local authorities are expected to submit expressions of interest by this Friday's deadline, having had just two weeks' notice.
DLUHC has not specified how many investment zones it expects to approve, or when it will let applicants know that they have progressed to the next stage of the process. This weekend the Financial Times reported that the chancellor had wanted to cap the number of zones, by was overruled by the prime minister.
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Financial uncertainty has split opinion over whether local government should push for a multi-year settlement or another single-year deal.
As chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng finalises his economic plan for 31 October amid market volatility, councils are struggling to balance their books due to soaring inflation, wages and increased demand.
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A ‘radical change’ to Shropshire Council’s past ‘passive’ approach to finances is required, according to a group of peers.
The council has insisted it has already begun the process of overhauling its strategy following the publication of a Local Government Association finance peer challenge.
Peers said there was a perception Shropshire was relying on lobbying central Government for more funding to address its ‘precarious’ finances.
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The number of vacant posts in adult social care has increased by a record 52% in one year, an alarming new report has revealed.
The annual report from Skills for Care, an organisation dedicated to supporting the development of the social care workforce, has highlighted the extent of the workforce crisis facing the overstretched care sector.
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Residential care workers are more likely to be living in poverty and deprivation than other UK workers, new analysis has revealed today.
A new report by the Health Foundation shows one in five care workers are living in poverty, compared to one in eight of all UK workers.
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The news that government departments have been tasked with identifying efficiency savings from public sector budgets has sent a collective shiver down the spine of local government.
It comes at a time when the future financial sustainability of councils and local services is already on a cliff-edge.
Recent signs had been encouraging, with the government using last year’s Spending Review to rightly ensure councils had enough funding to meet the extra cost pressures they were expecting to face this year and keep services standing still at least.
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Simon Clarke, the levelling up secretary, threatens to reignite the feud over housebuilding within the Conservative party with a significant “planning reset” that could water down environmental protections and affordable home requirements across England.
The latest in Liz Truss’s string of supply side reforms – nicknamed “Operation Rolling Thunder” in Whitehall – is slated to be launched by Clarke within weeks, and is expected to see him argue for a flurry of housing development as part of the government’s “dash for growth”.
He will probably claim that creating new houses would be better to grow the British economy than reshuffling assets between older and younger generations, and wants to launch a charm offensive on voters who do not want new developments in their area – which would see him “fighting to turn nimbys into yimbys”.
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A new poll by Laca, the industry body representing school caterers, suggests children are facing a deterioration in school meals due to shortages and soaring prices in the cost of living crisis. School meal providers have said they are having to cut back on the quality of meals and are using more processed food and poorer-quality meat for student lunches because of cost pressures.
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Kwasi Kwarteng will bring forward his plan for balancing the government's finances by almost a month to 31 October, in a bid to reassure markets.
The fiscal statement is expected to detail how the chancellor intends to pay for £43bn of tax cuts and cut debt.
An independent forecast of how the economy will perform in coming years will be published at the same time.
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The public sector could be set for an exodus of workers if the government fails to compensate departments for higher-than-expected pay offers, according to economists at the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
High inflation, partly caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Covid-19, means public sector pay rises this year are forecast to be £5bn more than initial estimates, the IFS said in a report. The IFS said that if departments were to choose workforce cuts to meet these higher pay offers, they would need to lose 110,000 workers – equivalent to 1.9% of the public sector workforce.
“Offering higher pay awards without additional funding puts enormous strain on departmental budgets and requires painful cuts elsewhere,” said IFS research economist Bee Boileau.
“Not offering higher pay awards risks a wave of strikes and ongoing challenges with recruitment and retention. But providing additional funding to departments would mean offsetting spending cuts elsewhere, or a U-turn on some of the chancellor’s recent tax cuts, if he is serious about having debt falling as a share of national income."
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Around 200,000 more children will be pushed into poverty if benefit payments don't go up in line with inflation, new analysis suggests.
It's prompted campaigners to call on ministers to stick by the former chancellor's pledge to uprate welfare payments in real terms next April.
Prime Minister Liz Truss and Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng have so far not ruled out taking a different course, with reports suggesting benefit payments will rise with average earnings instead, meaning households will get less support.
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Radical ideas to reduce spending outlined by the Prime Minister’s economic advisor in 2010 could be considered as the Government look to find spending cuts of around £40 billion by 2026/27. Matthew Sinclair, an economic advisor to Prime Minister Liz Truss, published a book in 2010 titled How to Cut Public Spending (and Still Win an Election), which included suggestions such as freezing state pensions and slashing ‘non frontline’ NHS and school staff.
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Senior Vice-Chair of the LGA Cllr Shaun Davies, has warned that councils could be forced to cut services as a result of extra cost pressures of at least £2.4 billion this year, adding that the scale of the pressures could not be met with efficiencies. In an interview with BBC News, he said: “These pressures come on top of the last 10 years where council’s budgets have not been cut to the bone but through the bone. This is at a time when councils have been asked to lead economic development, lead levelling up and lead things like social care.”
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Kwasi Kwarteng, Chancellor of the Exchequer, will reportedly tell the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) that public spending will not rise by more than economic growth in future. The OBR’s official forecasts are expected to show that annual borrowing will be £110 billion at the end of the forecast period in 2026-27, according to the Resolution Foundation.
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Prime Minister Liz Truss has reportedly insisted the UK should not set a limit on the number of applications for low-tax investment zones, despite concerns from the Treasury that the projects could cost billions in lost taxes. Kwasi Kwarteng, Chancellor of the Exchequer, reportedly tried to limit the number of zones to 40, warning that the zones could cause a tax liability of “up to £12 billion” a year.
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Plans are reportedly being drawn up to overhaul the “convoluted” subsidised childcare system that could see money handed directly to families instead. Changes to the childcare system are among the key reforms for Prime Minister Liz Truss’s drive for economic growth, and ministers believe the high costs and complexities of childcare cause unnecessary disruption for parents.
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The Government’s proposed investment zones will deliver the “slums of the future” and do little to boost growth, planning experts have warned.
Liz Truss has championed the creation of the “full fat freeports” in 38 different parts of the country as part of her “supply side reforms” to fuel growth in the economy.
But deep concerns over the plans have begun to emerge after the bidding process was opened earlier this week, which risks creating 38 different sets of planning regimes across the country.
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It was only a year ago that Boris Johnson stood up in Parliament and said he was going to fix the long-term problems in social care. He announced a new tax - to raise about £12bn a year - would be spent on health and social care costs only. But the UK's new prime minister, Liz Truss, has already scrapped the plan. Families, carers and care providers have been left asking where the funding will now come from to fix a system, which they say is broken.
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The soaring cost of living combined with a decade of austerity could see up to a sixth of English councils fully deplete their reserves in 2023-24 without substantial spending cuts, experts have warned.
As a result of higher inflation, councils are expected to have a cumulative budget deficit of £7.3bn by 2025-26, according to analysis from Grant Thornton – an increase of £4.6bn since forecasts made at the beginning of this year.
The firm said that although reserves were bolstered by more than £5bn in 2020-21 due to higher government funding, these balances will “continue to unwind through the long tail of Covid-19” with close to 60 councils forecast to use all earmarked and unallocated reserves next year.
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Councils have urged Liz Truss to delay the introduction of Boris Johnson’s cap on the cost of social care, saying they can find neither the staff nor the money to implement it. People will face longer waits and worse care because it is “unworkable” to introduce reforms next year as planned, local authority chiefs said.
Truss has pledged to press ahead with her predecessor’s plan to impose a lifetime £86,000 cap on the amount people pay for care and introduce a more generous means test offering help to those with assets below £100,000. However, she has scrapped the national insurance rise introduced to fund the measure.
The County Councils Network is urging the prime minister to delay the measure for a year beyond the planned
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Ministers should push back reforms aimed at capping the lifetime cost of care by 12 month due to rising inflation, council leaders have said.
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Landlords have warned that the Government’s plans to cap rents for social housing will undermine efforts to make homes safer and greener.
The Government is currently consulting on proposals to introduce ceilings on increases to rents for social and affordable homes in 2023/24.
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The number of Ukrainian families who are presenting as homeless to English councils has increased by 22 per cent in a single month, leading the LGA to call for “urgent solutions” from government. Some 1,915 Ukrainian households who are homeless or at risk of homelessness have turned to local authorities since 24 February, with 350 families seeking help in the past month alone. LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson said he was “deeply concerned” about the growing number of Ukrainians presenting as homeless and, in particular, “the significant rise in the number of those who arrived through the Homes for Ukraine scheme.”
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Households will be offered up to £1,000 to approve provisional fracking in their area under a plan backed by government ministers to secure local consent. It is proposed that companies which want to drill for shale gas to go door-to-door to convince residents to green-light the move and could offer cash incentives, with exploratory drilling allowed to go ahead if more than 50 per cent of households in the local vicinity give their approval.
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Local government could soon reach a point where it should disengage from competitions for fragmented pots of Whitehall funding, an economic development conference has heard.
Delegates at yesterday’s Institute of Economic Development event raised concerns about councils having to prepare bids for government initiatives that failed to address the determinants of local growth in a strategic way.
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"Stealthy" freezes to tax and welfare thresholds will outweigh any benefits people will get from the government's plan to cut taxes, according to economists.
Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng announced a raft of measures in his mini-budget last month, including cutting the basic rate of income tax by 1p and reversing the increase to National Insurance, brought in earlier this year to pay for health and social care.
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England's county councils have urged the government to delay its social care reforms, warning of serious staffing and financial pressures on services.
Changes designed to help people cover their personal care costs are due to come into effect in October 2023.
The changes include a more generous means-test and a lifetime cap on care costs of £86,000.
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Cambridgeshire County Council has joined councils across the country urging the government to 'properly fund' adult social care and its reforms.
The County Councils Network (CCN), which represents Cambridgeshire and 36 other councils, has warned that drastically underfunded services face a “perfect storm” of staffing shortages this winter, less availability of care beds, and higher costs.
Their warning comes as new analysis from the CCN reveals that councils in England are set to face £3.7bn in additional costs in 2023 compared to 2021 to keep services at current levels, due to rising inflation, wage increases, and demand.
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We are inevitably going to be in a period of stagflation, and there is nothing government can do at this late stage,” says economist and former Cabinet secretary Lord Gus O’Donnell. It is a sobering analysis, especially for those who remember the last painful bout of stagnant economic growth and high inflation.
“[In the early 1970s], there was an underlying shock, not too different from what we have seen now, coming from commodity prices – and then wages started rising, and that spilled into inflation,” recalls Morten Ravn, professor of macroeconomics at UCL. Higher prices in turn stoked calls for further pay rises, creating a vicious circle.
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The “large and unfunded fiscal package” announced by Kwasi Kwarteng last month has been cited as one of the main reasons ratings agency Fitch cut its outlook for the UK’s credit rating to “negative”, meaning it expects to make a downgrade.
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https://www.publicfinance.co.uk/news/2022/10/government-plans-hampered-opaque-and-stealthy-taxes?utm_source=Adestra&utm_medium=email&utm_term=
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06 OCTOBER 2022 BY JESSICA HILL
Changes are expected to be made to the levelling up and regeneration bill to reflect Liz Truss’s focus on ‘growth’, with concerns levelling up may now take a backseat.
The bill was put forward by the previous administration and championed by former communities secretary Michael Gove, but under his replacement Simon Clarke, amendments are expected to be made to include the investment zones announced in the chancellor’s mini budget.
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A district council has won a temporary high court injunction against a hotel, preventing it from housing asylum seekers on behalf of the Home Office.
Great Yarmouth BC took the action after learning from residents that the Home Office was planning to move asylum seekers into the Hotel Embassy. They argued using hotels to house asylum seekers was counter to their economic strategy of making the seaside resort a year-round tourist destination.
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Audit fees in local government in England are expected to rise by 150% for the 2023/24 accounts according to the outcome of the procurement programme announced today by Public Sector Audit Appointments (PSAA).
The PSAA said that it understood that this “dramatic increase” in total audit fees would represent a “significant funding challenge” for local bodies already facing a range of financial pressures.
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The UK is at a “significant risk” of experiencing gas shortages this winter, according to Ofgem. The industry regulator said due to the ongoing war in Ukraine, the country could enter a “gas supply emergency”, leading to supplies being cut to power stations which use gas to generate electricity. Gas-fired power stations currently generate between 40 and 60 per cent of the UK’s electricity.
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More than eight million people will receive a cost-of-living payment of £324 in November, as part of the £650 grant to help low-income households cope with rising food and energy bills, the Government has confirmed. The payments will be automatic for those on certain benefits, including universal credit and pension credit, and will arrive in accounts between 8 and 23 November, according to the Department for Work and Pensions.
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The final list of firms that can sign off accounts has been confirmed by Public Sector Audit Appointments but fees will increase next year.
CIPFA and ICAEW backed the announcement but warned the cost increases would need to be looked at by the government.
Only six auditors will be competing for business out of 10 potential suppliers.
The PSAA said this was due to the challenging backcloth of a troubled audit profession, a turbulent market and a local audit system that is facing unprecedented difficulties including large volumes of delayed audit opinions.
But there was also a warning that work to improve the quality of accounts will need to happen as fees could increase by up to 150%.
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Liz Truss has promised to “level up Britain the Conservative way” and “bolster social care” in her speech to the Conservative party conference this morning.
Addressing a full hall in Birmingham, the prime minister said the government’s proposed new investment zones would be central to achieving levelling up.
But though she began her speech by paying tribute to West Midlands CA mayor Andy Street as a “human dynamo” and Tees Valley CA mayor Ben Houchen she did not mention devolution or creating any new metro mayors. She also committed to “bringing down debt as a proportion of our national income”.
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After 24 hours of confusion, the Treasury has confirmed that it has brought forward the publication date of long-awaited financial plans.
The economic forecasts could be published later this month.
This is despite both Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng and PM Liz Truss saying that the publication date is 23 November.
That was the date announced by the chancellor in the wake of his mini-budget 12 days ago.
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There will be no fair funding review during this spending review period, the local government minister has said.
Paul Scully was speaking at Conservative Party Conference at a fringe event held by London Councils.
First promised in 2016, by then communities secretary, Greg Clark, the fair funding review is set to ensure a fairer formula for the allocation of funding from the government.
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The government shelved plans for a new spending review this year due to a lack of time, the chancellor has said.
Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng was speaking fringe event during the Conservative Party Conference, hosted by the Institute for Economic Affairs and the Tax Payers Alliance.
Responding to a question from LGC as to why the new spending review had been canceled despite rising inflationary costs, Mr Kwarteng said the government would be sticking with the spending review package of 2021.
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Schools and hospitals must find a whopping £11bn of cuts after the chancellor refused to protect their budgets from rampant inflation, experts say.
Kwasi Kwarteng is being warned that his decision to stick to 2021 spending allocations – despite prices now rising by 10 per cent – spells bad news “for stretched public services”.
The chancellor sparked fresh fears when he confirmed he has rejected pleas to reopen the settlement, saying it was vital to “stick within the envelope of the CSR [the Comprehensive Spending Review]”.
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The first preliminary hearing of the UK’s public inquiry on COVID-19 will begin later today. The inquiry started informally in the summer, and the day-one hearing had originally been scheduled for September but was delayed after the death of Queen Elizabeth II. The first preliminary hearing is considered a significant milestone for the families who lost loved ones to the virus, and will focus on the UK’s pandemic preparedness before 2020.
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Formal political negotiations have still not yet started on the trailblazer devolution deals, with the government instead pouring its energy into investment zones and devolution discussions with other areas.
In February the government made a pledge to open negotiations on trailblazer deals to deepen devolution with the West Midlands and Greater Manchester combined authorities. These would act as “the blueprint for other mayoral combined authorities to follow” according to the levelling up white paper.
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Frontline services and regeneration projects are under greater threat with inflationary pressures predicted to cost metropolitan and unitary authorities at least an extra £1bn next year.
Today the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities (Sigoma) warned that councils are already cutting back on regeneration projects and looking to cut services. A survey of members suggests things have deteriorated since June.
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If the government is going to tear up the ‘economic orthodoxy’ it should also tear up the corresponding orthodoxy that has characterised centralism, writes a local government researcher.
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The skills minister said she is “not a proponent of elected mayors” and has opposed the idea of giving more powers over post-16 education budgets to mayoral combined authorities.
Andrea Jenkyns, who has been skills minister since July, was speaking at a fringe event at the Conservative party conference.
During the conference Tory mayors Ben Houchen and Andy Street have been called for more powers over skills in their areas.
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Senior parliamentary figures fear that recent changes at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities mean roles have been demoted, while the department itself has been described as having been "downgraded".
The former head of the civil service Lord Bob Kerslake (crossbench) and the influential Tory MP Bob Blackman both raised their concerns to LGC about local government as well as housing and planning issues losing their influence under the current DLUHC team.
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Councils fear growing pressure from people in need of support under the new full dispersal scheme for asylum seekers.
Regional partnerships have been asked to submit plans for the scheme, which aims to ensure the number of asylum seekers is spread around the country.
All local authority areas in England, Scotland and Wales became an asylum dispersal area by default in April as the Home Office tries to increase the number of suitable properties that can be procured for destitute asylum seekers.
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Kwasi Kwarteng’s hastily rewritten speech at the Conservative Party conference was packed with mentions of growth and the need to bring down the UK tax burden, but commentators have expressed concern over his fiscal plans.
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Liz Truss is preparing to push ahead with an unlimited number of Investment Zones despite concerns within government about uncosted tax breaks for businesses, it is reported. The Treasury is believed to have raised concerns about the potential liability of not capping the number of areas allowed to get favourable tax and planning treatment, with the Government about to announce an appeal for areas to apply within days.
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People who have provided a home to Ukrainian refugees in Hampshire are being given extra money to cover rising winter costs. Hampshire County Council said it would pay residents hosting families an extra £200 per month for five months, to help hosts who may be facing cost-of-living pressures, with about 1,100 families who have fled Ukraine having been supported by households in the county.
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The Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng has confirmed the Government is reversing the proposed scrapping of the 45p rate of income tax on people earning more than £150,000 a year.
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Public Sector Audit Appointments said total fees may increase by £75m from £50m in 2022-23 to £125m in 2023-24. PSAA chair Steve Freer admitted the increase in audit fees was ‘dramatic’ and the body did not have ‘levers to mitigate the very significant increase in audit fees anticipated in 12 months’ time’.
A PSAA spokesperson said: ‘At this stage our advice to bodies is to anticipate a major reset of total fees for 2023-24 involving an increase in the order of 150% on the total fees for 2022-23... We appreciate that the extent of this likely increase in audit fees will pose a significant funding challenge for local bodies already facing a daunting range of financial pressures.’
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Britain has lived in a “fool’s paradise” for too long and must reduce public spending to help to fund the government’s £45 billion worth of tax cuts, a senior cabinet minister has warned.
Simon Clarke, the levelling-up secretary and a key ally of Liz Truss, criticised the “very large welfare state” and said Whitehall departments would have to “trim the fat”.
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The cost of living crisis is forcing healthcare workers to walk away from the NHS in pursuit of better-paid jobs, trust leaders have warned.
As energy, food and transport costs rise, staff are skipping meals to feed their children or taking on second jobs, with some also struggling to make the journey to work, according to a new survey of NHS trusts in England.
Health workers are turning to the hospitality or retail sectors, placing further strain on an already overburdened NHS, leaders say. Two-thirds of surveyed trusts “report a significant or severe impact from staff leaving”, with services struggling to respond to rising operational pressures.
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Prime Minister Liz Truss and Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng will hold talks with the Office for Budget Responsibility today following the ongoing economic fallout of the budget announcements last week. The Government has said it would not reopen funding settlements announced in the Spending Review last year to address rising cost pressures on the public sector and has asked government department to find efficiency savings, leading to fears over further cuts to local services. LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson said, without government support to meet extra cost pressures faced by local government, councils face huge financial uncertainty and will need to make “severe cuts” to services. He said: “Those cuts will have to start before next year, because you can’t do them overnight on April 1. That will mean that we will be reducing our services that everybody sees. That may be a leisure centre, that may be less fixing of roads. But we will also have to reduce the services to some of the most vulnerable because they represent the biggest cost factor.”
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The Government’s long-promised white paper on health inequalities has reportedly been cancelled by Thérèse Coffey, Health Secretary. The document, which was due to set out plans to address the inequalities in health exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, narrowing the gap in health outcomes in England, will reportedly not be published. The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) denied that any decision has been made on the white paper.
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The government’s ‘Growth Plan’ risks weakening public finances, worsening inequality and leading to the Bank of England aggressively raising interest rates, major international institutions have warned.
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The government is likely to make tens of billions of pounds of spending cuts in the next few years to meet its fiscal targets, following its market-spooking package of tax cuts, a panel at a think-tank event heard.
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Setting up investment zones could help the UK compete with Europe for investment post Brexit, but additional central government funding is likely to be required, senior council officers hoping to secure one for their city have told LGC.
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The Treasury has said the forecast it will receive from the Office for Budget Responsibility in October will not be published until late November, resisting calls to release it earlier in an attempt to calm the markets.
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Low-income homes in England are to have their energy efficiency improved under a £1.5bn government plan that will also address poor insulation.
The funding is being made available to local authorities and social housing providers with the aim of upgrading 130,000 homes.
Wall and loft insulation, double glazing, heat pumps and solar panels are all measures that could be funded.
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Ministers will be told to make efficiency savings in their departments in a bid to balance the budget, as anger among Tory MPs over last week’s mini-Budget grows.
Chris Philp, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, will write to all government departments in the coming days to demand they look for cuts in a bid to calm the markets and restore the strength of the pound.
The move comes despite pledges by Liz Truss during the Tory leadership contest that public spending would not be reduced.
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A network of councils in England is warning support services for families hit hardest by the cost of living crisis face being axed amid an unexpected £400m bill caused by soaring inflation.
Services that district councils have no legal obligation to provide – such as debt and benefits advice, hardship funds for families, homelessness prevention projects and help hubs for people facing poverty – are under threat.
Other discretionary services, including the running of leisure centres and swimming pools, parks, museums and theatres, also face closure or reduced opening hours as rising energy and wage costs force them to pare back services to a legal minimum, the District Councils’ Network (DCN) said.
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Council leaders have expressed concern over the cancellation of this year’s spending review as it means many local authorities could face “difficult decisions this winter”.
During her Conservative leadership campaign, prime minister Liz Truss promised a spending review for this year. However, reports suggest that the government has backtracked on these commitments.
Cllr Sir Stephen Houghton, chair of the Specialist Interest Group of Municipal Authorities (SIGOMA), told Room151 that the cancellation of this year’s spending review “is very concerning”.
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The cost of local authority borrowing from the Public Works Loan Board (PWLB) has increased significantly following the financial uncertainty of the past two weeks.
On 28 September, fixed interest rates on a 1-year loan were 5.31%, compared to 3.98% on 14 September. This is a dramatic increase from interest rates of 1.17% seen at this time last year.
In addition, before chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng announced the mini-budget on 23 September, interest rates were set at 4.33%. The event introduced the biggest tax cuts in 50 years, which included the abolition of the 45% top rate of income tax.
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More than 40% of available mortgages have been withdrawn from the market since the UK government announced its mini-budget on Friday, figures show.
Lenders began suspending products on Monday as they struggled to price them amid the uncertainty on financial markets – and the volatility and number of offers being removed have snowballed this week.
The latest data from Moneyfacts, which monitors the sector, revealed on Thursday that another 321 mortgages had been withdrawn overnight, taking the total to 1,621, with 2,340 remaining on sale. During the previous 24-hour period, 935 packages were pulled, double the previous record of 462 at the start of the pandemic lockdowns.
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Senior figures have warned that looming Whitehall efficiency savings are likely to mean cuts to the local government finance grant and other funding pots.
Chief secretary to the Treasury Chris Philp told ITV’s Peston show that he had instructed all government departments "look for efficiencies wherever they can find them”.
Rob Whiteman, the chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy, told LGC the implications are “we will likely see funding pots cut back”, and “what little grant still in the system further trimmed”.
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Senior figures have warned that looming Whitehall efficiency savings are likely to mean cuts to the local government finance grant and other funding pots.
Chief secretary to the Treasury Chris Philp told ITV’s Peston show that he had instructed all government departments "look for efficiencies wherever they can find them”.
Rob Whiteman, the chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy, told LGC the implications are “we will likely see funding pots cut back”, and “what little grant still in the system further trimmed”.
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The International Monetary Fund has launched a stinging attack on the UK’s tax-cutting plans and called on Liz Truss’s government to reconsider them to prevent stoking inequality.
In rare public criticism of a leading global economy, the Washington-based fund said Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget risked undermining the efforts of the Bank of England to tackle rampant inflation amid the cost of living emergency.
It said a statement planned by Kwarteng for 23 November presented an “opportunity for the UK government to consider ways to provide support that is more targeted and reevaluate the tax measures, especially those that benefit high income earners”.
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Every primary school child in England will have access to a free breakfast under plans unveiled by Labour.
Labour's education spokesperson Bridget Phillipson said breakfast clubs across England would be funded by returning the top rate of income tax to 45%.
Ms Phillipson said breakfast clubs would be the "first step on the road to a modern childcare system".
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Foster carers have called for more support to help with the cost-of-living crisis and warned an impending shortage of carers is likely to be ‘financially ruinous’ for local authorities.
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A Labour government would give councils and combined authorities additional powers, as well as look at giving regions more control over income tax, the party leadership revealed during its annual conference.
Shadow levelling up secretary Lisa Nandy told a fringe event this week that Labour is exploring the devolution of a percentage of income tax as well as responsibility for skills policy and transport while also ensuring there was a right to 'universal basic infrastructure' everywhere.
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The chancellor’s silence on public service funding was deafening amid tax cuts and increased borrowing, writes the chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy.
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Social care is so underfunded it has become an “emergency service” when it could deliver more in terms of prevention and support, Labour conference heard.
Lack of funding for adult social care is leading to high turnover in the workforce and little time to address long-term issues, a director from the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services told a fringe event yesterday.
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Members of Unison have voted almost 2:1 in favour of accepting the final pay offer from the National Employers for Local Government Services, averting the prospect of extensive strikes across councils this winter.
Unison’s members voted by 64% to 37% to accept the offer of a £1,925 pay rise from April 2022, which equates to a 10.5% increase for the lowest paid staff and 4% for the highest paid. The turnout was 34%.
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The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has confirmed the ministerial portfolios of the four new ministers who have joined the department since prime minister Liz Truss’s cabinet reshuffle.
Dehenna Davison, a parliamentary under secretary of state at DLUHC has been appointed the minister for levelling up.
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The collapse of the value of the pound in the wake of Friday's mini-budget appears to have stalled, for now, but only thanks to market expectations that the Bank of England will be forced to intervene.
The rout for sterling, which began after Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng revealed a £45bn tax cut plan on top of government aid for energy bills, was a consequence of concern over the levels of borrowing required.
It essentially called in to question the confidence the market had for sustainable public finances in the UK, pushing up the rates demanded by investors to hold UK bonds - government IOUs - which will be used to fund the growth plan.
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The decline in the value of the pound has steadied due to market expectations that the Bank of England will intervene. The pound hit an all-time low versus the dollar of $1.0327 early on Monday but had settled around $1.0767 early on Tuesday.
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A Tory MP from Cumbria has said he will look to lay an amendment to the levelling up and regeneration bill urging the government to “use reserve powers to impose devolution” on areas with “unnecessary opposition”.
Carlisle MP John Stevenson (Con) said he would look to lay the amendment in the Autumn with the hope of supporting areas where there is some resistance to devolution but “broader support more generally”.
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Around 40 councils are set to receive funding to tackle their spiralling high needs deficits in return for implementing a strict reform plan as part of the government’s ‘safety valve’ programme, LGC understands.
With another 55 councils with less severe deficits already receiving support via the separate Delivering Better Value in Send programme, this means almost two thirds of local authorities with Send responsibiities will be part of a government programme aimed at slashing deficits now reported to amount to more than £2bn.
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Councils face further budget cuts after the government reportedly shelved plans for this year’s spending review.
The last spending review, which took place last year, set out the envelope for public spending over a three-year period but during her leadership campaign, the prime minister Liz Truss promised a new spending review this year. She has now backtracked on these commitments, The Times today reported.
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Under Labour councils could expect a three-year finance settlement and greater flexibility, the shadow levelling up secretary said yesterday.
The commitment comes amid fears the government will not honour a pledge Michael Gove made when he was levelling up secretary to give councils a two-year settlement. Meanwhile, it was reported today by The Times that the government has backtracked on the promise of a new spending review this year, putting further doubts on long term certainty being offered to councils this year.
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Around 40 councils are set to receive funding to tackle their spiralling high needs deficits in return for implementing a strict reform plan as part of the government’s ‘safety valve’ programme, LGC understands.
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During the Conservative Party leadership contest, Liz Truss pledged to hold a new Spending Review, just a year into the current three-year funding envelope.
Last year’s funding increases were based on inflation estimates that proved to be well below the mark, meaning rising prices have cut into the budgets in real terms, leaving them far less generous than intended.
However, the Treasury confirmed on Monday that the government is “sticking to spending settlements for this Spending Review period”.
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County councils are pressing for more progress on devolution amid suggestions talks have stalled in some areas.
The County Councils' Network (CCN) called for deals for the first cohort of areas to be completed by the end of November.
It has also asked the Government to commit to beginning talks with at least two-thirds of CCN’s 36 council areas by the end of this Parliament.
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Millions of public sector workers face a two-year pay squeeze before the general election after Kwasi Kwarteng said he would go further in cutting taxes.
The government has abandoned plans for a new spending review, despite forecasts that inflation may remain in double figures for the next year. This means that public sector workers will have real-term pay cuts before 2024 and schools and hospitals will have to make tough choices about budgets.
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The use of pre-recorded evidence of victims and witnesses to crimes has been introduced at crown courts in England and Wales.
The Ministry of Justice said that from Monday the technology would be available at a final 20 crown courts in Buckinghamshire, Cambridgeshire, East Anglia, Essex, London and the south-east, marking the end of a national rollout.
The recording of evidence as close to the time of the offence as possible while memories remain fresh will help victims avoid the stress of giving evidence under the full glare of a live trial setting, which many find traumatic.
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A Labour Government would oversee the ‘biggest wave of insourcing for a generation,’ deputy leader Angela Rayner has said.
In a speech at the party’s annual conference yesterday, Ms Rayner said Labour would raise standards by ‘clawing back the public’s money from those who fail to deliver for taxpayers’ and ‘striking off failed providers’ to ensure failure was not rewarded.
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The war in Ukraine has fundamentally upended European security. There has been no bigger shock to the global order since the Second World War – the ramifications will be with us for a very long time.
The unprecedented global sanctions on Russia, not to mention the equally unprecedented flow of Western weaponry into Ukraine, mean we are now in uncharted territory. Add soaring inflation and food and energy shortages to this unpredictable situation, and we are left with a volatile mix of pressures.
Uncertainty and disruption are two factors that have often helped to shape the public sector into what we understand it to be today. In the UK, the NHS was born out of the conflict and suffering of the Second World War, and now epitomises what we think of when we talk about public services.
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The chancellor’s reset at the Treasury will need more than a new permanent secretary to succeed, according to former senior policy adviser at the Treasury and current principal consultant at Metro Dynamics JP Spencer.
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Tax cuts in Friday’s ‘fiscal event’ are set to raise UK government borrowing by more than £30bn – more than half of the total increase in borrowing since the Office for Budget Responsibility last released a forecast, economists have claimed.
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New Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng has unveiled a mini-Budget aimed at boosting the economy and growing his way out of the country’s financial woes.
At the heart of the plans, the Chancellor revealed he is already in negotiations with 38 local and combined authorities to create investment zones.
The investment zones, including plans in Tees Valley, South Yorkshire, the West Midlands, West of England and Norfolk, will see ‘targeted and time limited’ tax cuts for business. They will also see ‘liberalised’ planning rules’ to free up land for housing and commercial sites.
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The Government is in ‘early discussions with nearly 40 places’ including Tees Valley and the West Midlands about creating new Investment Zones offering tax cuts for businesses, the chancellor has confirmed.
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Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng today confirmed that the National Insurance (NI) rise put in place by his predecessor will be reversed and a planned levy to fund social care will be dropped.
Since April, workers and employers have paid an extra 1.25p in the pound in NI payments to help fund the NHS and social care.
Former Chancellor Rishi Sunak had planned for NI to go back to its old rate next April, to be replaced by a new Health and Social Care Levy at a rate of 1.25%.
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New chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng has pledged to accelerate a long list of infrastructure projects, including the Stonehenge road tunnel, and raised the prospect of planning and regulatory reform.
Mr Kwarteng’s Growth Plan 2022 provides a long list of infrastructure projects the Government intents to prioritise for acceleration across transport and infrastructure.
It also pledges ‘reforms to accelerate roads delivery, including by consenting more through the Highways Act 1980 and by considering options for changing the Judicial Review system to avoid claims which cause unnecessary delays to delivery’.
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Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng has announced the end of IR35 rules from next April in this morning's highly anticipated 'mini-Budget'.
It means workers providing their services via an intermediary, such as a personal service company, will be responsible for determining their employment status and paying the correct tax.
Mr Kwarteng said the aim was to 'simplify' off-payroll working rules by repealing the 2017 and 2021 IR35 reforms.
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The Treasury has promised to reduce the number of different funding pots for local growth because the bidding system has become “onerous” for councils, as part of today’s mini budget.
The document accompanying the chancellor’s statement this morning, says: “The government has invested in local growth through a wide range of competitions and grants, but recognises that the sheer number of different funds has become onerous for some councils to navigate and deliver.
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Health secretary Thérèse Coffey has announced a £500m adult social care discharge fund, describing it as a “down payment on the rebalancing of funding across health and social care”.
However, it is not yet clear whether the funding will go to councils directly. The government’s Plan for Patients, published this afternoon, says the funding “can be used flexibly by local health and care systems” to target the “areas facing the greatest challenges” and strengthen the sector’s ability to recruit and retain staff.
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Repealing reforms to off-payroll working rules could lead to a return of “widespread non-compliance and significant loss of tax revenues”, compliance experts have said.
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A watchdog has questioned the ‘resilience’ of councils to run future elections.
The Electoral Commission’s report on this year’s polls found they were ‘well run’ and voters were ‘highly satisfied’ but the 'resilience of electoral administration teams remains a concern’.
It also warned of the implications of the Elections Act coming into force shortly before future polls.
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Communities should not bear the risk of this Government's growth gamble.
The Truss Government is embarking on a huge national fiscal experiment to drive down taxes and regulation in the belief this will automatically drive up growth. The trouble is, communities are yet to recover from the last big top-down economic gamble that was forced upon them: austerity.
Experts from the International Monetary Fund to the Institute for Fiscal Studies have cast doubt on the underlying economic assumptions of Truss’s plans.
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In his ‘Growth Plan’, Kwasi Kwarteng announced he will reverse reforms to the rules, known as IR35, enacted in 2017 and 2021, allowing workers who provide services through an intermediary company to determine their own employment status – effectively letting them choose what rate of income tax and national insurance to pay.
The Treasury said the move “will free up time and money for businesses that engage contractors, that could be put towards other priorities”.
But the Association of Taxation Technicians said that without putting more money into HMRC’s compliance work the government risks missing out on revenue and letting people cheat the system.
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The government has not decided how to distribute the £500m adult social care discharge fund, LGC can reveal.
Health secretary, Thérèse Coffey, announced the fund in a House of Commons statement yesterday as part of a new Plan for Patients.
She said: “The local NHS will be working with councils with targeted plans on specific care packages to support people being either in their own home or in the wider community.
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Investment zones 'another set of funding hoops to jump through’
The government hopes new investment zones will drive growth by through lower taxes and less regulation of planning frameworks. This has received a cautious welcome from the sector, with the caveat lots of questions now need answering.
Jonathan Carr-West, chief executive of the Local Government Information Unit (LGIU) said the focus on investment zones was for local government, “the most striking manifestation” of the government’s new approach of lower taxes and streamlining regulation.
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Health Secretary Thérèse Coffey is due to announce plans today to cut GP waiting times, enable people to be discharged from hospital more quickly, improve access to dental care and reduce ambulance backlogs as part of her Our Plan for Patients initiative. The plans include easier same day access to GP appointments. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, said: “Urgent support is needed for social care ahead of what is likely to be a very difficult winter. Comprehensive funding of adult social care will not only alleviate pressure on the NHS but will mean thousands of people are able to live an equal life.”
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Reports have suggested that the Prime Minster will announce plans tomorrow to roll together levelling up funds into a single pot to encourage economic growth. Combining levelling up funds into a single pot is being examined as part of government plans to create up to 40 “investment zones” across the UK that would entice companies by offering low business taxes and light-touch environmental and planning regulations.
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The Chancellor could announce changes to benefit rules for some part-time workers, requiring them to work longer hours or take steps to increase their earnings, reports suggest. The new rule will require Universal Credit claimants working up to 15 hours a week to take new steps to increase their earnings or face having their benefits reduced, in an attempt to increase economic activity among the over 50’s.
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The hourly rates for the Real Living Wage are rising by £1 to £10.90 across the UK and by 90p to £11.95 in London with immediate effect. The 10.1 per cent rise, which was brought forward from November, is the biggest in the scheme's 10-year history.
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Up and down the country finance departments are issuing stark warnings about their ability to balance budgets. Kirsty Weakley reports
Budget-setting season feels like a distant memory. Since February England have won a major football tournament, the UK has been asked to host Eurovision, there have been two prime ministers (with three levelling up secretaries), and inflation has spiralled to levels not seen for decades.
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The government plans to extend the committee stage of the Levelling Up & Regeneration Bill, amid speculation about major changes to the legislation.
The bill's committee stage was due to conlcude this week but Commons' papers show this has now been extended until 20 October.
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Kwasi Kwarteng will tighten benefit rules for part-time workers, requiring them to work longer hours or take steps to increase their earnings.
The new rule will require benefit claimants working up to 15 hours a week to take new steps to increase their earnings or face having their benefits reduced. The current threshold is nine hours, though it was increased this summer to 12 hours, which will come into force next week.
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The LGA has called on the new prime minister to honour her promise to put £13 billion into social care, as government confirms plans to scrap the newly introduced national insurance levy. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board said: “The new PM can make a dramatic improvement to the lives of hundreds of thousands of people by delivering on this promise. This injection of funds is exactly what the sector needs to come back fighting fit and ensure it is stable and effective in these turbulent times.”
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The Government has announced £500 million to help the social care sector with discharging hospital patients as part of it’s Plan for Patients. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board said: “Adult social care will remain in a crisis state until a comprehensive plan is in place to fully fund the care needed. Councils and care providers cannot continue relying on last minute, short term allocations of funding.”
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‘Deteriorating senior officer and member relationships over a number of years’ has been a theme in the latest tranche of auditor interventions, a report by Grant Thornton has found.
The report, which looked at a range of interventions including section 114 notices at Slough and Northumberland councils, found officers had been ‘pushed out of the organisation and paid off with non-disclosure agreements and severance payments, which were designed to circumvent transparency and governance’.
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Councils are facing deep cuts to services in order to cover ‘staggering’ budget gaps.
Leicestershire CC is bracing for an overspend of £28m next year - a figure expected to rise to £140m by 2026.
Council leader Nicholas Rushton said services faced average cost inflation increases of 10% to 15% and the scale of cuts required to balance the books would be ‘terrifying politically to get through’.
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The former head of the civil service has warned of a looming “catastrophic” homelessness crisis caused by the cost of living, unless the Government reintroduces the eviction ban which protected tenants during the COVID-19 pandemic. Sir Bob Kerslake, who chairs the Kerslake Commission on Homelessness and Rough Sleeping, said a failure to act “could see this become a homelessness as well as an economic crisis.” LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson said councils share the Commission’s concerns. He said: “It is right in calling for us to draw on the successes seen during the pandemic, where councils supported thousands of people sleeping rough off the streets into safe accommodation.”
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Adult social care in England is in serious crisis, councils have warned the Government, as it faces funding gaps and growing staffing shortages which has brought many local care providers to the brink of collapse. The intervention by the County Councils Network comes amid widespread local government concern over the increasing fragile state of social care after a recent acceleration of care costs, fuelled by unexpected wage and energy inflation.
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The Treasury will not publish a forecast of the UK's economic outlook alongside this Friday's mini-Budget. Independent forecaster the Office for Budget Responsibility has already provided a draft to Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng, it is reported, ahead of the announcement which is expected to see the Government reverse a rise in National Insurance and cancel a planned increase in corporation tax, which reports say could cost £30 billion.
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Nearly 90,000 more people died at home from non-Covid causes during the pandemic, leading to fears that some could not access medical treatment or passed away without pain relief. Latest figures from the Office for National Statistics show that there was a 30.2 per cent increase in deaths in private homes between March 2020 and June 2022, while at the same time, the number of people dying in hospital and hospices for non-Covid reasons fell by nearly 95,000, suggesting that most of those who died at home would ordinarily have been taken in for care
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Many UK firms taking part in a four-day working week trial have said they will keep it in place after the pilot ends. More than 70 firms are taking part in the scheme where employees get 100 per cent pay for 80 per cent of their normal hours worked and at the halfway point in a six-month trial, data shows that productivity has been maintained or improved at the majority of firms.
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Everyone who stays overnight in Wales, whether in a hotel, holiday cottage or campsite, may face a “visitor levy” under a proposed Welsh government scheme. It could result in almost all visitors – including Welsh residents staying away from home – being taxed for their stays, which the Welsh Government says would raise money that local authorities will be able to reinvest to improve tourist spots and engender a feeling of “shared responsibility” between residents and visitors.
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Organisations in the public sector are to receive help from the government with energy costs, alongside households and businesses.
By working with energy suppliers, the Energy Bill Relief Scheme plans to reduce costs by provide discounts in wholesale gas and electricity prices for all non-domestic customers. Businesses, charities, and public sector organisations including schools will fall into this category and will not need to take any action, with the discount automatically being applied to bills.
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The council tax on second homes in North Yorkshire could double in a move aimed at tackling the housing crisis, the county council has announced.
Senior councillors from North Yorkshire County Council yesterday decided that those who own second homes in the area will see a 100% rise in their council tax within the next two years.
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The cost-of-living crisis is likely to have a ‘catastrophic’ impact on homelessness and so should be treated with the same level of urgency as the pandemic, the Prime Minister has been told.
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The cost-of-living crisis could add £3.7bn to the costs of delivering adult social care, the County Councils Network has warned.
Calling on the prime minister to follow through on pledges of more funding made during her leadership campaign, the network said councils face an “extremely challenging” 18 months.
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Two more ministers have joined the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities, as the new prime minister Liz Truss continues to make appointments following the end of the mourning period.
Lee Rowley, a parliamentary under secretary of state at DLUHC, has been named as the new housing minister. Mr Rowley will be the 13th housing minister since 2010 and the fourth person in the role in 2022 alone.
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The Government’s new package of energy bill support for councils is ‘too little, too late,’ trade union Unison has warned.
Local authorities had been facing eye-watering rises in energy costs while needing to continue delivering essential services.
Ministers said the new scheme could roughly halve the price paid for wholesale gas and electricity by non-domestic customers such as councils.
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The prospect of a Treasury bailout for cash-strapped local authority budgets has faded further with the latest public finance figures showing a record level of borrowing.
Latest Office for National Statistics figures showed that in August interest was £8.2bn - the highest figure since monthly records began in 1997 and £1.5bn more than in August 2021.
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The nation has paid a final farewell to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, with a state funeral and military procession. World leaders and foreign royalty joined His Majesty King Charles III and the Royal Family in the congregation at Westminster Abbey yesterday. Hundreds of thousands of people also lined the streets as the coffin was taken to Windsor where she was laid to rest.
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An article looks ahead to Friday’s mini-Budget, where the Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng will outline plans to deliver promises made by Prime Minister Liz Truss during her Conservative leadership campaign to cut taxes. The mini-Budget is expected to reverse a 1.25 per cent increase in National Insurance and scrap a 6 per cent rise in corporation tax at a cost of £30 billion. It is also reported a cut in the basic rate of income tax is being considered.
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Leicestershire CC has warned that inflation could lead to a £140m shortfall in four years’ time with the council now looking at what services it could cut next year.
A report published today setting out the financial challenges facing the council says that the budget gap is expected to grow from £8m to £28m next year, rising to up to £140m by 2026.
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Some councils are scaling back their traditional Christmas lights switch on ceremonies this winter amid rising energy cost concerns.
Guildford BC which is currently predicting a net revenue overspend of more than £3m, much of which relates to utilities costs, said it could not "afford or justify" the cost of holding the same event as in previous years, and has scaled back its offering.
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District councils have been lobbying ministers to allow them to monetise the benefits of growth.
The use of tax increment financing (TIF), which allows local authorities to borrow money for infrastructure projects against the anticipated increase in future tax receipts, was among a taster of policy ideas the District Councils’ Network (DCN) has submitted to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.
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The National Audit Office (NAO) is resisting pressure from the sector to launch a review of the £2.6bn UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF), The MJ understands.
It is believed that members of the NAO’s local government reference panel, which is made up of members of treasurers’ societies and regional, membership and professional bodies from the sector, suggested there was scope to review the fund to help judge whether it makes a difference.
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The fees paid by councils for homecare are ‘significantly’ below the cost of recruiting and retaining a skilled workforce and delivering high-quality services, the Homecare Association warns.
Research by the UK’s membership body for homecare providers has revealed that the average fee rate paid for homecare in England by local authorities after 1 April 2022 was £19.01 per hour.
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Headteachers have raised alarm over school funding, with some parents urged to make donations and parent-teacher associations on standby to plug funding gaps for classroom essentials. School leaders have said money from PTA fundraising efforts will be needed to cover core costs rather than “nice to have” extras, as energy bills and wage costs rise.
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Inflation is affecting the Government’s ability to deliver its flagship £4.8 billion levelling up local regeneration programme, as soaring building costs force projects across Britain to be delayed, scaled back or potentially cancelled, councils warn. A District Councils Network membership survey this summer found that 40 per cent of respondents said the effects of inflation would force them to delay proposals, or make them unviable in their current form.
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Thurrock Council is almost three times more indebted to other councils than any other authority in England.
The latest government figures for the first quarter of the financial year show Thurrock has £941m outstanding in short term loans from other councils. This is nearly three times as much as the council that has the second highest amount of short-term loans from other councils, which is is Lancashire with £332m of loans.
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Most local authority maintained schools are reluctant to join a multi-academy trust (Mat) despite the government’s ambition to move to a fully-academised system, a survey of governors has found.
The schools white paper, published in March 2022, says the government wants “all schools to be in or joining a strong trust by 2030,” although a Department for Education official has since said “there are no plans to legislate for all schools to become academies”.
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Kwasi Kwarteng will deliver his emergency mini-budget to bring in winter tax cuts for millions of people and set out more detail on energy support next Friday, according to sources.
Although normal politics has been paralysed by the death of the Queen, the chancellor and his team have been putting the final touches to the budget with the aim of announcing it once the country emerges from national mourning.
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Over half of low-paid workers report using foodbanks during the last year, a new study of the impact of the cost-of-living crisis has revealed.
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The Government will announce plans to cut taxes as well as measures to mitigate the impact of the cost of living crisis in a fiscal event before the end of the month. The Commons will not sit again until September 20 at the earliest, the day after Her Majesty The Queen’s funeral. It is due to rise again on September 22 for the Labour and Conservative party conferences. MPs will not return to Westminster until October 17
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Inflation has fallen to 9.9 per cent, the first time the rate has fallen in nearly a year. Data from the Office for National Statistics showed petrol prices dropped by more than 14p a litre in August, although the cost of food is still increasing.
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Councils will have more freedom on spending funds from the infrastructure levy under a Government amendment to the Levelling Up Bill.
In one of his last acts as planning minister last week, Marcus Jones introduced the clause that will allow funds from the levy to be spent on ‘non-infrastructure matters’ such as ‘improving local services’.
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New Prime Minister Liz Truss has addressed her Conservative Government’s plan to tackle the ongoing energy crisis that threatens to damage the stability of households across the UK along with a commitment to support businesses, charities and public sector organisations with their energy costs this winter. It was announced that an average energy bill for a typical household will be capped to no more than £2,500 per annum for the next two years, commencing from 1st October.
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Buckinghamshire Council yesterday launched an appeal to raise extra funds to help vulnerable residents through the cost-of-living crisis.
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A charity has called for an ‘immediate increase’ in disability benefits and for more assistance with energy costs to help families with disabled children.
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Prime Minister Liz Truss should use any upcoming emergency budget to address the inflation cost pressures facing council budgets and the social care crisis, council chiefs say.
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Council pension funds should be wary of reducing employers’ contribution rates even if this year’s triennial valuation shows improved funding levels, the chair of the LGPS Advisory Board has warned.
The 86 LGPS funds in England and Wales underwent their three-yearly valuation in March, and the results are expected to show improved funding levels for most funds.
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Controversial plans to introduce traffic light ratings for the sector could be revived – this time by Whitehall, The MJ understands.
Prime Minister Liz Truss’ new local government secretary faces an early key decision on whether to push ahead with Michael Gove’s plans for a new watchdog – the Office for Local Government (Oflog).
As part of plans for the watchdog, it is believed Whitehall officials have floated the idea of a traffic light system.
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Dehenna Davison has joined the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities as parliamentary under secretary of state.
Further announcements about junior ministerial appointments were made yesterday afternoon, before the Queen’s death was announced. All normal parliamentary business has now been suspended.
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Queen Elizabeth II, the UK's longest-serving monarch, has died at Balmoral aged 96, after reigning for 70 years.
She died peacefully on Thursday afternoon at her Scottish estate, where she had spent much of the summer.
The Queen came to the throne in 1952 and witnessed enormous social change.
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This article was originally published in September 2021.
The U.K. government’s plan for what will happen in the days after the death of Queen Elizabeth II — codenamed Operation LONDON BRIDGE - is detailed below.
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New Prime Minister Liz Truss has addressed her Conservative Government’s plan to tackle the ongoing energy crisis that threatens to damage the stability of households across the UK along with a commitment to support businesses, charities and public sector organisations with their energy costs this winter. It was announced that an average energy bill for a typical household will be capped to no more than £2,500 per annum for the next two years, commencing from 1st October.
“HM Government will also support all business, charities and public sector organisations with their energy costs this winter, offering an equivalent guarantee for six months.”
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Funding local government is critical and must be a priority for the new ministerial team, its leaders have warned.
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Prime Minister Liz Truss has appointed her new cabinet, hours after taking over at 10 Downing Street.
For the first time none of the great offices of state is held by a white man, with Suella Braverman as home secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng as chancellor and James Cleverly as foreign secretary.
Here is a guide to the new faces and role changes.
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Thérèse Coffey is considering handing hundreds of millions of pounds to care homes to help free up hospital beds as part of her emergency plan to tackle the growing crisis in the NHS.
The new health secretary is examining proposals to pay care homes in England to look after patients who are medically fit to leave hospital but cannot be discharged because of a lack of social care.
Officials at the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) believe the scheme could tackle two major NHS problems at once, by freeing up some of the 13,000 hospital beds currently occupied by “delayed discharge” patients and improving handovers by ambulance crews to A&E staff.
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Criminals are cashing in on the energy crisis by offering bogus rebates to try and trick victims into handing over bank account details.
Police say in the past fortnight they've had nearly 1,600 reports of suspicious emails with links to malicious websites designed to steal personal and financial information.
The scam emails pretend to be from the energy regulator Ofgem and are headed "Claim your bill rebate now", telling recipients they are due a payment under a government scheme to help people cope with escalating gas and electricity costs.
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Government plans to cap energy bills are “poorly targeted” and will fail to protect low-income families without a package of additional support, charities and thinktanks have warned.
Liz Truss is expected to announce a package to cap average household energy bills on Thursday, alongside subsidies for small and medium-sized businesses, after concerns the increasing cost of gas and electricity is on course to push inflation towards 20% next year.
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New Prime Minister Liz Truss will unveil plans to limit energy bill rises on Thursday, spending billions to protect people from soaring prices.
Typical household energy bills could be capped at around £2,500 a year, with firms also likely to get some relief.
It is unclear how long the support will last, but the government is expected to borrow at least £100bn to pay for it.
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Senior figures in local government have welcomed the appointment of Simon Clarke as levelling up secretary, highlighting his previous experience as local government minister.
Mr Clarke was appointed secretary of state for levelling up, housing & communities by new prime minister, Liz Truss on Tuesday evening (5 September).
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Liz Truss has promised to deal with surging energy costs and to cut taxes, after she won the Tory leadership contest to become the next PM.
Her plan, set to be announced on Thursday, is likely to include a freeze on energy bills - though precisely how it would work is still unclear.
Ms Truss will be formally appointed by the Queen at Balmoral Castle later, after a final speech by Boris Johnson.
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Help for consumers' energy costs is to be provided by allowing energy suppliers to take out government-backed loans in order to subsidise bills.
The plan, which had been suggested by the energy industry, is set to be announced on Thursday.
The "deficit reduction scheme" is expected to form the centre piece of the government's attempt to tackle the high cost of energy for consumers. Small business are also expected to be offered some relief.
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More shared “banking hubs” are to be rolled out across the UK to help communities hit by branch and ATM closures to get continued access to cash.
A banking hub is a shared service that operates in a similar way to a standard branch, with a counter service run by Post Office staff where customers of almost any bank can withdraw and deposit cash, make bill payments and carry out regular transactions.
There are also private spaces where customers can speak to someone, with trained specialists from different banks available on different days.
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Simon Clarke has been confirmed as levelling up secretary, taking the helm at a department where he has previously served as a junior minister.
Mr Clarke, whose most recent government role was chief secretary to the Treasury, served at the then Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government from February to September 2020 before quitting for personal reasons.
During that time he was an active champion for devolution with some in the sector viewing his latest appointment as a lifeline for the agenda. However, his reputation for reining in public spending wherever possible has sparked some concern.
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Former Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick is back in government as Liz Truss begins appointing her junior ministers.
Mr Jenrick, who was sacked from the cabinet last year by then-PM Boris Johnson, returns to the frontbenches as a health minister.
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Leicestershire County Council has criticised the East Midlands devolution deal for not including large parts of the East Midlands.
A landmark £1.14bn devolution deal for a new combined county authority (CCA) in the East Midlands was agreed last month. The CCA will cover Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Derby, and Nottingham – also known as the D2N2 area.
Billed as a deal for the East Midlands, Leicestershire County Council argues that it is anything but.
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Councils have warned of service cuts if new Prime Minister Liz Truss fails to provide further financial support for the sector.
As Ms Truss officially took office this week, local authorities have pressed for action to help them cope with soaring inflation.
Chairman of the County Councils’ Network, Tim Oliver, said inflation had added a minimum of £1.5bn to his members’ costs.
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Any attempt by new Prime Minister Liz Truss to outlaw strikes will be met with ‘fierce resistance,’ trade union Unite has warned.
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Labour has warned that families with young children face another potential income squeeze this autumn after data suggested the cost of after-school clubs had risen one-and-a-half times faster than consumer inflation since 2010.
Citing analysis that says families using after-school provision five days a week are spending £800 a year more than in 2010, Labour called for ministers to do more to address what it said was another significant cost of living pressure.
The average family using five-day-a-week after-school provision now spends more money on this than on their weekly food shop, the party said.
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Council leaders have welcomed the publication of the Government’s Rough Sleeping Strategy but voiced concerns over the lack of any new policies to address the affordable housing shortage.
Over the weekend, the Government published the £2bn Rough Sleeping Strategy, which aims to end rough sleeping and tackle homelessness.
The strategy includes up to £500m over three years for the Rough Sleeping Initiative, which this year will help provide 14,000 beds for rough sleepers and 3,000 staff to provide tailored support across England.
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The minister for the Ukrainian refugee programme, Lord Harrington of Watford, has resigned.
Richard Harrington announced his departure from the role on Sunday (4 September), the day before the election of the new leader of the Conservative party and prime minister.
He was appointed to the role in March 2022 and worked jointly between the Home Office and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities.
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Businesses across rural England are set to benefit from a £110m cash injection to boost productivity and create job opportunities in the countryside.
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Green belt land being offered up for development by London and the Home Counties councils has risen by a fifth since last year, a report has found.
Research by the London Green Belt Council and the Campaign to Protect Rural England found that local councils around London and in the Home Counties are planning to allow building on more than 19,400 hectares of the city’s green belt.
If all those plans go ahead, around 75 square miles of protected countryside would lose that status, a 21 per cent rise since last year, analysis shared with The Telegraph found.
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The South East of England, the most affluent region in Britain outside London, last year received almost twice as much money as the North East from the Government’s Levelling Up fund aimed at boosting deprived areas. Projects in the South East benefited from £9.2 million from the fund in the year to 31 March 2022, while by comparison the North East received £4.9 million, despite being the poorest region in Britain by disposable household income, according to figures obtained under Freedom of Information laws.
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Michael Gove has been accused of hatching an “outrageous” plan when he was Levelling Up Secretary to “waste” £1.5 billion of unspent cash that could be used to tackle the cost of living crisis. Under Mr Gove’s leadership, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities reportedly developed a plan known as “Project Zero” to “get rid” of a £1.5 billion projected underspend, so the department could “ask for more money in the future.”
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The number of complaints from parents about special needs education has risen by three-quarters in the past four years, with more than one complaint a day filed last year, according to figures from the Local Government Ombudsman. The increase reflects the crisis in the special educational needs and disabilities system, with rising demand, chronic underfunding, lengthy delays and enduring gaps in provision.
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Around 93,000 pupils have fallen off school registers since the Covid pandemic began, which the Chair of the Education Select Committee Robert Halfon has called England’s so-called “ghost children”. In addition, last year more than 100,000 children missed at least 50 per cent of the autumn term and currently over 1,000 schools in disadvantaged areas have an entire class-worth of children missing.
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Bus journeys in England will be capped at £2 from January to March next year in a bid to ease the rising cost of living, the Government has said. The £60 million plan could see some passengers save more than £3 per single bus ticket, according to the Department for Transport, with Transport Secretary Grant Shapps saying the move will provide "direct help" to thousands of households.
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The new prime minister must “turn the page and take a more intelligent approach to social care” amid an “astonishing” level of need which is not being met, groups have warned.
The Care and Support Alliance (CSA) is calling for the incoming Conservative Party leader to “act fast”, with research suggesting one in eight older people are going without the social care they need.
Analysis by Age UK for the CSA found around 12% of people over 50 in England are not getting the help they need with activities such as washing, dressing, eating and getting in or out of bed.
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Nadhim Zahawi has drawn up plans for a multibillion-pound package of tax cuts to help businesses facing bankruptcy because of rising energy costs.
The chancellor, who is working on an emergency energy strategy for the new prime minister, said the government could learn the “lesson from Covid” and introduce targeted reductions in VAT and business rates to help the retail and hospitality sectors.
He suggested that tax breaks could also be given to energy-intensive industries and urged people not to “panic” about the cost of living crisis.
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Soaring inflation and energy costs will leave millions of people on low incomes thousands of pounds short of what the public say is the minimum amount needed to live with basic dignity in the UK this winter, according to an annual survey.
The annual Minimum Income Standard study is based on intensive deliberations by groups of socially representative UK residents, who agreed what a normal, no-frills lifestyle would cost and look like in 2022, taking into account housing, food, clothing, household goods, transport and social participation.
It reveals that even factoring in the government’s existing cost of living support package, a single adult without children working full-time on the national minimum wage will make nearly £7,000 less than the £25,500 they would need on an annual basis to fund a basic decent standard of living.
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External auditors for Luton Borough Council have warned national issues have increased its financial risks and reduced its ability to resolve its skills shortages.
In audit update report, Ernst and Young said it was concerned the authority has made “little to no progress” on improving the capacity and skills of the finance team since a previous report in January.
It made the assessment despite accepting the staff problem is a challenge not only for not only Luton but also for other authorities – and the audit industry.
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The Department for Levelling up, Housing and Communities confirmed the intervention in a letter to Thurrock chief executive Lyn Carpenter on Friday.
The department said it was due to the “scale of the financial and commercial risks potentially facing the authority”.
The letter said ministers were “not satisfied that the pace or scale of the council’s response is proportionate to the issues it faces and has decided that Thurrock requires immediate urgent government action”.
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The LGA says a number of councils are experiencing a 22 per cent rise in the cost of repairing a pothole, relaying a road surface and other maintenance costs. A £400 million reduction to local roads maintenance budgets has also put councils under pressure. LGA Transport spokesperson Cllr David Renard was interviewed on GB News and said more funding is needed: “Given the increasing costs of both materials, energy and inflation, this places an additional pressure on local councils when they’re already very short of resources to carry out other statutory duties.”
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Proper backing will help the sector play its role in leading the nation towards a brighter future, writes the managing director of the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives & Senior Managers.
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The energy industry has thrown its weight behind a plan it says could save homes and businesses up to £18bn a year, by reducing the prices charged for electricity generated from sources other than gas.
Energy UK, the trade body for the sector, said its proposals could cut £18bn a year from energy bills, including £11bn for businesses.
This could deliver a saving for households of between £150 and £250 a year.
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The Treasury is working on a menu of options to counter Britain’s cost of living crisis in readiness for an emergency mini-budget due to take place within two weeks if Liz Truss replaces Boris Johnson as prime minister.
With opinion polls and bookmakers’ odds showing Truss the clear favourite to move into 10 Downing Street next week, officials are drawing up plans that would allow the new government to move quickly over bills and longer-term reforms of the energy market.
Truss has said she wants to announce a package by the end of September but parliament will go into recess on 22 September for the party conference season. That would leave the chancellor, expected to be Kwasi Kwarteng, with little more than a fortnight to choose from a range of measures.
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Lancashire County Council considers job cuts as it anticipates an overspend of £17.7m due to ‘circumstances outside of the council's control’.
The local authority has said that while the financial health of the council is good, expenditure is expected to increase over the coming years due to rising inflation and the increasing cost of living.
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Shropshire Council has warned that it is facing a predicted overspend of up to £18.8m due to inflation, rising energy costs, and the growing demand for council services.
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Hundreds of thousands of some of the most vulnerable households are not protected by the energy price cap, social housing providers warn.
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Bids into the latest round of the levelling up fund are likely to significantly outstrip the money available, LGC analysis suggests.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has received more than 525 bids to the second round of the fund after the portal finally opened between 15 July and 2 August, following a six week delay.
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The government is considering plans to cap rents for social housing tenants in England next year to ease some of the pain of the cost of living crisis.
Rent increases for people living in social homes could be capped at 3 per cent during the next financial year from April, the levelling up department has announced.
But council bosses and housing association chiefs said they were “very concerned” that a cap on rents would hamper their own ability to keep up with soaring costs and invest in new homes.
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Struggling families in the UK will be able to use "warm banks" this winter to protect themselves from the sky-high price of heating their homes, after the energy price cap rises again in October.
Birmingham City Council, England's biggest serving 1.14 million people, is the latest to announce facilities such as churches, community centres and libraries will be available for people to stay warm during the colder months, as first reported by the Local Democracy Reporting Service.
But the government has been urged to step in with support before average energy bills rocket by around 80% to £3,549 per year - with one charity behind a number of warm places calling ministers "irresponsible" for the lack of action.
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A “significant humanitarian crisis with millions of children’s development blighted” is on the way if the Government does not act to prevent more than half of UK households plunging into fuel poverty, experts have warned.
High fuel costs and rising poverty are damaging health and this “profound impact” will worsen over the coming winter, widening inequality, according to a report by the UCL Institute of Health Equity (IHE).
The review, Fuel Poverty, Cold Homes And Health Inequalities, is led by IHE director Professor Michael Marmot, who warned that growing up in cold homes will have “dangerous consequences” for many children now and into adulthood.
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After a convoluted journey through parliament, the Health and Care Act 2022 was passed with only days of the 2021-22 parliamentary session remaining, with integrated care systems becoming statutory bodies from 1 July.
This should act as a driver for change and add impetus to the policy, but it is far from ‘job done’.
As highlighted in the government’s white paper, Joining Up Care For People, Places And Populations, many questions remain around how closer integration will operate.
A recent briefing paper from CIPFA – Integrating Care: Putting The Principles In Place? – builds on a roundtable event of senior financial professionals from the NHS and local government.
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Local authorities are being urged to apply for funding to help supply new life-enhancing accessible toilets that allow people with disabilities to be more independent.
The latest round of funding for the toilets will provide councils with a share of £6.5 million, whilst building on the £23.5 million that has already been pledged to provide better accessible facilities around the country.
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Councils have warned they will struggle to maintain roads and street lights, and will face salt shortages this winter, due to spiralling inflation.
New analysis by the Local Government Association (LGA) and the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning and Transport (ADEPT) found councils have reported a 37.5% increase in the cost of running and repairing street lights over the last six months.
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Projects to regenerate town centres, help struggling high streets and provide new leisure facilities are under threat from soaring inflation, councils in England have warned.
Many "levelling up" schemes have been paused or scaled back due to rising fuel, material and labour costs.
The government says it is ready to talk to any councils struggling to balance their budget.
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Councils are facing unprecedented costs to fix potholes due to a shortage of material caused by Russia's war in Ukraine.
Local authorities were already facing a significant road repair backlog, with latest estimates stating it would take them 10 years and £12bn to bring all surfaces up to scratch.
New analysis from the cross-party Local Government Association (LGA) found many councils across England and Wales have been hit by a 22% spike in the cost of road maintenance since the war escalated.
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A prominent Conservative city leader has lashed out at a government minister’s “disappointingly short response” to her letter calling for extra funding to help councils meet inflationary pressures.
Stoke-on-Trent City Council leader Abi Brown (Con) wrote a three-page letter to levelling up secretary Greg Clark last month outlining nearly £10m in extra budgetary pressures facing the city.
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Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire and their cities will be united under an elected mayor - and get £1.14bn over 30 years and the power to improve transport, affordable housing and skills, the government announced on Tuesday.
Ministers at the Department for Levelling Up Housing & Communities have signed a devolution deal to unite the counties, plus Derby and Nottingham, in an East Midlands Combined County Authority.
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Millions of households will see their energy bills rocket as the price cap is hiked to £3,549 a year, plunging many into financial hardship.
The record 80% October increase, announced by the regulator Ofgem, will see a typical default tariff customer paying an extra £1,578, laying bare the deepening cost of living crisis.
The rise follows a 54% increase in April, which saw average bills surge to £1,971 a year.
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The Government has offered local authorities thousands of pounds of funding in an effort to transfer unaccompanied asylum-seeking children (UASC) from temporary hotels to long-term care.
Currently, the Government spends more than £5m a day accommodating asylum seekers and Afghan refugees in hotels, including children who have sought asylum without any adult relatives.
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Half of care workers employed in independent care homes would earn more if they took an entry level job in a supermarket, according to new research into a staffing crisis that has left thousands of vulnerable people suffering inadequate care.
In June nearly 400,000 care staff earned less than the minimum wages paid in most of the major supermarket chains, while a third of workers would have received an immediate 6.3% pay increase, plus staff benefits, by moving to the best-paying supermarkets, according to the research by the King’s Fund health thinktank.
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Conservative leadership contender Liz Truss has pledged to divert billions of pounds earmarked for tackling NHS backlogs into social care in an effort to free hospital beds. The Foreign Secretary told a hustings that too much of the Government’s £13 billion package to address Covid backlogs and overhaul social care was going into the NHS, while former Chancellor Rishi Sunak called for fundamental reform of the NHS, warning that otherwise it would “gobble up every single pound that everyone has”.
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Ministers could face spending an additional £23 billion for covering extra household energy costs of £900 this autumn, rising to £90 billion next year, a new paper by the Institute for Government has found. The paper also warned the Government should plan for prolonged rises in energy bills by going a lot further in making public appeals to use less gas, such as informing people about the cost savings from turning down thermostats and in committing to building more energy efficient homes.
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About 6 million disabled people across the UK will receive a £150 cost of living payment from the end of next month, the government has said.
The one-off payment, announced in May, will be paid automatically to people who receive certain disability benefits from 20 September, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) said.
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Concerns have been raised that the levelling up bill will centralise planning decisions into Whitehall's hands, and that "effective scrutiny" of the legislation has been hampered by a lack of detail.
The Commons' levelling up committee has warned this means evidence it has heard as part of its inquiry into the bill has been presented with “some scepticism and some distrust as to what the government’s intentions are”.
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A multi-million-pound electric vehicle (EV) charge point pilot looks set to deliver an estimated 1,000 new chargers across the country.
The winners of the pilot fund are as follows: Barnet, Dorset, Durham, Kent, Midlands Connect (with Lincolnshire as a lead authority), North Yorkshire, Suffolk, Warrington, and Nottinghamshire.
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Charities have accused ministers of doing too little, too late after the amount of time that unaccompanied asylum seeker children can be held in hotels was halved.
Following evidence that children as young as 11 seeking refuge in the UK were at risk of exploitation while held in temporary accommodation, local authorities have been given five working days instead of 10 to move them from hotels into care.
Enver Solomon, the chief executive of the Refugee Council, said the move was an “unacceptable, serious failure” that leaves children outside the legal framework.
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Cash-strapped councils are increasingly hiring out their green spaces to festivals, an expert has warned, blocking them off from residents for weeks at a time, damaging grass and causing congestion.
Councils were “more desperate than ever” to attract commercial income to supplement their reduced budgets after a pandemic hiatus, risking making public parks “more exclusive and more elitist” in the process.
Community groups have raised concerns about lack of access for local people during the recent unprecedented heatwave and the school holidays.
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A group of MPs has sought assurance that the Office for Budget Responsibility is preparing for a potential emergency Budget or “significant fiscal event” in September should the incoming prime minister decide to announce one.
Parliament’s Treasury select committee wrote separately to the OBR and to the chancellor asking whether the latter is assisting the former on a forecast to be published alongside the potential Budget, and what work the OBR is currently undertaking in preparation.
The questions come after a report in the Financial Times suggesting Conservative Party leadership race frontrunner Liz Truss would publish an emergency Budget without OBR forecasts accompanying it.
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A multi-million-pound electric vehicle (EV) charge point pilot looks set to deliver an estimated 1,000 new chargers across the country.
The £20m Local EV Infrastructure (LEVI) pilot scheme is aimed at helping local authorities and industry work together to create new, commercial EV charging infrastructure for residents.
The winners of the pilot fund are as follows: Barnet, Dorset, Durham, Kent, Midlands Connect (with Lincolnshire as a lead authority), North Yorkshire, Suffolk, Warrington, and Nottinghamshire.
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Local authorities in England are spending almost £330m less a year in real terms on parks and open spaces than they were a decade ago, with the most deprived areas experiencing the deepest cuts, a Guardian analysis has found.
Years of deep budget cuts have left bandstands and playgrounds deteriorating, buildings crumbling, staff numbers decimated and parks’ upkeep in the hands of volunteers, according to park workers, volunteers and visitors.
The Guardian has learned that some councils are now submitting fewer parks for accreditation under the Green Flag awards, the benchmark of park quality, with those that have faced the highest reductions to budgets withdrawing the most parks.
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GMB is set to ballot over 100,000 local government staff on the offer of a £1,925 pay rise made by the National Joint Council last month.
This equates to a 10% pay rise for the lowest paid council staff.
The ballot opens today and will not close until 21 October, although a decision on the deal will likely not be made until the end of the year.
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For a group of 250 Ukrainians marooned at a motorway hotel in Wales, life under the Homes for Ukraine scheme — so welcoming at first — has been turning sour.
The Welsh government had originally promised the families they would be rehoused within weeks. Instead, they have been stranded, in some cases, for more than four months. Eating the same sandwich suppers, anxious about how their children will be schooled and with no near-term prospect of moving on, their hopes are fading.
“It’s like we have been thrown away in the wilderness,” said Ibrahim Dally, a 25-year-old dentist originally from Lebanon, but who studied, married and settled in Ukraine before fleeing the Russian invasion.
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More than three million households in Britain were still waiting to receive a £150 payment to help with energy costs on 1 July, a BBC Freedom Of Information (FOI) request has revealed.
Councils were expected to start paying the £150 rebates from April, but have until September to do so.
Halfway through that period, 97% of households who pay by direct debit in England and Wales had got the payment.
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Three former council chief executives have been charged as part of an investigation into financial irregularities.
Former Liverpool chief executive Ged Fitzgerald, ex-interim chief executive officer David McElhinney and former Lancashire CC chief executive Phil Halsall are to appear before magistrates in October.
They have been charged as part of Operation Sheridan, an investigation into financial irregularities at Lancashire CC that began in 2013 involving police in Lancashire and Merseyside Police, the county council and Liverpool City Council.
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A shortage of staff in care homes is leading to a drop in the level of care received by residents, it has been reported. Guardian analysis found that staff shortages were identified as a key problem in three-quarters of all the care homes in England where the Care Quality Commission regulator had cut their rating from “good” before COVID-19 to “inadequate” this summer.
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GPs around England are to prescribe patients activities such as walking or cycling in a bid to ease the burden on the NHS by improving mental and physical health.
The £12.7m trial, which was announced by the Department for Transport and will begin this year, is part of a wider movement of “social prescribing”, an approach already used in the NHS, in which patients are referred for non-medical activities.
In 2020 the government launched trials into the impact of getting involved in the natural environment on mental health and wellbeing, while social prescribing has also been embraced in many other countries, including Australia where GPs have begun prescribing 5km parkruns to patients.
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The monthly payment to families hosting Ukrainian refugees should double, the minister in charge of the scheme has said, amid fears thousands will drop out as a result of the cost-of-living crisis.
Lord Harrington, the refugees minister, told The Telegraph that he expects around a quarter of the 25,000 households hosting refugees to pull out after six months - meaning new homes will have to be found.
He has asked the Treasury for funding to double the “thank you” payment of £350 a month to £700, after some families warned they can no longer afford to house Ukrainians because of soaring energy bills.
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Some Homes for Ukraine hosts have yet to receive their £350 thank you payments, it has been reported. The news comes as 1,335 Ukrainian arrivals have been listed as homeless. The LGA said councils received funds to distribute in June and have been making backdated payments where necessary
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Nine in ten councils employing private police forces pay them per fine issued for littering and loitering, the first figures have shown.
A total of 66 councils employ enforcement companies to hand out fixed penalty notices for an ever-increasing range of offences which include dropping rubbish, walking dogs on beaches and feeding birds.
Despite a Government ban on the companies earning more money the more fines they dish out, almost 90 per cent of councils agreed to pay in this way, documents obtained using Freedom of Information laws show.
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England’s poorest families have been urged to claim a £150 grant “as soon as possible” after it emerged up to a million could miss out.
Ex-Chancellor Rishi Sunak unveiled the April rebate for households in council tax bands A-D to help with rising energy bills.
But 1.08million eligible households still hadn’t applied a few weeks ago - out of 3.53million who don’t pay by direct debit.
And the government has given councils a September 30 deadline to pay the funds - prompting fears huge numbers will miss out.
[ more...]
The Government have announced £130 million of funding for bus routes to prevent some from being axed. Operators and councils had warned that some routes would have to be cut when emergency funding support ended in October. The additional £130 million of funding takes the total amount of pandemic support to £2 billion, as passenger numbers fail to return to their pre pandemic levels.
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Directors of Adult Social Care are warning of looming winter pressures for the health and social care system, due to difficulties with hospital discharge. Speaking to BBC Radio Four’s Today programme, Presidents of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) Sarah McClinton said, “We’re seeing pressures in summer that we would normally expect to see in the winter months. What we are seeing is the impact of a decade or so of underfunding in social care which is having a devastating impact on the lives of people who rely on it.”
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Government borrowing was £3 billion higher than expected in the year to July, putting pressure on the next chancellor to keep costs down to meet fiscal targets.
Borrowing since April came to £55 billion, compared with the £52 billion forecast by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), the official forecaster.
The government is under pressure to deliver more support for households facing the worst cost of living crisis in decades, while an impending economic downturn is expected to eat into tax revenues.
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UK retail sales rose in July but the longer-term downward trend in consumer spending shows no sign of abating, official data shows.
Sales increased by 0.3% in July, which was much higher than economists' forecasts of a 0.2% drop, according to the Office for National Statistics.
But sales fell by 1.2% in the three months to July when compared with the previous period, continuing the decline since last summer.
[ more...]
The effects of lockdown may now be killing more people than are dying of Covid, official statistics suggest.
Figures for excess deaths from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that around 1,000 more people than usual are currently dying each week from conditions other than the virus.
The Telegraph understands that the Department of Health has ordered an investigation into the figures amid concern that the deaths are linked to delays to and deferment of treatment for conditions such as cancer, diabetes and heart disease.
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Local authority leaders have called for the introduction of tougher sentences to help in the fight against fly tipping.
Fly-tippers prosecuted in court for the worst waste dumping offences were handed an average fine of just £335 in 2020/21, according to the Local Government Association (LGA).
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A workplace parking levy has enabled Nottingham City Council to tackle congestion and raise revenue to improve public transport and active travel.
Nottingham City Council recently celebrated the 10th anniversary of its pioneering workplace parking levy.
Nottingham’s WPL was introduced to tackle congestion growth in the city and, while it has achieved that goal, it has also accomplished so much more.
The WPL package of improvements in sustainable travel has allowed us to create a truly connected city, with hospitals, schools, universities, parks, libraries, leisure centres and employment sites all linked by sustainable modes of transport to residential areas, particularly disadvantaged ones.
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Levelling up secretary Greg Clark said he was minded to appoint the new commissioner, and give them power over the council’s finance functions plus control of senior appointments.
Clark said: “There are still serious shortcomings that need to be sorted out, especially in financial management.
“But I want this to be a turning point at which the city of Liverpool can see a bright future that lives up to the power this great city embodies.”
[ more...]
Luton Borough Council paid out more than £1m to a criminal organisation posing as its local enterprise partnership, and efforts to retrieve the money have so far failed.
A report from the National Investigation Service (NATIS) found a the South East Midlands Local Enterprise Partnership (SEMLEP) employees’ account was “compromised by a criminal entity”, and the fraudulent payment was flagged a month later by Lloyds Bank.
The report also warned investigators were hampered by delays in being alerted about the crime.
In March 2020, a council officer was deceived into changing the bank details of an account belonging to Mark Rutherford School, which was set to receive funding from the SEMLEP.
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Financial independence from central government is the 'stuff of dreams', argues Sir Stephen Houghton (Lab), chair of the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities and Barnsley MBC leader.
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Accelerating inflation is placing pressure on the National Audit Office (NAO) to take a fresh look at the financial sustainability of the sector.
The NAO said in March 2021 the financial position of local government remained a ‘cause for concern’ and experts warned last week the Treasury would need to top up spending by more than £8bn this year to compensate for the squeeze on public services dealt by sky-high inflation.
An observation by the Institute for Fiscal Studies think-tank last week said the Government’s spending plans laid out in the October 2021 Spending Review were now ‘considerably less generous’ than originally intended.
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Thousands of foreign workers will be hired for Britain’s care homes this winter under plans for a matchmaking service to plug staff shortages.
As concern mounts in government about the state of the NHS and social care, ministers are looking at bringing in foreign staff “on a mass scale”.
Steve Barclay, the health secretary, wants an overseas hiring spree in which NHS managers may also be sent to countries such as India and the Philippines to recruit thousands of nurses. He also wants to make it easier for regulators to check overseas qualifications so that staff can get to work more quickly.
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Financial independence from central government is the 'stuff of dreams', argues Sir Stephen Houghton (Lab), chair of the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities and Barnsley MBC leader
[ more...]
The new Office for Local Government (Oflog) has launched a massive recruitment drive amid mission creep fears and frustration over poor engagement with the sector.
[ more...]
Two treasurer society presidents have indicated their preference for the current five-year IFRS 9 statutory override to be made permanent following the government’s latest consultation on the issue.
The temporary override of IFRS 9’s requirements relating to fair value movements on pooled investments expires on 31 March 2023. A government consultation, launched on 11 August, suggested three options: allow the override to elapse; extend it for a time-limited period; or make it permanent.
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Plans for permanent tax cuts set out by Conservative Party leadership candidates will be “difficult” to implement given the economic environment the promises are being made in, Institute for Fiscal Studies economists have warned.
[ more...]
Millions of public sector workers are expected to vote on strike action over pay this autumn in what unions suggest could lead to the biggest wave of industrial action since the 1970s. The walkouts would see staff shortages in hospitals, fire stations, schools and on the transport network, if negotiations over pay rises cannot be resolved.
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The government is “playing catch up with inflation” and will need to rapidly step up its support package for households just to keep pace, although many people will still be much worse off, the Institute for Fiscal Studies has warned.
[ more...]
UK inflation hit 10.1 per cent in the year to July, according to the Office for National Statistics. The Bank of England predicts that it could go up to just over 13 per cent by the end of the year because of the rise in energy prices. The last time the Consumer Price Index - which measures price rises - was in double digits was in February 1982.
[ more...]
Millions of public sector workers are expected to vote on strike action over pay this autumn in what could be the biggest wave of industrial action since the 1970s.
The walkouts could see shortages in hospitals, fire stations, schools and on the transport network, if negotiations over pay rises cannot be resolved.
Unions say pay offers are not keeping pace with the soaring cost of living, but the government says it must tackle rising inflation and says hiking up pay now could result in prices increasing even more.
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The attainment gap between poorer pupils and their better-off class mates is just as large now as it was 20 years ago, according to a damning new report which says the coronavirus pandemic is likely to have increased the inequalities in education
The landmark study, based on research carried out for the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) and funded by the Nuffield Foundation, found that disadvantaged pupils start school behind their better-off peers, and those inequalities persist through their school years and beyond – eventually having an impact on earnings.
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Pay fell at the sharpest pace on record between April and June, official figures show, as soaring inflation continued to weigh on earnings.
Wages - when taking into account rising prices - fell by 3% on the year, said the Office for National Statistics.
Household budgets are being hit by soaring energy bills as well as higher food and fuel costs.
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The effects of inflation on local government could be worse than the period of austerity after 2010, the director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies has warned.
Paul Johnson also told LGC the Tory leadership contenders risked bringing back austerity “by the back door” if they did not increase public sector funding to compensate for rising costs.
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Public sector pay rises continue to lag well behind the private sector according to latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
While average annual total pay growth for the private sector was 5.9% in April to June 2022 it was only 1.8% for the public sector. The gap will fuel demands by public sector unions for higher pay settlements. Local government employers have offered a flat rate rise of £1,925.
However in real terms, adjusted for inflation, average weekly earnings actually fell by a record 3% during April to June 2022, A larger fall on the year was last seen in 2009 at 4.5%.
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The withdrawal of vital funding for bus services will only worsen the cost of living crisis, mayors from the North of England have told the Government.
The Bus Recovery Grant, which was introduced to support bus services during the pandemic, is set to end in October in a move that operators warn could threaten hundreds of bus routes.
Led by the mayor of West Yorkshire Tracy Brabin, a group of Northern mayors has written to the Government warning that the cuts will make the cost of living crisis worse for communities that are dependent on public transport.
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Announcing the bids, which total £120.8m, the authority said they include plans for investment in parks, transport infrastructure, high streets and “local economies” in the constituencies that have not yet benefited from the Levelling Up Fund or the Towns Fund.
The council said £8.7m in matched funding from the council and £56.3m from partners and grants would bring the total investment in the city to £186m if the bids succeed.
“We have put together six ambitious bids, and they represent a real opportunity to build on the great work taking place across Leeds to regenerate our local communities, deliver 21st century infrastructure and create meaningful jobs,” said council leader James Lewis.
Plans include a 6000-square-metre wellbeing centre, a “revitalised” high street that prioritises public transport and pedestrians, a park and ride site and improving transport infrastructure to a local ‘employment hub’.
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Despite high demand, cost inflation is affecting the construction industry – and it will get worse over the next year, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It means the public sector will have to devote more resources to getting projects finished, and supply chain margins will be hit. The key to successful public sector project delivery will be sharing cost and risk, as well as the ability to collaborate effectively rather than signing up to fixed contracts.
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Parents are being left without childcare as nurseries shut at short notice due to financial pressures and staff shortages.
The Pregnant Then Screwed campaign group said it had been "inundated" with messages from parents whose local nursery had closed suddenly.
Nurseries are facing increased energy, food and staffing costs, as well as struggling to recruit.
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School leaders are considering three or four-day weeks to pay for teacher salary rises and crippling energy costs, The Telegraph has learnt.
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The Institute for Fiscal Studies has said the larger than expected jump in energy prices forecast for the autumn means the Government would need to spend an additional £12 billion to achieve the same level of support for households as it set out in May.
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Food banks are being overwhelmed and unable to cope with unprecedented demand and are being forced to turn away families in need as more people are falling into hardship as a result of the cost of living crisis. Several managers have said they were forced to have a “painful” discussion about caps on the number of people they can help as they ran out of food this summer.
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Two RAF flights carrying as many as 500 Afghans who worked with British forces and their relatives are landing in the UK each month from Pakistan but there is deep frustration within the Ministry of Defence about how the rest of government is struggling to accommodate arrivals.
It comes as the Taliban and western allies mark the first anniversary of Nato’s withdrawal from Afghanistan.
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In May, the government announced a £24bn package comprising £400 “discounts” on energy bills for 29 million households, £150 rebates for households in council tax bands A-D, £650 for families on means-tested benefits, £300 for pensioners on means-tested benefits and £150 for those on disability benefit.
But because energy prices are expected to rise by 141% in 2022-23, compared to the 95% they were expected to rise when the policies were announced, the package no longer protects households by the same amount in real terms.
The IFS said that in May the £400 discounts and £150 council tax rebates could have been expected to protect a typical family from about half of the increase in their energy costs.
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Every bus journey would be capped at £2 to help Britons cope with the cost of living crisis under plans drawn up by Grant Shapps.
In an exclusive article for The Telegraph, included in full below, the Transport Secretary is proposing a £260 million taxpayers’ subsidy to cut the cost of bus journeys that would save £3 on a single ticket for many hard-pressed families.
Mr Shapps said it would provide guaranteed help to families most in need who cannot afford to own a car and are the biggest users of buses for travel.
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Labour has called for an extension of the tax on oil and gas companies to fund a freeze in the energy price cap.
The cap - the maximum amount suppliers can charge for average use - is forecast to hit £3,582 in October and £4,266 in January.
Leader Sir Keir Starmer said if Labour's plan was adopted, the typical family would see savings of £1,000.
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The recommendation by the Commons Public Accounts Committee to hold back the identities of shortlisted bidders from ministers until the principles for allocating levelling up funding awards have been finalised has been rejected by the Government.
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More than 70 Labour council leaders and around 1,000 councillors from across England have written to the Prime Minister urging him to double the Household Support Fund. Cllr Shaun Davies, Leader of the Labour LGA Group, said: “Councils provide essential support for so many around the country. Measures like increasing and extending the Household Support Fund must be put in place now, so councils can plan how best to help this winter. The fact that so many councillors have put their name to this letter underscores the vital importance of this issue.”
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The UK economy contracted by 0.1 per cent in the second quarter of the year, the Office for National Statistics has said, compared to the first three months of this year when gross domestic product grew. The Bank of England has predicted that the UK will fall into recession towards the end of this year and the downturn will last for the whole of next year.
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Senior consultant at CIPFA Mark Williams clears up what the Prudential Code for Capital Finance in Local Authorities means for councils, and why the institute updated the framework last year.
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The UK economy shrank between April and June as experts forecast a gloomy outlook with recession on the horizon.
The economy contracted by 0.1% in the second quarter of the year, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.
This was partly due to Covid schemes like Test and Trace ending, retail sales falling and the Queen's Platinum Jubilee bank holiday in June, it said.
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The construction sector – like many others in the current economic climate – is under huge pressure, facing a perfect storm as the cost of raw materials soars.
What began as an imbalance between supply and demand as projects worldwide ramped up in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic has now become a full-blown crisis – with rising energy costs forcing suppliers to raise prices, the war in Ukraine causing even greater supply chain disruption, and further pandemic-related shutdowns in China adding yet more complexity.
Higher materials prices are the result. In the timber sector, for example, the cost of sawn wood is up 89% over the past year, with particle board and structural steel prices rising 73% and 69% respectively.
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The body, backed with £25m of government funding, will provide support to departments and public bodies over the fraud risks they face, as well as designing and testing defences.
It will also work with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and banks to help recover fraudulent payments made under the Covid-19 bounce-back loan scheme.
Simon Clarke, chief secretary to the Treasury, said: “The launch of the new body will put a laser-like focus on fraud and renew our efforts to combat people taking advantage of our public services and support.
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The government is seeking views on whether to retain a statutory override allowing local authorities to exclude changes to pooled investment values from revenue accounts.
Since 2018, private and public bodies in England have been mandated under IFRS 9 to record yearly changes in investment fund values in their revenue accounts.
To prevent budgetary issues at local authorities, the government implemented a five-year override mandating councils to remove changes in pooled investment funds from their budgets and record them in an unusable reserve.
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Local authority leaders have urged the Government to stick to their pledge to reinvest money raised from the soft drinks industry levy into council-run initiatives to boost physical activity.
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Clive Betts, chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee, talks to Mike Thatcher about lack of progress on levelling up, pork-barrel politics and why local government finance cannot be reformed until social care funding is sorted.
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The number of Ukrainian refugee households that have fallen into homelessness has more than doubled to over 1,300 households since June 2022.
Data on the number of households who had arrived in the UK on either the Family Scheme or the Homes for Ukraine scheme since February, but who have subsequently presented to their local authority as homeless was first published by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities on 16 June.
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The government will need to spend an extra £44bn over the next three years on public services to keep pace with rising inflation and avoid steep cuts, according to analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
In a review of the rising costs facing the public sector, the IFS said that without further funding, Whitehall budgets faced being overwhelmed by rising cost pressures that would force departments to cut staff and services.
The government said in its November spending review that it would increase departmental budgets by 3.3% on average above the then inflation rate. But with prices soaring since then, the tax and spending thinktank is forecasting the rise in budgets is now unlikely to be more than 1.9%.
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The high rate of inflation will wipe out a significant chunk of planned real-terms spending rises for public services, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies. It estimates the Treasury will have to find an extra £8 billion this financial year to compensate for the impact of inflation. The LGA has warned that inflation, energy costs and projected increases to the National Living Wage will add £2.4 billion in extra cost pressures to council budgets this year alone, rising to £3.6 billion in 2024/25. LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson said: “These pressures are putting council services at risk. Budgets are having to be reset with potential cuts to the essential services people rely on, in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis.”
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Six million UK households owe more than £200 to energy suppliers, according to a survey by Uswitch. Citizens Advice has also said it has helped more than 47,000 people with energy debts so far this year. It comes as it is estimated that energy bills for a typical household could hit £4,266 next year.
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CIPFA’s Prudential Code for Capital Finance in Local Authorities was updated in December 2021.
The code is important for local authorities because it sets out the capital finance framework they should operate in.
However, there are a few misconceptions about how the prudential borrowing fund can be used to fund investments.
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Swimmers across the UK have lost access to more than 60 public pools in the last three years, BBC News has found.
Freedom of Information requests to UK councils revealed 65 pools had closed, either temporarily or permanently, in the three years to March 2022.
Ukactive said a lack of staff, rising energy costs and chemical shortages had created a "perfect storm" for centres.
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The government is seeking views on how to make sure councils are able to pay for costly care reforms due to come into effect next year.
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Higher inflation is set to wipe out 40% of the planned growth in public sector funding over the next three years leading to a £44bn shortfall, according to a study by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS).
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The government has opened a consultation into the distribution of funding for adult social care charging reforms set to come in from October 2023.
Included in the reforms is an £86,000 cap on the amount anyone in England will need to spend on their care and an increase in the point at which a person is eligible for local authority means-tested support.
The upper capital limit for means-tested support is set to rise from £23,250 to £100,000 and the lower capital limit will rise to £20,000 from £14,250.
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Norfolk County Council has been hit by more "financial headwinds", with costs surging by another £5m - on top of an ongoing £60m funding gap.
At Monday's cabinet, finance portfolio holder Andrew Jamieson (Con) said inflationary pressures were "particularly severe in children's services".
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A programme of a similar scale to the unprecedented Covid-19 employment scheme might be necessary to keep rising energy bills from pushing millions of people into financial desperation, according to Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey.
He urged the government to cancel Ofgem’s planned energy price cap increase in October, when the limit could rise by as much as £1,400 per year per household, and fund energy companies’ shortfalls with public money.
The move, which the Lib Dems have dubbed an “energy furlough” scheme would cost £36bn, and could be paid for with higher VAT revenue and by expanding the windfall tax on energy companies.
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Hybrid working arrangements will allow East Hampshire District Council to downsize its office, costing £1.7m but with the promise of saving nearly twice that in the coming decade.
The authority’s cabinet agreed to move from its current Penns Place headquarters on the outskirts of Petersfield to a council-owned office closer to the town centre.
A report discussed at the meeting suggested the move will save £3.3m over 10 years, with initial capital reserve funding of £1.7m to furnish the building and install new IT and energy efficiency upgrades.
Council leader Richard Millard said: “This move is a win-win for us as an authority and for our residents and businesses.
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Svitlana Stadnyk, head of the Association for Family Mediation of Ukraine, has warned a “moment of crisis” is looming as Ukrainian refugees housed by UK families reach the end of their six month stay. There are fears that if refugees who have fled the war have not become self-sufficient in that time, councils could struggle to find alternative accommodation and some could end up homeless. Cllr James Jamieson, Chairman of the LGA, said: “As we get closer to the end of the six month initial placements, we are working with government and key partners to look at what is needed for what is increasingly likely to be long term support for Ukrainian refugees and their hosts in the UK.”
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The government has put back its timeframe for the announcement of further devolution deals from the autumn until the end of the year, LGC has learned.
Nine areas were lined up for county deals in February when the levelling up white paper was published with the government committed to getting those deals over the line by the autumn. Ministers were thought to have been keen to have devolution announcements to unveil at the Conservative party conference in early October.
At the LGA conference at the end of last month, then communities secretary Michael Gove told LGC he was “confident” all nine county deals would still be agreed by the autumn – even including Leicestershire, where negotiations had broken down.
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Plans for a county deal for Durham CC have all but fallen by the wayside, in favour of the unitary joining an expanded north east devolution deal - or even the Tees Valley CA, LGC has learned.
Durham deputy leader Richard Bell (Con) told LGC the county, which was announced as a front runner for a county deal in the levelling up white paper earlier this year, has now been told by government there will be more money on offer if they join with neighbours rather than go it alone.
To Durham’s north, talks are taking place to expand the current North of Tyne CA devolution deal covering Newcastle City Council, Northumberland CC and North Tyneside Council to include Gateshead and South Tyneside MBCs and Sunderland City Council. To its south, the existing Tees Valley CA covers Middlesbrough Council and Darlington, Hartlepool, Redcar & Cleveland and Stockton on Tees BCs.
Cllr Bell told LGC the Tees Valley proposal was "being considered" and that he is "supportive" of it.
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Turmoil at Number 10 means councils will have to wait for details on next year’s funding arrangements.
Last month, then-communities secretary Michael Gove said a new approach with a two-year financial settlement would be introduced from next year with a consultation to take place ‘shortly’.
But The MJ understands consultation now won’t take place until after the next Prime Minister takes office in September at the earliest.
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Stephen Kitching argues that DLUHC’s latest rule changes are part of a series following on from revisions to MRP guidance and the purchase of commercial property. He questions whether councils are independent decision-making bodies or simply local agents of central government.
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An investigation has found that elderly care home residents who pay their own way face typical annual bills of £50,000 after their fees jumped by more than a fifth this year. Self-funders were already paying more than councils do for state-funded residents at the same properties. The LGA said: "Councils, care providers, charities and the NHS are united around the need for central government to fully fund adult social care."
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Analysis shows that in more than half of the Government’s key departments, ministerial announcements have been pulled at short notice, legislation has stalled and deadlines have been missed on the publication of policy documents. These include proposals to reform gambling laws and new legislation for an online safety bill.
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The LGA has written to the Health Secretary, Steve Barclay, to warn that the social care reforms could push some councils “over the financial edge” and force others to cut back on “vital council services”. It is calling for key reforms – such as an £86,000 cap on the costs of care and a new means tested system – to be delayed by six months to urgently ease pressure on councils. Cllr David Fothergill, Chairman of the LGA’s Community Wellbeing Board, said: “Social care’s lack of capacity to deliver the care that people need has been evidenced time and time again and the Government needs to step in. If it doesn’t, we can expect one of the most challenging winters in recent times, with knock-on effects that will continue to impact on people and their loved ones.” Cllr Fothergill also appeared on ITV News at Ten to discuss the issue.
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Around 600 people every day are joining growing waiting lists to be assessed for social care and support in England, figures from councils suggest.
Unprecedented numbers of people needing help at home, hospital patients and unpaid carers are waiting months for assessments and longer for vital care, the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (Adass) said.
The organisation said a combination of increased demand, people seeking help with more complex conditions, and a lack of social care staff is behind the “enormous” waiting lists.
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Almost 300,000 people are waiting for social care assessments in England, with 600 a day joining growing waiting lists, according to figures from the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services. Council budgets, staffing issues caused by Brexit and the impact of the pandemic are all cited as contributing factors behind the large waiting lists, with increased demand and more complex conditions reportedly also to blame.
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The UK is on course to fall into recession later this year, according to the Bank of England. Interest rates were raised to 1.75 per cent as the Bank attempts to combat soaring prices, with inflation now set to hit over 13 per cent. The economy is now forecast to shrink in the final three months of the year and continue to do so until the end of 2023.
[ more...]
The majority of senior councillors are worried social care reforms will make council services worse rather than better, according to the results of a new survey.
[ more...]
The vast majority of people support full funding for local authorities, a new report has revealed.
A survey of over 2000 people by the think tank New Local found 79% of people think national politicians should guarantee funding for local councils so that they can invest in communities.
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Nottinghamshire CC is projecting a "significant shortfall" of up to £33m in what is required for it to pay for the fair cost of care reforms, and is warning it may have to cut services elsewhere without further government support.
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Rishi Sunak has been caught on camera boasting he had “started the work of undoing” funding formulas he inherited from Labour, that had “shoved all the funding into deprived urban areas”.
The former chancellor, who is vying to be the next prime minister, made the comments to Conservative party members in Tunbridge Wells on 29 July in a video that was shared with New Statesman.
He said he had “managed to start changing funding formulas to make sure areas like this are getting the funding they deserve, because we inherited a bunch of formulas from Labour that shoved all the funding into deprived urban areas and that needed to be undone” . “I started the work of undoing that," he added.
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Conservative leadership hopeful Liz Truss has said she would give £13bn to the adults’ social care sector if elected.
Speaking during the Sky News leadership debate, Ms Truss said she would “make sure we’re putting the recent funding we allocated – the £13bn – into social care”.
“There are many people at the moment in hospital who ought to be in social care but there aren’t the beds available,” she said, “so I’d first of all make sure we’re investing the money available in social care.”
[ more...]
Sunday 31 July 2022 was the deadline for local authorities to publish their draft accounts for 2021/22. Despite some last-minute weekend working, almost one-third of councils did not meet the deadline.
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Councils face a return to the darkest days of austerity as a triple whammy of pay rises, inflation and growing need hits
Councils will be plunged back to the darkest days of austerity unless there is a funding boost to cover pay rises, inflation costs and soaring energy bills, leading chiefs have warned.
[ more...]
A shocking 600 people a day are joining growing waiting lists to be assessed for care and support in England, warn directors of adult social services.
A new survey by the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) suggests that almost 300,000 people are now waiting for an assessment of their needs by social workers, an increase of 90,000 (44%) in five months.
[ more...]
The Secretary of State for Levelling Up Greg Clark has written to all council leaders amending rules which saw some councils attempting to circumvent rules allowing for the flexible use of capital receipts.
The change makes clear these flexibilities can be used to fund transformation projects only where councils do not retain either direct or indirect control of disposed assets.
The move will prevent councils from using novel practices which put taxpayer money at risk and drain resource. It will also help put a stop to accounting firms and consultancies wasting taxpayer money advising councils on creative accounting.
[ more...]
The refugees minister has appealed to councils to help house 10,500 Afghans currently living in UK hotels at a cost to the taxpayer of £1m a day.
Lord Harrington told councils the government had fewer than 100 properties available in June, but expects 500 Afghan arrivals each month.
Several Afghans said living in hotels had left them unable to settle.
[ more...]
Rising wages are set to make school finances difficult next year as funding increases fall below forecast spending growth, the Institute for Fiscal Studies has warned.
[ more...]
The government has stepped in to block a coastal council’s attempt to sell valuable beach huts to fund its transformation programme.
[ more...]
England’s “ravaged” adult social care sector urgently needs more money from Government before the year is out, MPs have warned.
A cash injection and a long-term plan is needed to help the sector meet immediate cost pressures and become sustainable over the coming years, the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (LUHC) Committee said.
[ more...]
New research by the Institute for Fiscal Studies has warned that schools in England are facing a looming funding crisis, with spending per pupil in 2024/25 expected to be 3 per cent lower than in 2010.
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Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council outlined plans earlier this year to sell its beach hut portfolio, worth more than £50m, to a subsidiary company.
However, levelling up secretary Greg Clark wrote to the authority yesterday, restricting the use of regulatory “loopholes” to help plug financial gaps.
He said: “Every council has a duty to use the tax they receive from hard-working people in a responsible way.
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York and North Yorkshire are to elect a mayor and receive £540m of government investment over 30 years in a landmark devolution deal to be signed on Monday.
The agreement will create a new combined authority across the region led by a directly elected mayor, who will have the power to spend the money on local priorities such as transport, education and housing.
It is the first city and rural region to see devolution on the scale enjoyed by city regions such as South and West Yorkshire, according to the Department for Levelling Up. The unveiling of the plan coincides with Yorkshire Day.
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Ministers’ views were tested on whether to authorise an above cap council tax rise as part of the current year's budget settlement for Slough BC, but this was not proceeded with, LGC understands.
A report by the council's commissioners warned last week that Slough requires council tax rises in the range of 12-20% above the current cap level in each of the next three years if it is to be able to balance its books.
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Expanding Right to Buy will dramatically cut the number of council homes as they are “impossible” to replace, local authorities have warned.
The Local Government Association, which represents councils, has slammed plans to expand the Right to Buy scheme to housing association tenants. It said that the Government’s promise to replace these properties one for one was unattainable due to red tape.
Under Right to Buy, first introduced under prime minister Margaret Thatcher, council tenants can buy their homes at a discount, depending on how long they have been living in the property. The scheme has helped millions of people onto the housing ladder. However, it has been criticised for depleting the supply of council homes, which are being replaced at a rate of just one in three in England, new data showed.
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The deal would give an elected mayor powers to introduce bus franchising, control local transport functions and set a new council tax precept.
Details published following the announcement revealed the combined authority would receive £540m split equally over 30 years to support long-term growth – 35% of it to be used for capital spending and 65% for revenue spending.
This would be reviewed every five years to “confirm that the investment has contributed to economic growth and levelling up”, the government said.
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The government needs to urgently tackle England’s crumbling school buildings, teachers have said, as figures show nine in 10 schools have at least one part of their buildings needing repair or replacement.
The National Education Union, which represents more than half a million teachers, said it was “shocking” that of 20,000 school buildings inspected between 2017 and 2019, a total of 19,442 had at least one building component that had “major defects” or was “not operating as intended”.
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Nine in 10 English schools are in need of repair, as research by the National Education Union found that around 90 per cent of schools have at least one building in need of repair or replacement. Of 20,000 school buildings inspected between 2017 and 2019, a total of 19,442 had at least one building component that had “major defects” or was “not operating as intended”.
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Councils in England have seen their deficits in special educational needs (SEN) top a record £2.4bn this year, as local authority leaders warn the government’s proposed reforms will not address this substantive funding black hole.
New analysis from the County Councils Network (CCN) and the Society of County Treasurers reveals that local authority deficits in SEN are now at approximately £2.4bn in 2022-23 – six times higher than levels in 2018 – with councils warning they face ‘catastrophic financial decisions’ if this debt is not written off. If nothing changes, this figure could rise to £3.6bn in 2025.
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The government has announced how all households in England, Scotland and Wales will receive £400 to help with rising fuel bills this autumn.
The money, part of the Energy Bill Support Scheme, will be paid in six instalments.
Households will see a discount of £66 applied to their energy bills in October and November, and £67 a month from December to March 2023.
But how the money is received will depend on how you pay your bill.
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The authority has forecast a £20.4m overspend on this year’s budget, mainly fuelled by slow progress meeting £53m of savings targets, only £34m of which are now seen as deliverable, Ryan Keyworth, director of finance and commercial services said.
Speaking to members of the finance subcommittee, he said the council set aside £25m of reserves to meet overspends, which it would currently cover, but he warned the newly proposed local government pay rise would mean the set-aside reserves would be exhausted.
“When we set the 2022-23 budget, we knew that there were risks around the timing and delivery of some of the savings that were built into it,” Keyworth said.
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More than 100,000 people fleeing the war in Ukraine have been granted visas in the UK since the outbreak of the invasion, according to government figures. Some 104,000 people had arrived in the UK under Ukraine visa schemes as of Monday. LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson praised the “incredible role” played by sponsors who opened up their homes. He said: “Both they and their guests need continued support to help people to start to rebuild their lives and plan ahead, and to ensure more people feel able to step forward to offer their help and their houses as arrivals continue.”
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The deadline for councils to spend funding received under the Community Renewal Fund has been extended by six months, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has confirmed.
This is not the first time that the deadline to spend the fund has been extended. Originally, it was intended that councils would spend the money they received from the CRF by March 2022, however, in November 2021 DLUHC extended the deadline to 30 June 2022.
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Local authorities in England are grappling with a £2.4bn “funding black hole” for special educational needs, according to new analysis, with councils warning the impact on young people could be “catastrophic”.
Rising demand has resulted in councils’ SEN deficits growing six-fold since 2018, according to analysis by the County Councils Network (CCN) and the Society of County Treasurers. A third more children have become eligible for extra funding support over the past three years and the number now stands at 473,000 children.
The CCN is warning that the government’s planned SEN reforms later this year – which will try to reduce the “postcode lottery” in services and make the system less adversarial – will not be enough to plug the deficit that could rise to £3.6bn without action.
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Nearly 80% of eligible households have now received their £150 council tax rebate, the latest figures have shown.
The rebate was announced in February by the Government to help people struggling with rising energy bills.
The figures show that 15 million households have received the rebate, including over 90% of those who usually pay using direct debit.
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Unless there is a very pressing reason, councils should prioritise more strategic roles in their local education system over being a provider, writes the chief executive of the Confederation of School Trusts.
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Local authority deficits in special educational needs (SEN) have reached an ‘unmanageable’ £2.4bn this year, new research has uncovered.
The analysis from the County Councils Network (CCN) and the Society of County Treasurers shows the deficit is six times higher than levels in 2018.
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Jacob Rees Mogg, Minister for Government Efficiency, has commissioned a review into the role of the civil service to ascertain whether civil servants could adequately implement the decisions made by cabinet. The review will also examine whether departments’ non-executive directors are able to “discharge their functions adequately”.
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Councillors in the Cotswolds have spoken out about the "totally unacceptable" abuse they face.
Cotswold District Council unanimously agreed to denounce such behaviour, which members said was spreading from social media into real life.
A recent Local Government Association (LGA) poll found that seven out of ten councillors across England and Wales experienced abuse over the last year.
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Public spending in the north has fallen behind the England average despite the government's flagship "levelling up" agenda, according to a new think tank analysis.
IPPR North - a branch of the Institute for Public Policy Research - said that, despite Boris Johnson's repeated pledges to level up the country, "money simply hasn't followed the rhetoric".
Their analysis of ONS figures found that per-person public spending in the north went from being £246 higher than the England average in 2019, the year Mr Johnson took office, to £86 under the average in 2021.
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The levels of reserves held by councils dropped by £8bn in the last financial year, with councils now planning budgetary cuts to some services to shore up their positions.
The latest data from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities reveals that council expenditure is higher than on pre-pandemic levels. Net expenditure on services for 2022-23 is budgeted to be £3.7bn (3.5%) higher in real terms than it was in 2019-20. However, it is 1.5% (£1.6bn) lower than in 2021-22 when the country was still in the throes of the pandemic.
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The pay offer made by the National Employers for Local Government Services is “not enough to make up for a decade and more of lost wages” but is "better than expected", unions have said.
Council staff have been offered a £1,925 pay rise from 1 April 2022, equating to a 10.5% increase for the lowest paid members of staff, and 4% for the highest paid.
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More than 100 projects have been awarded £50m to make streets safer and tackle violence against women and girls.
The latest round of money from the Safer Streets Fund will be given to local authorities, police forces and eligible community groups across England and Wales.
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Discussing the economy during speech in Liverpool, Sir Keir Starmer restated Labour's intention to replace business rates with a "fairer system". See also: https://labour.org.uk/press/labour-to-scrap-business-rates-and-replace-with-fairer-system/.
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An extra 490,000 social care jobs will be required in the coming years, a new report has found. Councils have called for the social care recruitment crisis to be made a Government priority in the wake of the Health and Social Care Select Committee's findings.
The committee emphasised that more needed to be done to ensure the recruitment, training and retention of health and social care staff. It estimated that an extra 475,000 jobs in health and 490,000 jobs in social care will be required by the early part of the next decade. Health and social care committee chair Jeremy Hunt said there was an 'absence of a long term plan by the government to tackle' the shortage.
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The council thwarted two attempted bank mandate frauds, whereby criminals send spoof emails mimicking suppliers to change payment details, a report discussed at a governance and ethics committee meeting said.
It said the attempted frauds were prevented because council staff improved controls to help monitor and verify bank account amendments.
“We have systems in place to double check [whether the recipient] is actually the right person or organisation before any changes are made, and then indeed to alert both the bank and ourselves before [the payment] takes place,” a council officer told councillors.
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Oxfordshire County Council has become the sixth local authority to become a trailblazer for the government’s social care reform.
The six local authorities will implement the changes of the charging reform ahead of national roll out in October 2023.
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Kent CC and its local partners have called for an urgent national response to the chaos and delays approaching the Port of Dover after distributing water and food to those affected through the weekend.
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Councils will not be able to fix recruitment and retention issues afflicting social care services if they do not have enough money to ensure staff are paid properly, MPs have warned.
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Profit margins for the private care sector increased during the pandemic, research has shown. A study by Surrey University found that the UK’s biggest care home chains saw their profit margins jump by 18% on average during the pandemic.
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The number of children in England waiting for a place in a secure children’s home has doubled in the past year, with about 50 waiting for a place each day, according to latest data from Ofsted. The LGA said the current approach of relying on a very small number of councils to run a national service does not support the “necessary expansion of services” and means that children often live far from their homes. It has also called on the NHS to play a greater role in supporting placements for children with the most complex needs. Cllr Anntoinette Bramble, Chair of the LGA’s Children and Young People Board, said: “It is absolutely vital that we have sufficient places available to provide what is essential, very specialised support. Without this, the impact on children can be devastating.”
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Child poverty campaigners have accused the Government of “abandoning” struggling families after it announced a cost-of-living package which included free theatre tickets and supermarket discounts. The Help for Households scheme is intended to help families facing soaring food and fuel bills including a mix of new and pre-existing discounts on meals, mobile tariffs and theatre tickets from businesses such as Asda, Morrisons, Amazon and Vodafone
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Families are cutting back on fuel and clothing as rising prices make them question what they can afford, new figures suggest. Petrol and diesel sales fell by 4.3 per cent in June as prices at the pumps hit new records, monthly retail data shows, while clothing sales dropped by 4.7 per cent as UK inflation reached new highs.
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Local government audit is in crisis. Strict adherence to the International Finance Reporting Standards (IFRS) is causing delays and accounts that are ‘no longer readily understandable’, writes the s151 officer for Worcestershire County Council.
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Conservative party leadership hopefuls Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak have pledged to make more funding available for adult social care if they become the next prime minister during a hustings with councillors yesterday.
Sources present at the event have told LGC Ms Truss made the pledge despite also promising to scrap the recently introduced national insurance rise designed to raise £12bn a year for health and social care over the next three years.
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The government's planning reform and electoral integrity projects are among those that seem to be "unachievable", while there are significant issues with the levelling up fund, an official report has warned.
The Infrastructure and Projects Authority's (IPA) annual report, which outlines progress on large-scale projects across government up to March 2022, gave four Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities programmes a red confidence rating.
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Refuse workers in Sandwell MBC have called off a planned strike due to start next week after accepting a 9% pay increase and securing additional annual leave.
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Highways authorities will struggle to future-proof their assets as climate change leads to higher road surface temperatures, despite improvements in the performance of materials, a key sector figure has warned.
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Councils are spending 46% of their procurement budgets with local suppliers, new research has revealed.
The research, conducted by Tussell, shows councils are spending £9bn a year more on local suppliers than they were in 2016. This is up from £16bn in 2016, to £25bn in 2021.
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Tax cuts proposed by Conservative leadership candidate Liz Truss could cost more than £30bn and break the government's fiscal rules, economists at the Institute for Fiscal Studies have warned.
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The government’s reluctance to fully fund pay rises for NHS staff this year could leave trusts with a funding gap of £1.8bn, a leading health service figure has warned.
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Reining in a higher than expecting budget gap will be among the priorities for the newly-announced chief executive of Somerset CC, Duncan Sharkey.
Mr Sharkey is currently chief executive of Windsor and Maidenhead LBC and will take up the post initially with the county council in the autumn and of the new unitary Somerset Council from April.
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Council staff exit payments have plummeted since 2014-15 when they hit more than half a billion pounds
The latest figures released by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) show the total value of exit packages for 2021-22 was £214,161,226, down from a high of £517,103,453 in 2014-15.But when it comes to senior staff exit payments, councils paid out £21,572,159 in 2021-22 compared with £20,934,952 in 2014-15.
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The number of filled posts in adult social care is down for the first time on record, highlighting recruitment challenges, a new report has found.
According to the annual report for Skills for Care on the adult social care sector and workforce in England, the number of filled posts decreased by around 3% (50,000) between 2020/21 and 2021/ 22.
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The cost-of-living crisis is set to exacerbate existing funding constraints for councils and the social care market, and more central government funding will be necessary to avoid a winter crisis, service directors have warned.
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Council investment in early intervention support for children almost halved over the ten years leading up to the pandemic , with many of the deepest cuts made in the poorest areas, a new report reveals.
Early intervention support for children fell from £3.8bn to £1.9bn. Total spending on children’s services fell by 2.4% between 2010-11 and 2020-21 to £10.2bn.
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Workforce pressures and increases in demand that have not been matched with enough funding mean social care directors have “never been more concerned” about the winter ahead, their representative body has warned.
Directors also raised concerns about more unpaid care arrangements buckling under pressure and a rise in care providers returning contracts or closing.
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Just over a quarter (27%) of local authorities in England have enough holiday childcare available to meet the demand of parents working full-time in their area, new research has shown today.
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Councils, young people and families are trapped in a ‘vicious cycle’ due to the halving of investment in early intervention over the last decade, the largest children’s charities have warned.
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Conservative leadership candidates have spent much of the past two weeks talking about their ideas of tax cuts, but a senior International Monetary Fund official has warned it could be economically unwise to do so.
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More than 1,000 people who have arrived from Ukraine have presented to councils as homeless as a result of placement breakdowns. Discussing the issue on Radio 4 yesterday, LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson said the majority of homelessness presentations seen by councils are coming as a result of breakdowns in the family scheme, as opposed to the sponsorship scheme. He said the Government needs to ensure those on the family scheme can be transferred onto the sponsorship scheme and called for an urgent plan for when 6 month minimum sponsorship placements end with councils picking up locally that many sponsors do not want to continue hosting Ukrainian arrivals after that time.
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A number of UK fire and rescue services declared major incidents yesterday due to wildfires amid the heatwave. Services in London, Lincolnshire Leicestershire, South Yorkshire, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Suffolk, Nottinghamshire and Humberside were among services that all declared major incidents yesterday. Cllr Ian Stephens, Chair of the LGA’s Fire Services Management Committee said: “It is imperative that people do not take unnecessary risks and make efforts to stay safe. This means not having BBQs on balconies and grass, parks and other open spaces, disposing of rubbish safely, including cigarettes, broken bottles and glass. Anyone who sees a fire should report it immediately. The pressures we are seeing fire and rescue services under today demonstrate the importance of continuing to fund them for potential risk rather than just day to day demand.”
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Public sector unions have begun preparation for strike action after the publication of pay deals yesterday. The deal for NHS staff recommended on average between a 4 and 5 per cent pay rise but unions have criticised the deal, saying it did not cover the increases in inflation.
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Rising petrol and food costs has pushed inflation to 9.4 per cent, the highest it has been for 40 years. Inflation stood at 2.5% in June 2021, with rapid increases taking place over the last year.
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The government has announced pay rises for millions of public sector workers as inflation eats into salaries.
More than a million NHS staff in England will get a pay rise of at least £1,400, with lowest earners getting up to 9.3%.
Police in England and Wales will get £1,900 salary uplift, equivalent to 5% overall pay award.
Unions are pressing for pay to reflect living costs, with inflation running at 9.1%.
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Labour's new lead at the Local Government Association talks pay, devolution and why he is a 'natural' fit for the role
Failure to make more funding available for council staff pay rises will herald a new age of austerity for local government and exacerbate the sector’s recruitment and retention crisis, Labour’s most senior councillor has said.
In his first interview with LGC since being elected as the Local Government Association Labour group lead in June, Shaun Davies, said the government needed to be part of the discussions between unions and local government employers.
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A prominent Conservative council leader has called on the government to provide a one-off grant to offset the impact of inflation, which she warns is threatening the viability of levelling up projects.
Stoke-on-Trent City Council leader Abi Brown (Con) has written to levelling up secretary Greg Clark outlining nearly £10m in extra budgetary pressures facing the city.
She drew attention to the "emerging and growing financial pressures faced by the city council and the rest of the local government sector, which is being driven by the rapidly rising levels of inflation and direct and indirect impact these external economic factors on our residents, businesses and the services we are able to provide”.
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Councils have been warned against undermining the ‘fundamental integrity’ of national talks by agreeing local deals as pressure grows on pay.
In a bulletin to the sector, Local Government Association deputy chief executive, Sarah Pickup, said she was aware some councils were considering making an up-front payment before the national award had been finalised and advised ‘very strongly against any such payments being made’
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Citizens Advice issued around 700 food bank referrals a day last month, compared with 400 a day during the same period last year. Cllr Andrew Western, chair of the LGA’s Resources Board said: “Councils have been at the forefront of helping their residents through the current crisis, by providing advice and financial support, including making referrals and allocating funding to food banks.
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The government is due to unveil this year's pay deal for 2.5 million public sector workers.
The awards cover one in four public servants, including teachers, nurses, doctors, police officers, and members of the armed forces.
Unions are pressing for pay to reflect the cost of living, as inflation rises at the fastest rate for 40 years.
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Planning experts have said Britain’s housing shortage is being exacerbated by red tape relating to the levels of nutrients in waterways. Councils have brought plans for more than 100,000 homes to a halt due to guidance requiring authorities to limit the pollution caused by residential developments, according to the Home Builders Federation.
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The TV licence fee could be scrapped and replaced with a new council tax levy, according to the cross-party House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee, which has looked at the best way to fund the BBC in the future. The proposal would see all households pay for the BBC through their local authority bill.
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Vulnerable people are reportedly struggling to access food vouchers and cash grants as part of the Government’s £1 billion household support fund, as councils work to find suitable payment methods. The fund was launched last autumn, with an initial £500 million pledged to help poorer households, and councils were instructed to distribute the money to their communities.
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Michael Gove's departure as communities secretary prompted fears within local government that the devolution agenda might be kicked into the long grass, but many of the first wave of deals are said to be on track.
LGC has been told by insiders working on the deals that Mr Gove's replacement, Greg Clark, is determined to push on and stick to Mr Gove’s target of the first nine deals being signed by the autumn.
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Ongoing delays to get councils’ financial accounts signed off by auditors are placing extra burdens on stretched teams, the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy has warned.
Some delegates at the organisation's conference suggested more should be done to hold auditors to account for their part by introducing a statutory deadline for the audit to be completed.
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On Friday afternoon, the government announced that it has opened up the second round of the Levelling Up Fund for applications, and it will remain open until midday on the 2nd August.
This will allow councils around the country to bid for a share of the £4.8 billion that is available for them to improve the standard of living, reduce the levels of regional inequality, and provide improved opportunities for everyone. Town centres, transport links, cultural sites, and improved infrastructure have all been key focuses for those bidding for the funding so far, helping to “give people pride in the places where the live.”
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A rise in the number of elderly people living in rural areas of England could see the quality and access to social care services decline without additional government funding, a report by the County Councils Network (CCN) warns. The number of people aged over-65 living in county and rural areas has increased by more than a million over the past decade. Cllr Martin Tett, adult social care spokesman for the CCN, said: “The failure to reform an outdated council formula has left social care services in these areas already hundreds of millions of pounds worse off.”
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The NHS Confederation has said the shortage of social care staff is part of the reason for the health service's poorest ever performance figures in June.
The NHS faced its busiest June on record for A&E attendances and 999 calls, with average ambulance response times for category two emergencies such as heart attacks and strokes rising from 40 minutes in May to 51 minutes in June. The target is 18 minutes.
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Councils cannot expect extra funding and must take a “sensible approach to risk” when faced with growing budget gaps, the top civil servant at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has urged.
Permanent secretary Jeremy Pocklington reiterated warnings that councils should not expect any additional funding from central government to cope with inflation, rising social care costs and the cost-of-living crisis.
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Academisation is a form of outsourcing that would distance schools from the local authority and the community, writes the joint general secretary of the National Education Union.
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The Bureau of Investigative Journalism found earlier this year that of 137 English councils for which it had data, 87 were forecasting a loss on their Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) budgets in 2021/22, adding to multimillion-pound cumulative deficits built up over many years. Extra funding available to the worst-hit councils under so-called “safety valve” agreements with the Department for Education will be expanded to cover 34 councils, with 55 more brought into another, less prescriptive, scheme. But a planned change in council accountancy rules from next April will mean councils, particularly those without safety valve deals, will have to show they have enough money in their general reserves to cover the accumulated DSG deficits. The LGA warned more money is needed. It said: “It was good the Government provided much-needed additional funding to help councils meet the rising demand for support from children and young people with SEND. However, this has fallen short of enabling councils to eliminate high needs deficits.”
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Poor home insulation and greater car dependency means inflation is up to 30 per cent higher in northern English cities than it is in London, according to a new report. The Centre for Cities thinktank said a study of cities in England and Wales showed the north-south cost of living divide was intensifying regional inequality.
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The permanent secretary at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has confirmed that the government intends to rationalise the number of funds involving a bidding process for councils.
Jeremy Pocklington, speaking at CIPFA’s annual conference in Liverpool, said he was conscious that the number of government funds is now “well into the hundreds” and is putting a “significant burden” on council finance functions.
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Audit firms faced heavy criticism from audience members at a CIPFA conference fringe meeting, with suggestions that there needs to be statutory deadlines for accounts to be finalised.
Currently there is a requirement for local authorities to publish audited accounts by a particular date (30 November for 2021/22 accounts), but this is not a statutory deadline. A number of audience members, including section 151 officers, argued that introducing a stricter regime would encourage auditors to finish their work more quickly.
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Newcastle City Council has restructured its senior management team resulting in two director posts being axed including the director of resources role held by Tony Kirkham.
The council said that savings of £320,000 could be delivered by making the director of resources role redundant and not directly replacing the director of city futures following his retirement.
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The leader of Hampshire County Council has called for “root and branch” changes to the way local government is funded as the authority faces a budget gap of £200m by 2025/26.
Cllr Rob Humby said the council was currently facing an “unprecedented financial situation” due to the increased cost of adult social care, growth in the use of services and rising inflation.
[ more...]
"Huge uncertainty" risks diverting attention from the levelling up and net zero agendas, and from delivering services, the new president of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy has warned.
Jayne Owen, who is finance and resources director of North Wales Housing Association, has replaced outgoing Cipfa president Mike Week and yesterday set out the vision for her term at the body's annual conference yesterday.
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The UK economy rebounded in May after shrinking in April and March, official figures show. The economy grew by 0.5 per cent during the month, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said, higher than the flat growth most analysts expected.
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Melting roads caused by soaring temperatures are posing such a risk that motorists may soon see glimpse a sight normally only seen in the freezing depths of winter.
When snow and ice threaten to make the nation's highways slippery and dangerous, it is the gritters that are dispatched to make conditions safer.
But with the extreme heat posing a risk of damage to roads, Hampshire County Council says it is taking its fleet of gritters out of hibernation months earlier than usual.
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COVID restrictions could be reintroduced if a rising number of cases has an impact on the NHS backlog, a minister has said.
Official data shows 2.7 million people in private households are estimated to have had COVID-19 over the past week, up 18% from 2.3 million the previous week.
And in the House of Lords, health minister Lord Kamall was asked what the government was prepared to do if rising cases began to impact the health system.
[ more...]
Research carried out for the End Child Poverty Coalition found that around the UK child poverty was at the lowest level in seven years. However it went up by 12 percentage points in the North East, six percentage points in Yorkshire and the Humber, and by five in Wales.
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Retail sales are falling as price rises hit household budgets, the British Retail Consortium have said. Shoppers are cutting back on white goods such as fridges and dishwashers as well as opting for cheaper brands, and sales in shops and online have dropped for three months in a row.
[ more...]
Sixty-one schools will be rebuilt or refurbished under the latest round Government's School Rebuilding Programme.
The projects will include updating and modernising buildings, and creating facilities such as new sports halls, music rooms, science labs and dining areas.
[ more...]
The Welsh Government today announced it will revalue all 1.5 million properties in the country under bold plans to modernise the council tax system.
Wales’s minister for finance and local government Rebecca Evans announced a 12-week consultation on a revised regime.
[ more...]
A senior mandarin says the government has no plans to force all schools to become academies, amid growing concerns many schools lack the ambition to form or join trusts in their areas.
The schools bill currently working its way through Parliament sets the ambition for children to be taught in a strong multi academy trust (mat) or for their schools to have plans to join or form one by 2030.
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Polling by YouGov has suggested public support for Ukrainian refugees is already waning in Britain. In March it found three-quarters of people supported resettling Ukrainians in the UK and 42 per cent thought the figure should be in the tens of thousands “at least”. However, the figures have now fallen to 71 per cent of people supporting resettlement and 29 per cent wanting to see tens of thousands of refugees welcomed.
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Nearly one in 10 workers with COVID-19 symptoms are being pressured by managers to come into work, the Trade Union Congress (TUC) has claimed, as a new wave of coronavirus infections and hospitalisations sweeps across the country. Polling by the TUC reveals that 9 per cent of employees displaying symptoms have been forced into workplaces and in the past 12 months, 10 per cent have been asked to work alongside colleagues who had tested positive.
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Affordable bus fares are due to be introduced in England from October, with a £2 cap on all local and regional journeys. A taxpayer subsidy will reportedly cut the cost of travel for six months during autumn and winter, with bargain rates for cross-country trips of up to 80 miles and lasting more than three hours, according to a government scheme intended to address a long-standing anomaly whereby bus services in England are more expensive and less frequent than in London.
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Lord Greenhalgh announced his resignation from the government this afternoon, saying he was “saddened” by the events that had led to the prime minister’s resignation.
This leaves the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities without a main spokesperson in the House of Lords.
He was the minister of state for building safety and fire jointly at the DLUHC and the Home Office, and had overseen the Grenfell inquiry. He was also responsible with overseeing DLUHC's business in the House of Lords.
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The years 2020 and 2021 were two of the strangest and most disruptive in living memory, and this is reflected in the results of LGC’s latest chief executive’s salary tracker.
Between February 2020 and January 2022 64 councils welcomed a new head of paid service.
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Nearly half of Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) funds expect to be more than 100% funded at their next valuation, new research has revealed.
The survey, conducted by Alpha Real Capital, shows 46% of LGPS fund professionals in England and Wales are optimistic about funding levels at their next triennial actuarial valuation.
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Councils will be able to bid for £40m to deliver up to 4,000 new homes on derelict and underused brownfield sites across England.
The first round of funding is available from the Brownfield Land Release Fund 2, with an additional £140m being allocated to councils over the next two years.
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Metro mayor Ben Houchen has called on MPs vying to be the next prime minister to fully commit to levelling up the red wall and left behind areas.
Tees Valley mayor Ben Houchen has outlined a five-point ‘Levelling Up Pledge’ that he is urging all candidates to sign up to.
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‘Public disapprobation and abuse’ is preventing children’s services staff from filling director roles, a council director has warned.
President of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS), Steve Crocker, told The MJ there was not enough recognition of the valuable work done every day.
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Civil servants are looking at ways of tackling exploitation of the social care sector by private firms.
Accusations of ‘profiteering’ were levelled at providers in areas such as care homes, fostering and agencies at the annual conference of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS).
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The council lent Brighton i360 Ltd, which operates a 530ft viewing tower by the seafront, £36.2m in 2014 using money from the Public Works Loan Board, and interest has pushed the outstanding figure to almost £43m.
More than £6m in repayments that the i360 was due to make between 2019 and 2021 were deferred, and when Covid-19 saw already-low visitor numbers plummet and income at the attraction tumble a planned restructure was paused.
The authority’s policy and resources committee has now agreed the council will undertake cash sweeps of the business twice a year, leaving it only an “operational cash float”, as part of an overall debt restructure with a reduced interest rate and minimum payments based on forecast visitor numbers and revenue, over a 25-year term.
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Boris Johnson has appointed replacements for two ministers who resigned from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities in protest at his leadership.
Marcus Jones, a former local government minister, and Paul Scully take the places of Kemi Badenoch and Neil O’Brien who quit as part of a wave of government resignations which eventually led to Boris Johnson’s decision to stand down as leader of the Conservative party.
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Boris Johnson has announced his resignation as Prime Minister, with the process to appoint a new leader of the Conservative party set to begin immediately. It is not yet clear when Mr Johnson will leave his post, but a source for Number 10 said a new leader is expected to be in place for the party’s conference in October, although a number of MPs reportedly want him replaced sooner. In his speech from Downing Street, the Prime Minister thanked those who voted for his party in the last election, before highlighting his involvement in the UK leaving the European Union and the COVID-19 pandemic.
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The UK’s national debt is on an “unsustainable path” unless taxes are raised and spending is tightened, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility. The independent forecaster said that rising energy prices and the country’s ageing population risked a recession, with debt levels forecast to possibly more than treble in 50 years’ time.
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Greg Clark has been appointed the new levelling up secretary, replacing the sacked Michael Gove in one of Boris Johnson’s last moves before announcing his resignation.
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A local authority is using central government borrowing to provide business loans aimed at sparking a post-Covid-19 economic recovery.
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There is uncertainty about the future of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill after today’s committee meeting was cancelled.
The two government representatives involved in the committee stage of the bill resigned as part of widespread criticism of Boris Johnson’s leadership.
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Three borough councils in Surrey and two unitaries have been approached directly by the Department for Housing, Communities & Local Government over their levels of excessive debt.
LGC has learnt that Woking, Runnymede and Spelthorne BCs as well as Thurrock and Warrington, which all have relatively high levels of borrowing, have been contacted by DLUHC regarding their commercial property portfolios.
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The South East has the highest proportion of self-funders in community care services and the North East the lowest, according to the Office for National Statistics.
An estimated 26% of people using community care services were self-funders and 74% were local authority funded in 2020-21.
But the least deprived areas had a much higher proportion of self-funders (41%) than the most deprived areas (17%).
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A report by MPs has identified “a host of indefensible system failings” behind the educational disadvantage affecting children in care, and called for academies that illegally turn them away to be punished by Ofsted.
The report by the education select committee accused the government of failing to act as a “pushy parent” by placing looked-after children in the best schools available, resulting in children in care “receiving educational experiences that we certainly would not deem acceptable for our own children”.
The MPs highlighted the difficulties that many looked-after children have in accessing good or outstanding schools in England, and detailed how some academies attempt to keep them out despite their high priority for places.
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Senior Conservative councillors have voiced their support for Greg Clark, after his appointment this afternoon as levelling up minister.
Mr Clark will replace former levelling up secretary, Michael Gove, who was sacked by the prime minister, Boris Johnson, last night following a wave of cabinet resignations.
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Residential care self-funders will not be able to ask their council to arrange care for them at the lower local authority rate until April 2025, minister Gillian Keegan has announced.
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A turbulent evening in UK politics left Nadhim Zahawi as the new chancellor of the exchequer, after Rishi Sunak resigned citing his “fundamentally” different approach to government from Boris Johnson.
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Two public sector unions have been granted permission for a judicial review against pensions proposals that would see younger members foot the bill for changes linked to the McCloud ruling.
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Boris Johnson said that the government would make it possible for Ukrainian refugees to switch from the family scheme to the sponsor scheme to avoid people becoming homeless.
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Senior local government figures have expressed sorrow at the loss of ministerial colleagues who have worked with them on key issues.
Three ministers at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities resigned today over a lack of confidence in the prime minister’s ability to govern.
The housing minister, Stuart Andrew, local government minister, Kemi Badenoch, and junior DLUHC minister Neil O’Brien all shared their resignation letters on Twitter this afternoon.
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Council finance teams put a lot of time and resources into preparing financial statements each year but often the results are impenetrable. A focus on streamlining and clarity can make a huge difference, writes the ICAEW’s public sector director.
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The National Audit Office (NAO) intends to conduct a "value for money review" on the Conservatives' 2019 election pledge to build 40 new hospitals by 2030. Shadow health secretary Wes Streeting asked for an investigation into delays surrounding the programme.
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Around 135 bus routes across England could be cut or closed this summer due to falling passenger numbers, staff shortages and funding constraints. David Renard, transport spokesperson for the LGA, said: “Passenger numbers will take longer to return to those seen before the pandemic and without continued support, it is clear that some routes will no longer be viable and will have to be reduced. We want to encourage greater use of public transport and this means the government must embark on a long-term funding plan for bus services.”
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The Government’s flagship £4.8 billion Levelling Up Fund has been delayed, with the online portal for applications remaining inaccessible more than a month after it was scheduled to go live. Local authorities bidding for the second round of the fund were supposed to have been able to lodge their applications from May 31 ahead of a deadline for submissions of noon on July 6. The LGA said the competitive bidding process was creating “uncertainty” and using up “vital” council resources. An LGA spokesperson said: “Any delay to the distribution of vital funds will inevitably have an impact on what can they deliver.”
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Blood pressure checks in betting shops and diabetes support at sports clubs are among new schemes in parts of England to catch health problems before people become seriously ill.
An NHS shake-up on Friday sees the launch of 42 integrated care systems (ICSs) covering the whole of England. They bring together GP teams, hospitals, local authorities and other partners to plan and deliver services tailored to the needs of their populations.
Under the previous framework, competition between organisations was promoted but this has been scrapped in favour of more joined-up working.
Some regions have already rolled out new services under the changes, including a GP practice in Stockport providing blood pressure checks in betting shops.
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NHS leaders have called on the Government to implement a national care worker minimum wage of £10.50 an hour to prevent staff from leaving the sector and causing long-term damage to the health and care system.
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Councils may have to consider offering a four-day week in order to attract the staff desperately needed by the sector, a workshop at the Local Government Association’s (LGA) annual conference has heard.
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Responses to the LGA’s call for evidence of abuse and intimidation have also indicated that many councillors believe abuse is becoming more common, with the majority who experience abuse and intimidation, experiencing it multiple times and half experiencing it on an ongoing basis.
The LGA said councils are calling for government to work with local authorities and partners to urgently address toxic discourse and abuse against councillors or risk long-term impacts on local democracy and representation.
At the final day of its annual conference in Harrogate today, the LGA is publishing a new report, ‘Debate Not Hate: the impact of abuse on local democracy’, which highlights how councillors are facing increasing abuse and intimidation from the public, with little power to deter perpetrators or support to tackle the issue.
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Councils have warned ministers of their struggle to complete investment plans to unlock the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF), with the deadline fast approaching.
In a behind-closed-doors meeting between the Local Government Association (LGA) and levelling up minister Neil O’Brien, councils are understood to have spoken of ‘challenging timescales’ to draw up local investment plans by 1 August.
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Councils will need to ‘prioritise when delivering core services,’ the Treasury has warned.
In a recorded message to the Local Government Association’s annual conference, chief secretary to the Treasury, Simon Clarke, said he was ‘mindful’ that councils would be ‘feeling the pinch’ after inflation reached a 40-year-high of 9.1%.
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Councils are busy reviewing their budgets after hearing more funding will be needed for higher-than-anticipated pay rises, The MJ understands.
With inflation expected to hit double digits, most councils, which have on average budgeted for a 2% pay rise this financial year, are already being forced to think again.
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The census, the results of which were published yesterday, suggests London’s total population in March 2021 was almost 300,000 (3%) lower than the Office for National Statistics’ (ONS) previous population projection for 2021, with some boroughs’ figures almost a quarter (24%) lower.
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The government is preparing to ask people who have taken Ukrainian refugees into their homes under the sponsorship scheme if they can continue beyond the initial six-month stay.
Where people are unable to continue, the government will look to expand rematching schemes and seek support from the private rental sector.
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The communities secretary has warned councils not to have "false hope" about government support to cover the inflationary pressures, in an exclusive interview for LGC.
Speaking to LGC ahead of his speech to the Local Government Association Conference this afternoon, Michael Gove also gave more detailed of his ambitions for devolution, committed to the fair funding review this year and revealed he is confident all nine county deals will be agreed by the autumn.
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Councils can expect a funding settlement covering the next two financial years and are to face greater scrutiny from a new Office for Local Government, the levelling up secretary has announced.
Speaking at the Local Government Association’s annual conference in Harrogate, Michael Gove said the new body would be set up to assess local government performance across England.
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The chair of the Local Government Association has called for a triple lock on government funding for local authorities.
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Serious incidents involving the police and whistleblowing complaints are more common in private children’s homes run to make a profit than in homes run by charities and councils, data suggests.
Analysis of Ofsted data by the Guardian and BBC signals that children’s homes operated by profit-making firms had a disproportionately higher number of police callouts compared with those of not-for-profit providers. There was also a disproportionately higher number of complaints from often concerned staff members.
The dataset, released after a parliamentary question, shows private businesses provided 69% of the bed spaces in children’s homes in England but accounted for 76% of the serious incidents last year and 78% of the complaints over the last three years. Not-for-profit providers such as councils and charities provided 31% of the bed spaces and accounted for 24% of the serious incidents and 22% of the complaints.
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The pandemic has had a lasting legacy on the mental health of the “Covid generation” of students, exacerbating rates of anxiety, depression and self-harm and resulting in a “significant rise” in young people struggling at university, experts have said.
UK universities have reported that more students are experiencing mental health problems in the aftermath of the pandemic, and that this is expected to continue with the cohort arriving in September, whose school experience was heavily disrupted by the pandemic.
The president of the National Union of Students, Larissa Kennedy, said she was “deeply concerned” by the student mental health crisis, which was “getting worse”, with NUS research suggesting “the majority of students are burdened by anxiety”.
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Rising energy prices, spiralling inflation, and National Living Wage increases are set to add £2.4 billion in extra cost pressures onto council budgets this year, rising to £3.6 billion in 2024/25, LGA analysis reveals today. As its annual conference starts in Harrogate, the LGA said councils face the prospect of having to make funding cuts to local services, such as collecting bins, filling potholes, or care for older and disabled people as a result and has called for government to ensure councils have the resources they need to meet demand and cost pressures and protect services. LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson – who was also interviewed by BBC Radio 4’s Today programme this morning - said: “Inflation is not going to come down overnight. As our analysis shows, the impact on our local services could be disastrous. This will stifle our economic recovery, entrench disadvantage, and undermine government ambitions to level up the country.” LGA Labour Group Leader Cllr Shaun Davies also spoke to the Today programme about the new financial pressures facing councils.
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The extra cost pressures on council budgets will soar to £3.6bn by 2024-25 - posing a “serious risk” to the future financial viability of some councils, analysis by the Local Government Association reveals.
As its annual conference opens its doors in Harrogate today, the LGA warns that the gathering storm of rising energy prices, spiralling inflation and projected increases to the national living wage are forcing its member councils to rip up budget plans set just three months ago.
These cost pressures will add £2.4bn onto budgets this year alone, rising to £3.6bn in 2024-25, the LGA says.
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Rising prices and wages have been tipped to cost councils an additional £3.6bn in two years’ time, putting pressure on authority budgets and risking the need for them to cut services.
Analysis by the Local Government Association has suggested inflation, energy costs and projected increases to the national living wage will add £2.4bn of cost pressures this year, rising by a further £1.2bn by 2024-25.
The body said this means councils are being forced to change spending plans set as recently as three months ago in order to balance the books.
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The Welsh government will give more than 500 people leaving care a guaranteed income of £1,600 per month for two years to help them along in their transition to adulthood.
First minister Mark Drakeford said the “radical” £20m programme will be evaluated carefully to examine its effects on the lives of recipients.
The payments – £1,280 per month after tax – will be made to care leavers who turn 18 between July 2022 and June 2023, and will have no conditions attached.
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The number of holiday lets in England has risen by 40% in three years, BBC analysis of council figures suggests.
Tourist areas which already had large numbers of such properties - including Scarborough, the Isle of Wight, North Devon, the Cotswolds and Norfolk - have seen sharp increases.
Ministers are looking at whether holiday lets should be registered.
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Labour’s Lisa Nandy will accuse levelling up secretary Michael Gove of behaving like “a Grant Shapps tribute act” as she warns the government is putting its head in the sand over the crisis facing essential public services.
Ms Nandy will on Wednesday warn that there is “a perfect storm looming on the horizon” as local councils struggle to cope with the cost pressures imposed by high inflation.
Her comments come after the Local Government Association warned of cuts to services such as bin collections, pothole repairs and adult care as soaring energy prices and inflation drain £3.6bn from annual budgets over the next few years.
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The number of children in England seeking special educational needs and disability (SEND) support from councils has risen by nearly a quarter in a year, according to the latest data.
The Local Government Association has called for emergency action to ensure this rising demand for support is met.
The LGA has said that Government needs to resolve the high needs deficits built up by councils as a result of rising costs which outstrip the SEND budgets available to them.
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In an interview, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Simon Clarke, has warned that cabinet ministers will have to make cuts or find efficiencies if they want to offer public sector pay rises of more than 3 per cent.
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Two key by-elections have seen the Liberal Democrats and Labour pick up key victories, with Conservative Party Chairman Oliver Dowden resigning from his post following the results. The Lib Dems won in Tiverton and Honiton in Devon, overturning a 24,000 Conservative majority with a 30 per cent swing, and Labour emerged victorious in Wakefield, Yorkshire, after losing the seat to the Conservatives in 2019.
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Councils are warning that £5.4 billion of the health and social care tax ringfenced for adult social care reforms will leave them “hugely underfunded”. Ahead of its annual conference in Harrogate tomorrow, an LGA survey found that 98 per cent of councils were concerned that they do not have confidence that funding from the reforms were sufficient. The survey suggested that councils also lacked staff to implement changes and were worried that other services could suffer as a result.
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Government plans to "level up" areas around the UK will cost billions more than thought, a report by the Resolution Foundation has warned. The think tank said levelling up will require investment that goes "far beyond anything currently being contemplated" due to stark differences in income in different local authority areas across the country.
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Millions of households could be paid by the National Grid to use less electricity at peak times this winter, it has been reported. The company are working urgently to establish a scheme to pay consumers with smart meters to ration their usage.
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Government plans to "level up" cities around the UK will cost billions more than thought, a think tank has said.
Research by the Resolution Foundation found differences in income across the UK were "significant" and "persistent".
The government's levelling up agenda is designed to close economic gaps between different parts of the UK.
But only traditionally poorer areas of London such as Hackney and Newham have seen significant improvement over the last 25 years, the new report found.
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Concerns have grown among councils in recent months that the Government’s adult social care charging reforms are potentially hugely underfunded, which will risk their implementation as well as exacerbating existing pressures on the system.
Of the £36 billion the new UK-wide health and social levy will raise over the next three years, only £5.4 billion is ringfenced for social care reforms in England. These include the introduction of a ‘fair rate of care’ that councils will pay providers and tackling the issue of self-funders paying more for their care than those who access support at the council rate.
The survey of senior councillors responsible for adult social care across the country, ahead of the start of the LGA’s Annual Conference in Harrogate tomorrow, also found three quarters of responding councils said that they are not confident they will have the required capacity in frontline staff to deliver the reforms.
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A multi-million-pound investment will help people experiencing a mental health emergency get access to more crisis houses and safe havens, the Government has announced.
The Government today announced a £150m investment which is aimed at bolstering NHS mental health services, better supporting people in crisis outside of A&E, and enhancing patient safety in mental health units over the next three years.
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Three quarters of councils are not confident they will have enough frontline staff capacity to deliver adult social care reforms, a new survey by the Local Government Association reveals.
There is also widespread concern among councils the reforms are “significantly underfunded”, with only 2% of the 80 top tier authorities that responded to the survey expressing confidence the funding the government has provided will be sufficient.
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North Yorkshire’s new unitary council could inherit a budget deficit of £50m, it has been revealed.
A meeting of North Yorkshire CC heard that its successor authority would take on the deficits of the councils it will replace.
Executive member for finance, Gareth Dadd, said: ‘We could be looking at a possible structural deficit that the new authority will face of nigh on £50m per year.
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The announcement follows Nottingham’s failure to run subsidiary company Robin Hood Energy effectively, and the discovery that the authority misused £40m that should have been ring-fenced for housing.
An August 2020 report from auditors Grant Thompson raised concerns about the governance of RHE, into which the council had invested more than £40m.
And earlier this year it was found that since 2014-15 the authority and Nottingham City Homes had together unlawfully spent £40m that should have been used in the council’s housing revenue account – a much larger figure than the initial £15.9m discovered last December.
In a statement to parliament, local government minister Kemi Badenoch said: “In light of this evidence, the secretary of state is satisfied that Nottingham City Council is failing to comply with its best value duty, and is minded to implement [an] intervention package… to secure compliance with that duty.”
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The government has officially launched a programme where specialist advisors will probe the financial data of 55 councils to try and cut their dedicated schools grant (DSG) deficits, as part of a series of measures aimed at putting councils’ high needs budgets on a more sustainable footing.
The £85m Delivering Better Value in Send programme was launched today by the Department for Education, along with new guidance for councils on managing their high needs systems.
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The 2020-21 ‘tax gap’ – the estimated difference between the amount of tax expected and the amount collected – was £32bn, according to HMRC.
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This would mean the government did not collect 5.1% of the tax it was due in theory – the same percentage HMRC estimated for 2019-20, and slightly higher than the record (since the measurement began in 2005-06) low 4.9% estimated in 2018-19.
In absolute terms, the latest tax gap was £2bn lower than in the previous year, but this was in line with the fall in the amount of tax HMRC believes should have been collected amid lockdown restrictions.
“On the face of it, the pandemic has not had a significant effect on the tax gap, although as HMRC themselves note, the estimates for 2020-2021 are subject to even more uncertainty than usual due to Covid-19,” said John Barnett, chair of the Chartered Institute of Taxation’s technical policy and oversight committee.
“The figures suggest HMRC are still collecting about 95% of tax due, which compares well internationally.”
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Since 2014, £333m has been spent on 94 projects aimed at helping councils improve outcomes for children and exploring new ways of working.
These included projects such as an integrated mental health, education and families service supporting children in or nearly needing care; relationship support for women whose children have been taken into care; and targeted support for young people to receive stable placements.
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Schools in England say they face an acute crisis over retention and recruitment without a significant pay increase, as the country’s biggest teaching union warned of strike action this autumn without an “inflation plus” deal.
The threat came as new research shows that every 1% increase in pay gives a 2% boost to graduate recruitment in high-demand disciplines such as science, maths and technology.
Trainee recruitment is down by 25,000 compared with last year and experienced teachers are leaving the profession at the fastest rate for more than a decade.
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The National Education Union is warning that there will be growing teacher shortages without a new ‘inflation plus’ pay deal. They have warned the Government of potential strike action in the autumn if a new deal is not agreed. The Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi has described teachers going on strike as ‘unforgiveable’.
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Councils should not be depending on income from litter fines when drawing up their future budgets, a minister has suggested.
The intervention from Jo Churchill, a minister in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, came after she was made aware of ‘worrying reports’ that suggested some councils were using private litter enforcement contractors who were incentivised on the level of fines issued.
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The lowest paid workers at Surrey CC are set to receive a pay rise after unions and council officers came to an agreement on a proportionate pay offer.
Those at the council on the lowest pay grade will get a 7.85% increase, a minimum hourly pay rate of £10.24. This exceeds the UK Living Wage Foundation’s Real Living Wage, which is £9.90 outside London.
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Anna Cartwright has drunk a lot of tea recently. During the past six months, she has visited countless local authorities to find out about their planned regeneration projects – and how they will be funded.
Cartwright says the conversations will inform the design of new systems currently being put in place by the UK Infrastructure Bank, where she is deputy director of local authority lending. “We are trying to shape ourselves so that we work within the grain of what authorities are already doing, rather than getting them to shift dramatically,” she says.
Chancellor Rishi Sunak announced the creation of the UKIB at his March Budget last year, less than three months after the withdrawal period from the EU came to a close and ended UK involvement in the European Investment Bank.
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Interest payments reached £7.6bn, up 70.4% from the same month last year, figures from the Office for National Statistics show.
The ONS said the rise was because of high Retail Prices Index inflation – this week it was revealed RPI inflation reached 11.7% year-on-year in May – to which about one-quarter of UK government debt is linked.
“On an accrued basis, this month saw the third highest debt interest payment made by central government in any single month and the highest payment made in any May on record,” the ONS said.
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Leicestershire County Council has approved plans for a new solar farm that could save the council £600,000 a year in energy bills and cut carbon emissions.
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A new report into the state of East Sussex County Council’s finances has warned of an ‘unprecedented level of financial uncertainty.’
The annual State of the County report said that the impact of the pandemic and the Ukraine crisis, along with global supply chain issues and high levels of inflation, were putting the local authority’s finances under pressure.
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Gloucestershire County Council has decided to close down four care homes due to the pressures of ‘wider market conditions’.
The council agreed to close down Orchard House, Westbury Court, Bohanam House and The Elms following a six-week consultation with residents, their relatives and staff that involved a series of meetings in each of the four homes.
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The government should have provided “robust guidance and sufficient funding” for councils upon announcing the expansion of its Homes for Ukraine scheme to cover unaccompanied children, the sector has said.
Children fleeing the war in Ukraine who already applied to the Homes for Ukraine scheme will be allowed to come into the country alone under new rules announced yesterday.
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The UK government’s debt interest payments in May were among the highest it has ever made, largely because of high inflation.
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Prices are continuing to rise at their fastest rate for 40 years as food, energy and fuel costs continue to climb.
UK inflation, the rate at which prices rise, edged up to 9.1% in the 12 months to May, from 9% in April, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.
The figure is now at the highest level since March 1982, when it also stood at 9.1%.
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Local audit is a vital part of public accountability and transparency, and timely publication of audited local authority financial statements is a very serious issue.
Without it, there is no proper independent assurance over the billions of pounds spent by local authorities.
Last year’s National Audit Office report on local audit timeliness found that in 2019-20, 55% of audits did not meet the extended statutory deadline.
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Supply teachers could be among staff that vote to go on strike later this year after a minister dismissed demands for above-inflation pay rises.
Schools may have to close, or bring in volunteers, as supply staff would be among union members voting on strike action.
The National Education Union (NEU) said on Monday that it would ballot members on industrial action in the autumn term if the Government did not agree to pay rises in line with inflation for teaching staff.
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Top tier councils expect at least £1.6bn in additional budget pressures from spiralling inflation, surveys from bodies representing around two thirds of these authorities suggest.
London’s 32 boroughs are facing £260m of pressures on top of what was already planned for when budgets were set in April. Municipal authorities are looking at £570m and counties £729m totalling at least £1.6bn of additional costs in all.
Research shared exclusively with LGC by the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities (Sigoma) shows all 22 councils surveyed this month plan service reductions in the upcoming year, with one in four (23%) facing a threat to key services or financial sustainability.
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The mayor of Greater Manchester, speaking at an event organised by the Institute for Government think-tank, said simplifying local funding will unlock “the next phase” of devolution.
He described the existing culture as “this idea of making everyone get on bended knee to whichever Whitehall department, or not speaking out of turn because you might not get [funding]”.
“It’s just wrong on every level, and it’s wasteful of people’s energy and people’s time,” Burnham said.
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In the spring statement, he government said it wants the NLW to reach two-thirds of median earnings by 2024.
According to the Local Government Association, this increase alone (which the Low Pay Commission has said could mean the NLW rises by 20%) would cost nearly £400m.
The body added that the change could also cause other pay grades to rise, and increase the costs of commissioned and outsourced services such as social care, meaning the total cost could be much higher.
“Supporting those on the lowest pay is not only fair, but improves the motivation, loyalty, productivity, and retention of hard-working council staff,” said chair of the LGA’s Resources Board Andrew Western.
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Public service commissioning that uses investor capital to tackle complex social issues saves nearly £3 for every £1 spent by Government, according to a new study.
Commissioned by social impact investor Big Society Capital, the new research found that so-called social outcomes contracts have saved £397m from Government budgets so far as well as generating public benefits 10 times greater than the contract value.
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David Green says the latest government proposals on Minimum Revenue Provision should be welcomed by local authorities. There are still some unintended consequences, but the suggested approach for capital loans is generous and broadly retains the status quo.
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Local authority finance directors and treasury advisers have welcomed the government’s revised Minimum Revenue Provision (MRP) proposals, while pointing out that some unintended consequences still remain.
The government’s previous proposals on MRP, announced in November 2021, were criticised by many in the sector because of the unintended consequences that could follow where authorities have made capital loans. In response, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) has amended the proposals to provide “additional flexibilities”.
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More than 90 per cent of council staff are working from home in some areas, it emerged last night.
Council buildings are between a quarter and a half as full as offices in the private sector, according to freedom of information requests.
Yet local authorities are still using taxpayers’ money to service ‘barren’ office space.
Nearly 3,000 desk spaces are supported by Conservative-run Buckinghamshire County Council, but an average of only 340 of its 2,400 office-based staff come into work each week.
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Some hosts of Ukrainian refugees are still waiting to receive monthly £350 "thank you" payments from the Government, according to charity Mums4Ukraine. The LGA said the priority for councils has been putting in place quickly and at scale both the necessary checks to ensure that hosts and their guests are safe and supported. An LGA spokesperson said: “Councils are aware that another key task is to pay hosts the ‘thank you' payment. Now the funding and guidance from government is in place, those hosting new arrivals will be receiving these payments as soon as possible if they haven't already, including backdated payments."
Listen at 2:42
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Sky News analysis reveals that the social care sector was straining from a shortage of funding and a rising need long before the pandemic revealed a system in crisis. More than half of local authorities experienced a fall in per person spending in the decade to 2020, according to data from NHS Digital, with the numbers even starker in London where almost nine in ten local authorities experienced a funding cut.
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One in seven 65-year-olds have been pushed into income poverty as a direct result of the Government’s move to raise the state pension age, new research shows. Raising the state pension age for men and women from 65 to 66 means that income poverty rates among 65-year-olds have more than doubled, with nearly 100,000 people pushed into subsistence by the end of 2020, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
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Cuts to public health spending during the period of austerity were associated with increases in poor health, new research published by the Lancet has found.
They write: “Our findings suggest that cuts to total local government spending are associated with increased prevalence of multi-morbidity.
“Our estimates suggest that the average cut to total service spending of 22% between 2009-10 and 2017-18 was associated with an average increase of 2.2 percentage points in prevalence of multi-morbidity.
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Vulnerable children were left exposed to sexual exploitation in Oldham because of “serious failings” by the police and council, a damning independent review has found.
The report found there were multiple missed opportunities to prevent abuse stretching back to 2005, including offences committed by a council welfare officer who was later convicted of 30 rapes.
The review also suggested senior police and council officers may have misled MPs on the Commons home affairs select committee when denying wrongdoing over the “profound sexual exploitation” of a 12-year-old girl.
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London Councils called for additional funding to enable boroughs to provide a safety net for people struggling amid rocketing fuel and food prices.
“Boroughs welcome the government providing some much-needed extra support to households, and we are seeking a similar intervention to help councils deal with their massive finance pressures,” said London Councils chair Georgia Gould.
She said the additional cost of Consumer Prices Index inflation reaching 8% (which was forecast when London Councils carried out its survey in May – the current rate according to the Bank of England is 9%, and is set to reach 11% by the end of 2022) will increase costs by £700m.
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Sky News analysis reveals that the social care sector was straining from a shortage of funding and a rising need long before the pandemic revealed a system in crisis.
More than half of local authorities experienced a fall in per person spending in the decade to 2020, according to data from NHS Digital.
The numbers are even starker in London, where almost nine in ten local authorities experienced a funding cut.
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The Government’s levelling up agenda is destined to fail because ministers are unwilling to decentralise power from Whitehall, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer will say. In a speech to today’s Labour LGA conference, he will accuse the Conservatives of “hoarding” power and say that a Labour government in Westminster will offer a new partnership with local government, with decisions being made “as locally as practicable”. This was also reported in the Mail and Evening Standard.
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Three percent of English households own a second home, according to the English Housing Survey, with purchases of an additional property accounting for 4.2 percent of sales within a mile of the coast. Government figures from 2018 suggest that if housing stock were to increase by 1 percent, house prices would fall by about 2 percent, although measuring second-home owners’ contribution to local economies is difficult. In Cornwall, tourism is the biggest employer and supports one in five jobs, according to the LGA.
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A council has taken hundreds of thousands of pounds of grants out of next year’s budget as part of a savings drive aimed at saving the authority millions.
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Ministers have been told they must raise the amount of money spent on children’s school meals amid claims that pupils are going home hungry because of shrinking portion sizes. Caterers have already been forced to replace some items with cheaper alternatives, while schools struggle with a mismatch between free school meals funding and the prices set by caterers.
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School-building projects, swimming pools and libraries have been earmarked for emergency funding cuts because councils have been hit by an unexpected £1.7 billion hole in their budgets, it is reported. Inflation and rising energy bills mean that council leaders have been forced to change their financial plans from a few months ago, with higher than anticipated staff pay bills also contributing to their newfound deficits. Local authority leaders are understood to have already approached ministers to ask for extra financial support to soften the impact of rapidly rising costs, which they said will reduce their capacity to support residents facing the cost of living crisis. The LGA said paying the forecasted increase in the national living wage for the lowest paid council staff alone could cost councils at least £400 million over the next two years and without central government support to cover this cost, councils would be forced to cut jobs and services.
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Up to 50 local authorities will share £7.8m to train and employ new staff to drive forward tree planting and woodland creation.
All upper tier authorities are eligible to apply for the Woodland Creation Accelerator Fund to access the professional expertise they need to deliver plans.
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A Conservative council leader whose area had expected to be among the first to receive a county deal has lashed out at the government over the breakdown of its mayoral devolution discussions.
Leicestershire CC leader Nick Rushton (Con) claimed the area had gone from wearing “yellow jerseys" in the Tour de France to “riding at the back of the peleton”.
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Over 600 Ukrainian new arrivals have presented to councils as homeless since the end of February, according to latest government figures. At least 480 Ukrainian families with children and 180 single adults have applied for help, despite arriving on visas designed to secure a place to live. The LGA has warned that most homelessness presentations are from those arriving through the family scheme, as borne out by the latest figures. Cllr David Renard, housing spokesperson for the LGA, said: “Currently councils receive no data on, or funding for, people who are coming under the family visa scheme. Some of those families present as homeless once they have arrived, but we are asking that they should be able to be re-matched with a sponsor under the Homes for Ukraine scheme.”
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Plans to safeguard renters in the private rented sector are moving forward as the Government published their Fairer Private Rented Sector White Paper. The measures will form part of the Renters Reform Bill and will see tenants handed more powers to challenge poor practice, and the scrapping of ‘no-fault evictions.’ Cllr David Renard, housing spokesperson for the LGA, said: “Removal of ‘no fault evictions’ is a key step towards increased protection for private renters and will allow renters to challenge poor practice and unfair rent increases without fear of eviction. It will also be important that landlords are able to get their properties back in a timely fashion where they have a valid reason to do so.”
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Interest rates in the UK have risen from 1 per cent to 1.25 per cent, the fifth consecutive rise, as the Bank of England attempts to tackle soaring prices. Inflation is now at a 40-year high of 9 per cent, with the Bank warning it could surpass 11 per cent later this year.
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A record 6.48 million people were waiting to start routine hospital treatment in England at the end of April after being referred by a consultant, NHS figures reveal. The number of people forced to wait over a year for treatment is now almost 200 times higher than it was before the pandemic, with 300,000 on the list at the end of February this year.
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The head of pensions at the Local Government Association has expressed concern over members opting out of the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) due to the rise in inflation and the cost-of-living crisis.
Joanne Donnelly, addressing the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association local authority conference, said: “My personal concern is about opt outs from members because of the cost of living. I personally feel very lucky to be a member of the LGPS, but it is expensive.”
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Hampshire County Council decided to cut £680,000 of grants – £320,000 for voluntary organisations in the health and social care sector and £360,000 for social inclusion services for homeless people.
Councillors said the authority needs to find £40.6m of savings in its health and social care budget by the end of March 2023 – a significant proportion of the total £80m of savings needed across all areas of the council’s spending.
“What we cannot do is carry on giving grants to organisations and neglect our statutory responsibility to those who are perhaps most vulnerable in our society – the frailest, the elderly, people with disabilities,” said Liz Fairhurst, executive member for adult services and public health, at a council meeting.
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The pay of executives at equity firms that own care homes is 13 times higher than the wages of the care home workers they employ, new research has revealed.
A report from the University of Surrey and analysts Trinava Consulting – entitled Held to Ransom – found that the average salary has rocketed by more than 100% in five years for top executives at some of the largest care home owners including Barchester, HC-One, Care UK, Avery Healthcare, and Signature Senior Living.
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Demand for second homes has fallen, according to analysis by Rightmove. In Ilfracombe and Brixham in Devon, buyer competition fell by 64 per cent and 40 per cent respectively whist in Cornwall a 27 per cent drop was seen this year.
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A council in south-west England will scale back a town centre regeneration project in the face of rising construction costs.
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English counties could be forced to reduce services or postpone local infrastructure repairs in 2022-23, as inflation far exceeds initial forecasts.
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Lord Hammond, former Chancellor has said that the UK is heading for a recession, saying "all the data points that way". He told Sky News the country faces a "very, very difficult period ahead in the short term" and thinks the UK economy will slow down quite sharply in the autumn
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Plans to create a fairer private rented sector in England are taking a step forward with the publication of a Government White Paper on Thursday.
Tenants will have stronger powers to challenge poor practice and unjustified rent increases under the proposals, and they could also be saved the expense of having to move as often from one rented home to another.
It will also be made illegal for landlords or agents to place blanket bans on renting to families with children or those in receipt of benefits.
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CIPFA’s recent report, Internal Audit: Untapped Potential, lifts the lid on internal audit in public services. For some chief financial officers and chief executives, it will confirm the value and contribution of internal audit teams. The report found 87% of clients recognised the contribution internal audit makes, which is good news. However, for some leadership teams it might come as a surprise that internal audit can do more than provide a basic service at minimal cost.
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Thousands of patients are still catching COVID-19 on hospital wards, analysis shows, as scientists have warned that Britain could be facing a new wave of coronavirus. Just days after the NHS dropped a requirement to wear masks within hospitals and GP practices, data shows that 19 per cent of positive patients on wards are likely to have caught the virus in hospital.
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The UK economy shrank again in April as businesses felt the impact of price rises and the NHS Covid Test and Trace operation was wound down.
The economy contracted by 0.3% in April after it shrank by 0.1% the month before, official figures showed.
April was the first time all main sectors of the economy - services, manufacturing and production - had shrunk since January 2021.
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Cabinet minister Michael Gove has admitted the government has not conducted a “full” impact assessment of Boris Johnson’s extension of Right to Buy.
Quizzed by MPs, the Levelling Up secretary was also unable to say where the funding for the newly announced policy would come from, insisting: “Watch this space”.
It comes after the prime minister unveiled proposals to extend Margaret Thatcher’s flagship housing scheme, Right to Buy, to housing association tenants last week.
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The Government is preparing to repeal a legal ban that prevents agency staff filling in for striking workers.
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It is reported that Chancellor Rishi Sunak will refuse to cut taxes to ease cost of living concerns unless Prime Minister Boris Johnson identifies government spending that he is willing to cut to fund such a move.
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Voters will go to the polls tomorrow in the Yorkshire town of Whitby on the issue of second-home ownership. Residents will be asked if they want new-build properties to be reserved for locals.
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The Treasury has defended itself against a think-tank’s claim that it spent billions of pounds more than necessary on interest on the government’s debts.
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Proposals to expand the right-to-buy scheme to housing associations and earmark national infrastructure levy income for new social housing have sparked funding concerns among councils.
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Some regions across the UK are likely to miss out on initial development funding as the government directs its support towards the most deprived areas first, according to experts.
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The government must work out which areas need funding the most in order to best use the “finite resources” pledged to levelling up, said Andrew McPhillips, chief economist at the Northern Powerhouse Partnership.
Speaking at an Institute for Government event, he said this would be politically difficult but necessary to help define and track the progress of the government’s much-vaunted agenda.
McPhillips said: “There will be some [areas] that are just below and just above the cut-off line.
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The UK is expected to have the highest inflation in the G7 not just this year but also in 2023 and 2024, according to economists, reflecting how Britain is struggling with a toxic combination of price rises recorded in Europe and North America.
A Financial Times analysis of the causes of price increases across the world’s leading economies shows that Britain — where the inflation rate hit a 40-year high of 9 per cent in April — combines the worst aspects of other G7 countries.
The UK is contending with a huge rise in the price of energy, like many countries in mainland Europe. But Britain is also grappling with a broad rise in the prices of other goods and services, like North America.
Energy prices, combining electricity, gas and road fuels, contributed 3.5 percentage points to the UK’s 9 per cent inflation rate in April, much the same as in Germany and Italy. It highlights how Europe has been badly exposed to rising energy prices as the global economy reopened following the Covid-19 pandemic, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has magnified the problem.
Meanwhile, other goods and services contributed 5.5 percentage points to UK inflation in April, similar to the US and Canada. As the pandemic has eased, goods and services have increased in price as consumer spending has outstripped companies’ ability to meet demand.
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Northumberland County Council issued a notice in May after its interim director of finance Jan Willis found the authority provided international commercial services without a subsidiary company, breaching the Localism Act 2011.
Responding to councillors at an extraordinary full council meeting this week, she was unable to rule out the council issuing further notices.
“Are there going to be any further section 114s? I don’t know,” she said.
Willis said there are some matters she is “still looking into”, including two exit payments given to senior officers, but gave no further details.
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The government first proposed the national funding formula (NFF) in a white paper in 2010, with the aim of ensuring all schools receive a fair level of support per pupil.
The NFF was ‘soft launched’ in 2018-19, with funding given to authorities to allocate to schools through a separate formula.
However, a Department for Education consultation has now revealed that arrangements meaning central government will fund schools directly may not be implemented until 2027 – three years later than the government said as recently as last year.
The DfE said it is “not setting a definitive final end date” for rolling out the policy, saying it will depend on how the initial transition progresses.
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The shadow levelling up secretary, Lisa Nandy, was forced to withdraw a suggestion that the government had acted corruptly in promising a fair funding review for the Isle of Wight.
On Tuesday, Bob Seely (Con), the MP for the Isle of Wight, wrote in a statement to his constituents that his support for the prime minister in Monday’s confidence vote had been encouraged by a commitment from ministers to look into the Isle of Wight Council’s funding arrangements.
Speaking during the debate on the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill, Ms Nandy said: “I ask the secretary of state: did he have knowledge of this? Did he sign it off? Let me say to him: that sounds awfully like corruption to me.”
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Union representing local government chiefs are calling for pay rises on par with other council employees after it revealed chiefs’ wages have fallen by almost a third since 2008.
Unison and GMB, representing the officers' side of the joint negotiating committee for chief officers, says their members are continuing to report “dangerous workloads” after going “above and beyond” during the pandemic, and that a “substantial increase” in pay would represent a “form of recognition for the very high levels of unpaid overtime that our members contribute”.
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Northumberland CC needs a “fundamental reset of its philosophy, processes and relationships” because staff and politicians are consumed with in-fighting, a damning review of its governance has concluded.
Last month the council issued a section 114 notice over a £40,000-a-year payment to its chief executive and the structure of a trading company.
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The Government has been criticised for granting permission for oil drilling to go ahead on a site in Surrey against the county council’s wishes.
Housing minister Stuart Andrew has announced that UK Oil & Gas (UKOG) will be allowed to carry out exploratory drilling on a site for three years.
Surrey CC’s planning and regulatory committee refused planning permission for UKOG’s proposal in December 2019 but the Planning Inspectorate recommended that the appeal be allowed.
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Council leaders have warned that any homes sold under the newly-extended Right to Buy scheme must be replaced on a like-for-like basis.
Today Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced that up to 2.5 million housing association tenants will be given the right to buy them outright.
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Supply chain pressures are mounting up on local government, with place directors warning of a ‘perfect storm’.
COVID-19, a shortage of lorry drivers, global supply chain issues and the Ukraine crisis have led to unforeseen price increases across a range of council service areas.
Rising fuel costs have hit waste, highways and transport contracts while directors have reported increasing construction supply costs, with a number of early warnings on current schemes.
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Ministers have been accused of drawing up rules which allow billions of pounds of levelling up funding to be handed to their favoured areas. The Commons Public Accounts Committee revealed that the “principles” for successful awards from a flagship £4.8 billion fund were decided only after the Government knew which of 170 bidders “would win and who would not”. Its report also said councils are unable to plan properly because of the “unpredictability of the ‘alphabet soup’ of funding pots to support regeneration”. In response Cllr Kevin Bentley, Chairman of the LGA’s People and Places Board, said: “Turning levelling up from a political slogan into a reality will only be achieved if councils have the powers and funding they need. Competitive bidding for short-term, small pots of funding creates uncertainty and uses up vital resources in councils, which could be better spent on planning ahead for their communities.” The LGA’s response was also reported in the FT, iNews and Mirror.
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The Government has promised “the biggest shake-up in health and social care leadership in a generation” after a review found evidence of bullying, discrimination and blame culture. The review by retired general Sir Gordon Messenger, which will be published in full later, also found there is "instructional inadequacy" in how leaders and management are trained, valued and developed.
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Boris Johnson is expected to say that he wants 2.5 million people who rent housing association properties to have the chance to buy their homes at a discount. Under the existing Right to Buy policy, tenants living in council houses can get a discount of up to 70 per cent of the market price depending on how long they have lived there, or £87,200 rising to £116,200 in London, while the Prime Minister is also understood to favour the idea of building more modular homes.
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Councillors for the new North Yorkshire unitary council have started the process of recruiting a chief executive.
The new unitary will replace the county’s existing governance model when its county council and seven district councils are abolished in April 2023.
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The MP for the Isle of Wight was told that a fair funding package will be considered in the "very near future" during talks with ministers yesterday.
Bob Seely (Con), said he had talks with government ministers around why a fair funding package has not yet been delivered for the island’s council.
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The Government is in talks to expand its programme of bailing out under-pressure councils to wipe out their special educational needs (SEND) deficits.
It said it would be ‘expanding’ its so-called safety valve intervention after striking deals with nine councils totalling more than £300m earlier this year.
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Public bodies could find it difficult to retain senior staff if the decade-long trend of sharper pay reductions at the top of the sector continues, an expert has warned.
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The three major unions representing council workers in England have requested a “substantial pay rise” this year to help mitigate the impact of soaring inflation on their members.
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Councillors are concerned about some of the reforms laid out in the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill, with district councillors worried at how their councils' powers could be usurped without their consent under the proposals.
The bill, which is having its second reading in the Commons today, stipulates that only county councils or unitaries can be constituent members of the new bodies, with districts relegated to becoming non constituent members.
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The government has admitted there has been a delay to the launching the portal that will let councils apply to the next round of the levelling up fund.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities apologised for the “inconvenience” in an update on its website yesterday – one week after the portal should have launched.
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A report by the MPs found ministers had seen a “high-level summary” of the bids for the £1.7bn first round of the Levelling Up Fund before finalising the principles they would be judged on, meaning they knew which councils would win and which would not.
The government was unable to clarify how much say ministers had in awarding funds, nor did it publish lists of how bids were scored, which were shortlisted or which were unsuccessful, the report said.
The committee said it “remains concerned over the timing of ministerial input for final awards”.
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MPs have delivered another critical report on the government’s levelling up funding but LGC's news editor Kirsty Weakley doubts it will lead to any change
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Parents in England are being hit with an increasing number of fines as schools try to encourage children to stop missing school.
The number of non-attendance fines being handed out dropped off during the pandemic, as self-isolation rules and lockdowns led to millions of children learning at home.
But there has been growing concern since it was revealed that almost 1.8 million children regularly missed school in the first term of this academic year.
As part of a mission to tackle this, parents have been fined £3.7m for the school year so far, figures obtained by the BBC show.
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The government is “urgently” exploring a windfall tax on electricity companies within weeks, Rishi Sunak has said, extending the Treasury’s £5 billion energy tax raid to cushion the cost of living blow for struggling households.
The chancellor told MPs on the Treasury committee that electricity companies were racking up “extraordinary profits” on the back of a global oil and gas price surge that has driven up UK household bills by more than 50 per cent this year.
“We are working urgently with the industry to understand the scale of what those [profits] might be and the best way to address that,” Sunak said.
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More than 3,300 workers at 70 UK companies, ranging from a local chippy to large financial firms, start working a four-day week from Monday with no loss of pay in the world’s biggest trial of the new working pattern.
The pilot is running for six months and is being organised by 4 Day Week Global in partnership with the thinktank Autonomy, the 4 Day Week Campaign, and researchers at Cambridge University, Oxford University and Boston College.
The trial is based on the 100:80:100 model – 100% of pay for 80% of the time, in exchange for a commitment to maintain 100% productivity.
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The three unions representing local government workers have asked for a “substantial” rise to reflect the current rate of inflation, or a minimum of £2,000, in the pay claim they have just submitted for this financial year.
The National Employers say that Unison, Unite and GMB have asked for “a substantial increase with a minimum of £2,000, or the current rate of RPI [retail price index inflation] - whichever is greater, plus changes to a number of terms and conditions” in the claim that was submitted to them last week.
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Boris Johnson’s plans to slash the number of civil servants by 91,000 – around 20% – within three years, will leave Whitehall unable to handle the huge extra workload caused by Brexit, independent experts and unions have warned the government.
They say such a reduction would leave the state too small to cope with the added responsibilities taken on by officials in Whitehall since the UK left the EU, including in areas of trade, agriculture, immigration and business regulation.
This weekend the TUC releases figures showing that the planned cuts would mean the ratio of civil servants to members of the UK population would fall beneath the low recorded after former chancellor George Osborne’s ruthless austerity drive, when government departments were told to pare back numbers to achieve savings of up to 40% after the 2010 general election.
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Food banks are anticipating a surge in demand this summer unless the Government expands free school meals over the summer holidays, with the Independent Food Aid Network saying some are being pushed to breaking point. Around 1.7 million children are currently eligible for free school meals, but 2.6 million children live in households that missed meals or struggled to access food, according to the Food Foundation.
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From June 1 a handful of new driving laws will be introduced. The Highway Code is about to get its annual update, which will lead to some alterations.
On the list are changes to how electric cars are charged at home, details around clean air zones and increased council powers. It's thought the new driving law changes could lead to an increase in driving fines.
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More children should be given free school meals to help tackle the cost of living crisis in England, teaching unions have said. Unions have called for the Government to include families on Universal Credit in the scheme to ease pressure on household budgets.
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One in seven people aged 70 own a second home, a report by the IFS has found. In 2018-19 an estimated 772,000 households reported having second homes, about 500,000 of which were in the UK.
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One in seven people aged 70, who have been dubbed the “Platinum Jubilee generation”, own a second home, according to official statistics.
Those born in 1952, the year of the Queen’s accession to the throne, have been richer on average at every point of their adult lives than the general population, researchers at the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said.
When they were 25, at the time of the Silver Jubilee in 1977, people now aged 70 had average incomes of £12,500 (expressed in 2020–21 prices), compared with £10,700 for the whole of the UK.
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Boris Johnson has been accused of failing in his "defining mission" to level up Britain after official data showed a growing economic gulf between London and much of the Red Wall.
GDP in the capital surged by 2.3pc in the third quarter of 2021, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), driving overall UK output higher despite a 1.2pc slump in the North East.
Regional data published by the stats body also showed GDP falling in the West Midlands, East Midlands and East of England – all areas the Prime Minister has pledged to "level up" as part of his efforts to address regional inequality.
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Wirral Council has taken “many of the right steps” to resolve longstanding financial issues, balancing the 2022-23 budget without any government financing flexibilities (being allowed to use capital receipts to fund revenue spending) for the first time since 2019-20, an independent report said.
The approved budget includes £18m of savings, but the independent panel said cutting spending by this amount in a single year is challenging, and the authority faces further cuts next year.
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The Government today confirmed plans to establish a new regulator aimed at increasing the level of transparency in local authority finance systems.
In his review into the oversight of local audit and the transparency of local authority financial reporting, published in September 2020, Sir Tony Redmond found that there was a lack of coherence across the current local audit framework.
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The system for collecting and enforcing council tax needs modernisation and there should be a fairer approach to supporting people who struggle to pay, councils have said.
The Commons’ levelling up, housing and communities committee has published written evidence for its inquiry into council tax.
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Rising costs have created a “ticking timebomb” for UK small business owners, the chairman of the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) has warned, with almost half a million firms at risk of going bust within weeks without a fresh wave of government support.
While the FSB chairman, Martin McTague, applauded the chancellor Rishi Sunak’s latest support for consumers through the £15bn cost of living package announced last week, he said some of those recipients could lose their jobs unless the government rolled out targeted measures for their employers.
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The council’s cabinet awarded a two-year £500,000 contract to Oracle Corporation UK for the company to provide technical support services on the authority’s payroll and human resources software.
However, Government-appointed commissioners have criticised the council for only publishing the contract report the day before the meeting, with the agreement set to expire the day after.
The commissioners said in the report: “It is unacceptable that the matter has been brought for decision in the way it has, but given the nature of the service contract in question, and the risks that would ensue by not entering into the agreement proposed, there seems to be little alternative.
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Sheffield City Council’s 2022-23 spending plans relied on the authority making £53m of savings and using £15m of reserves.
However, the council has already forecast an £18.7m budget gap this year due to a combination of unmet savings and the impact of inflation on services, a report prepared ahead of a strategy and resources policy committee said.
The report said: “The council is facing a challenging financial position driven by rising cost pressures in the two social care areas and emerging inflationary pressure on contracts and energy.”
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Discharging hospital patients into care homes without testing for Covid was not the main driver of outbreaks in care homes during the first wave of the pandemic, a committee of experts has agreed.
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Stark regional and national differences in public spending and tax income in 2020/21 are outlined in new analysis from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showing London had both the highest spend and the smallest deficit per head of population.
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Local authorities in wealthier areas with higher levels of self-funded care home residents are likely to fare worse from planned changes to the funding regime, according to latest figures.
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English councils will soon be able ask the government for new powers to fine motorists for moving traffic offences such as driving in a bus lane.
Councils will be able to keep any surplus funds raised through the fines to fund public transport, highway improvement and environmental projects, when secondary legislation comes into force tomorrow, a Commons briefing says.
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Hundreds of swimming pools across Britain are facing closure because they are unable to cope with rising energy bills.
Pool operators are planning to reduce opening hours, turn down the temperature of the water and even ask swimmers to reduce the time they spend in the showers to save money.
Almost nine in ten public pool operators said they would need to reduce their service in the next six months, according to leisure and swimming body UKActive. Two-thirds said they would probably need to cut staff number to cope.
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Tens of thousands of Ukrainian refugees have fled the Russian invasion and are now living in the UK. But two months on, how has it been working out and are there areas of concern?
More than 60,000 people fleeing Ukraine have arrived in the UK - some with family visas and others under the Homes for Ukraine sponsorship scheme, which enables members of the public to host an individual or group. Latest figures show 115,000 visas have been issued.
But the experience of settling into life in the UK has differed wildly for many Ukrainians.
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The Government is said to be “open” to the idea of revisiting current legislation that outlaws the creation of any new academically selective schools. MPs are urging ministers to allow new grammars to be set up in local authority areas where they already exist as well as in new areas where there is demand for them.
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Half of Britain’s biggest children’s social care operators are owned by offshore private equity firms, The Times has found. Corporate bodies in Jersey, Luxembourg and the United Arab Emirates lie behind companies largely paid by the taxpayer to look after some of the country’s most vulnerable children.
As a report on children’s services in England warned of a “broken system”, The Times found that hundreds of UK children’s homes and fostering agencies are ultimately owned by foreign companies.
Regulators said that the role of large-scale childcare providers, primarily funded by local councils, has distorted the market. An independent review this week called for the government to levy a windfall tax on top companies.
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Half of Britain’s biggest children’s social care operators are owned by offshore private equity firms, it has been reported. An analysis of the ten largest providers of children’s homes and fostering services, based on LGA data, found that half are owned offshore.
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A package of new measures has been announced by the Government to tackle soaring energy prices, including an energy bill discount of £400 for all UK households this October. Households receiving benefits will be given an additional payment of £650, with the £15 billion package being partly offset by a 25 per cent windfall tax on oil and gas firms’ profits. In an interview with LBC, LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson, said: “We are very pleased because we are concerned about our residents who are having a tough time. Food prices, energy prices and housing costs have gone up significantly, so this is very helpful. The question for us is this is a measure to do the here and now, but the thing we’re most concerned about is how do we help our residents in the long term.” The LGA’s response to the announcement was also reported by The Mirror.
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More pupils will receive tutoring and additional lessons when catch-up money provided by the Government doubles in September, to help recover from lost learning caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. A £1 billion fund was previously announced to share between schools and one-and-a-half million pupils have already started courses under the National Tutoring Programme.
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Family concerns for Star Hobson and Arthur Labinjo-Hughes were too often "disregarded and not taken sufficiently seriously", says a report on how professionals failed to protect them.
Arthur, aged 6 from Solihull, and Star, 16 months from Bradford, were murdered by their parents' partners in 2020.
Both "suffered horrific and ultimately fatal abuse", said Annie Hudson, who chaired the review.
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A review into the deaths of Star Hobson and Arthur Labinjo-Hughes has recommended that specialist units with a child protection focus should be established in local areas.
The independent review, carried out by the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel, examined the circumstances leading up to the deaths of six-year-old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and 16-month-old Star Hobson to learn what needed to be done to improve child protection at the national and local level.
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Slough BC has been told it needs to sell most of its property, probably including its £41m head office, to resolve its financial difficulties.
The council, which is currently subject to a government intervention has £760m of borrowing debts and a forecast £479m financial black hole.
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‘Huge equal pay challenges in many areas’ could be sparked if employers are forced to retrospectively delete pay points, chief executives have been warned.
In a circular to council chief executives in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, employers’ secretary Naomi Cooke admitted the move may be considered in the ‘later part of a multi-year deal’.
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Treasury managers and section 151 officers are overwhelmingly in favour of the IFRS 9 statutory override being extended or made permanent, according to a Room151 survey.
The survey showed that 87% of respondents supported this approach – 68% thought the override should be made permanent and 19% thought it should be extended. Responses were received from a range of local authorities, including districts (40%), unitaries (18%), London boroughs (10%), other boroughs (9%) and mets (9%).
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The government is set to amend legislation so that local authorities can exit contracts with Russian companies, ensuring public funds do not contribute to the nation’s “barbaric war machine”.
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MPs have called for ‘more information and more transparency’ when it comes to levelling up grants and funding pots.
Clive Betts, chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (LUHC) Committee, has written to levelling-up minister Neil O’Brien asking for clarity around the funds available for the levelling-up agenda.
He said that the number of funding streams available makes it ‘impossible for those outside DLUHC [Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities] to assess what precisely is going on.’
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Local authority leaders have welcomed the Chancellor’s multi-billion-pound announcement of cost of living payments but called for a ‘longer-term solution’ to the crisis.
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Clive Betts, chair of parliament’s Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee, wrote to levelling up secretary Neil O’Brien asking for a table setting out each local authority’s allocation from every grant mentioned in this year’s white paper.
This will include the UK Shared Prosperity Fund, the Community Ownership Fund, the Levelling Up Fund, the UK Community Renewal Fund, the Getting Building Fund, the Towns Fund, the Transforming Cities Fund, the Local Growth Fund, the Coastal Communities Fund/Coastal Revival Fund and the Future High Streets Fund.
“Levelling-up is a crucial part of the government’s agenda but the complex array of grants and funding pots allocated by the DLUHC and other government departments makes it difficult, if not impossible, to assess what precisely is going on to improve communities up and down the country,” said Betts.
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Government-appointed commissioners said the council needs to sell £600m worth of assets because it does not have money in its revenue budget to service new borrowing.
A commissioners’ report discussed at a cabinet meeting said the council owns £1.2bn of assets, but when unsellable assets such as schools, parks and highways are excluded, the remaining £600m will need to be sold “without exception”.
While normally local authorities are not allowed to fund revenue spending through capital receipts, the government in March signalled it would approve more than £300m of financing flexibilities to allow Slough to do so.
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Child protection services in England face a shake-up after an independent review of safeguarding failures that led to the killings of six-year-old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and the toddler Star Hobson.
The review’s central proposal is the creation of specialist child protection teams including social workers, mental health workers, police officers, paediatricians and child psychologists to oversee cases where children are at serious risk of harm.
The report sets out the circumstances of what it calls the “unimaginably horrific deaths” of Arthur and Star and highlights a number of chances missed by child protection teams to save the children. There were multiple warnings from wider family members that the children were in danger.
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The government will top up the household support fund by a further £500m to support families with the cost-of-living crisis, the chancellor of the exchequer announced this lunchtime.
The fund, which is distributed by county councils and unitary authorities, is set out to support those most in need due to rising living costs.
During today’s statement, the chancellor announced the scheme would be extended from October 2022 to March 2023 with the new funding bringing the total available to £1.5bn.
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A government plan to help support people with the rising cost of living could come as soon as Thursday, the BBC understands.
The PM and chancellor have been under growing pressure to act as prices for fuel, food and energy continue to soar.
But BBC political editor Chris Mason said the government was also desperate to shift the agenda on from Partygate.
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Mendip has become the latest council to declare a cost of living emergency.
Councillors have declared the emergency motion following concerns that local families will be pushed even deeper below the poverty line unless the Government takes immediate action.
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Local authorities are missing out on millions of pounds worth of council tax income because of a loophole in the business rates system, an investment company has warned.
Colliers argues that the Government’s business rates system is giving many holiday home and second homeowners the opportunity to avoid paying tax by leaving open the option for them to make their properties available to rent.
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The Government’s flagship adult social care reforms could cost a minimum of £10bn more than currently estimated and will require over 4,000 new social work staff, a new study has revealed.
The analysis, released today by the County Councils Network (CCN) and Newton, has looked at the impact of the Government’s reforms, which include a more generous means-test and a cap on care costs of £86,000.
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The view from counties and cities around the country
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Police forces have reportedly begun planning for disorder over the summer amid fears that the cost-of-living crisis and other pressures could trigger civil unrest. Chief constables and policing organisations are said to be sharing intelligence about potential disorder and have also been assessing mutual aid, the process by which forces share officers to bolster their numbers during major incidents, according to a senior source.
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Councils should not rely on Government grants to fund social care, ministers have said.
The comments come as the sector told MPs more funding was essential to resolve the sector’s workforce crisis.
Appearing before the Health and Social Care Committee, the Local Government Association’s director of social care improvement, Simon Williams, said: ‘Adequate funding is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for moving forward.
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Northumberland CC has issued a section 114 notice for unlawful expenditure – including allowances paid to its chief executive Daljit Lally.
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Tens of thousands more youngsters will end up in care unless radical changes are made to child protection in England, a major review has warned.
The independent review on council-run children's services said struggling families needed early intervention to ensure they don't reach crisis point.
The recommendations include phasing out young offender institutions and a drive to recruit more foster parents.
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Public buildings across England will cut their use of expensive fossil fuels and save millions of pounds on bills, thanks to £553 million in government funding.
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Iain Duncan Smith MP has called for benefits to be immediately increased to help the poorest cope with the cost of living. The former conservative leader told Sky News there should also be tax cuts for those in work to help "the squeezed middle".
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District Councils in the current Cumbria, Somerset and North Yorkshire county areas are restricted from borrowing over £1m, selling land worth over £100,000 or entering a non capital contract worth over £100,000 without the consent of the shadow authorities.
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The upcoming national care review has been tipped as a “once-in-a-generation” chance to reform how councils support vulnerable children at risk of harm, after rising demand caused costs to increase by a quarter.
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Local authorities in England should be mandated to work more collaboratively as part of a system reset aimed at reducing profiteering in children’s care, according to an independent review.
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More than 400,000 children and young people a month are being treated for mental health problems – the highest number on record – prompting warnings of an unprecedented crisis in the wellbeing of under-18s.
Experts say Covid-19 has seriously exacerbated problems such as anxiety, depression and self-harm among school-age children and that the “relentless and unsustainable” ongoing rise in their need for help could overwhelm already stretched NHS services.
The latest NHS figures show “open referrals” – troubled children and young people in England undergoing treatment or waiting to start care – reached 420,314 in February, the highest number since records began in 2016.
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The announcement represents a 75% increase in the department’s counter-fraud spending, and will pay for 1,400 new staff alongside a new team dedicated to reviewing existing benefit claims.
Subject to parliamentary time, the government will also update counter-fraud legislation – giving officers powers to arrest, execute warrants and seize evidence to mitigate fraud, a DWP plan said.
Therese Coffey, works and pensions secretary, said: “The welfare system is there to help the most vulnerable.
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Councils’ budgets are being squeezed while the number and cost of looked-after children soars, but many private companies are profiting from the problem
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The private sector will be the “real determinant of whether or not levelling up is a success” Andy Street (Con), the mayor of the West Midlands has said.
Speaking at the unveiling of the region’s new £4bn investment deal with Legal & General at the inaugural UK Real Estate Investment and Infrastructure Forum this week, Mr Street emphasised the role for the private sector.
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Councils across England and Wales will be able to draw on a £300m fund aimed at cutting youth crime.
Around 80% of prolific adult offenders begin committing crimes as children, and the estimated cost of late intervention to the economy is nearly £17bn per year.
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Eight locations have been awarded city status as part of the 2022 Platinum Jubilee celebrations.
Colchester, Doncaster and Milton Keynes in England, Dunfermline in Scotland, Bangor in Northern Ireland, and Wrexham in Wales have been given the royal honour this year.
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Boris Johnson is among 30 individuals who will be told they face criticism in a report by Sue Gray into lockdown-breaking parties in Downing Street.
The Times has learnt that the senior civil servant is contacting 30 individuals who are either named or indirectly referred to in her report to give them a right of reply. About 15, including Johnson, are expected to be named.
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The £144m government funding councils have to provide discretionary support to cash-strapped households alongside the council tax rebate scheme is “nowhere near enough to meet the need”, a prominent council leader has warned.
The government gave councils funding to provide discretionary support to any household in financial need, regardless of council tax band, at the same time as it rolled out the £150 council tax rebate scheme in March.
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County council leaders have welcomed the Government’s decision not to remove local fire services from the oversight of upper-tier local authorities.
Earlier proposals for fire service reform had included an ambition for Police and Crime Commissioners or combined authority mayors to oversee local fire services rather than county councils.
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Ministers are facing growing calls to bring forward large increases in benefits and the state pension which will be paid from next April.
Charities want benefits to increase now to help people struggling with the cost of living, particularly energy bills.
A well-established system means the annual increase in benefits will match this September's inflation rate - but will only be paid from April 2023.
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The UK government failed in its duty of care to protect doctors and the wider healthcare workforce at the start of the pandemic, a doctors' union says.
The British Medical Association review said staff were desperately let down by the lack of protective equipment.
And they were still suffering the physical and mental health impacts, having seen levels of illness and death "they were never trained for".
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More than 42 million adults in the UK will be overweight or obese by 2040 and at higher risk of 13 types of cancer, an “alarming” report reveals, as health leaders accused ministers of “kicking the can down the road” when it comes to tackling the obesity crisis.
Data collected by Cancer Research UK (CRUK) shows that 71% of people will be overweight by 2040, a rise from 64% today. Of these, almost 36% of adults – 21 million people – will be obese. The charity described the figures as “staggering”.
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Districts will push to change the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill to ensure their functions cannot move to new combined county authorities (CCAs) without their consent, The MJ understands.
Civil servants are believed to have told sector representatives that the failure of the Bill to require district consent to the transfer of powers was a deliberate attempt to stop either one or a small number of councils exercising a veto.
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Audit Scotland has released a report praising the devolved government’s efforts in rolling out 12 benefits, and preparing to launch yet more, amid the challenging circumstances of Covid-19.
The public spending watchdog said the process of devolving social security is “going well” – but said large amounts of benefits are still yet to move across.
The report warned that policymakers will need to ensure sustainability in the long term, and also have a clearer idea of how its spending will help Scottish people.
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Eastleigh Borough Council confirmed it has begun talks with the government after being asked to explain how it plans to manage its debt, which stands at more than £550m, without compromising service delivery.
Around half its borrowing relates to a commercial property portfolio, which the authority said has been a “longstanding success both for our businesses and for the council”.
Keith House, leader of the council, said: “Staff from the borough council have been having positive discussions with government officials demonstrating how the council's investments and housing secure jobs, infrastructure, tackle climate change and achieve affordable homes.”
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UK inflation, the rate at which prices are rising, jumped to 9 per cent in the 12 months to April, up from 7 per cent in March. The rise came as millions of people saw an unprecedented £700-a-year rise in energy costs last month.
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Seventeen district and borough councils in England will receive directions from the government limiting capital spending and procurement before they are replaced by new unitary authorities next year.
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South Norfolk and Broadland Councils approved the proposals, which would see the authorities sell their existing office buildings to help buy the Horizon centre in Broadland.
The councils said they expect to receive £5.2m for the sale of their offices in Long Stratton and Thorpe St Andrew, with the authorities equalling splitting the remaining £4.9m costs.
Shaun Vincent, leader of Broadland Council, said: “Currently both the councils’ offices need extensive refurbishment and carry heavy maintenance costs.
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Andy Burnham (Lab), the mayor of Greater Manchester, has called on the government to devolve control of the UK’s railway stations to local leaders in order to drive growth and investment in their respective areas.
Speaking to LGC at the inaugural UK Real Estate Investment and Infrastructure Forum, Mr Burnham said he would be asking for such powers from the government in negotiations for Greater Manchester CA’s trailblazer deal.
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These are the provisional and final allocations for the localised council tax support administration subsidy grant 2022-23. This grant is designed to contribute to the costs of administering local council tax support (LCTS) schemes. Allocations are calculated based on the latest LCTS caseload data and the latest Area Cost Adjustment.
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UK wages failed to keep up with rising prices between January and March but the jobs market remained buoyant.
Wages when adjusted for the impact of rising prices, dropped by 1.2% in the biggest fall since 2013, the The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said.
At the same time, however, the unemployment rate fell to its lowest level in nearly 50 years while job vacancies hit a fresh high.
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Some of the poorest households in England and Wales are struggling to access council tax rebates to help offset their soaring energy bills, a charity has warned.
National Energy Action said those who did not pay council tax by direct debit were affected, with many facing long waits for the £150 payouts.
Councils say they are struggling to administer the rebates at short notice.
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UK wages suffered a sharp fall between January and March but the market for jobs remained buoyant, according to new data. The Office for National Statistics said earnings, when adjusted for inflation, dropped by 1.2 per cent in the biggest fall since 2013, but at the same time the unemployment rate fell to its lowest level in nearly 50 years while job vacancies hit a fresh high.
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Children’s home providers in England should not be able to profit from caring for society’s most vulnerable children, according to the new head of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services, Steve Crocker. Most councils in England have at least one looked-after child whose private placement costs £10,000 a week or more, with costs running to £60,000 a week in the most extreme cases.
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The possibility of more rises in food prices is a "major worry" for the UK and other countries, the Bank of England governor has warned. Apologising for sounding "apocalyptic", Andrew Bailey said the war in Ukraine was affecting food supplies and also defended the Bank's performance following criticism it has not done enough to try to rein in rising prices, as inflation has reached a 30-year high.
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A major part of the Government’s response to the cost of living crisis has not been available for months to applicants in some parts of the country after councils used up their allocations amid soaring demand. Funding for the Household Support Fund was meant to last until 31 March, but figures obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show one in six councils ran out of money for applicants at least a month earlier.
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Rishi Sunak is reportedly preparing to announce fiscal measures to help with cost of living crisis before Parliament enters the summer recess. The Chancellor is expected to use fuel price data, which gives an insight into the energy price cap, to decide what additional support he could introduce to help families cope with rising bills.
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Ofgem has announced that the energy price cap, the mechanism which determines gas and electricity bills for 22 million households, could soon be reviewed every three months. It is putting the idea out to consultation amid criticism that the current twice-yearly adjustment arrangement, in April and October, had contributed to the failure of suppliers last year at the height of the wholesale gas price shock.
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The government has published statutory guidance seeking to restrict the level of exit payments made to local government employees above statutory or contractual limits.
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Children’s home providers in England should not be able to profit from caring for society’s most vulnerable children, the new head of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) has said.
Steve Crocker criticised private providers driving around in sports cars and buying racehorses with their profits after “getting rich off taxpayers’ money”.
Profit margins for the 15 largest private children’s home operators average 22.6%, according to the Competition and Markets Authority.
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"Help must come" for those struggling to pay their bills amid rising prices, ex-Prime Minister John Major has said.
Addressing a conference, Sir John said providing support would help bring "trust and respect back to politics".
He also warned that government couldn't raise spending while reducing tax and that "hard choices" had to be made.
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A Conservative MP has suggested people could "incentivise granny annexes" to save money amid the cost of living crisis.
Speaking in the Queen's Speech debate on making Britain the best place to grow up and grow old, former minister Jackie Doyle-Price said the government should be "encouraging people to make better use of their housing asset for the whole of their family".
She told MPs: "We can incentivise granny annexes, we can make sure that young people have got some hope by having greater access to the wealth in their parents' home.
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A new crackdown on second homes has been floated by the housing minister after he revealed he was being contacted by concerned MPs "on a daily basis".
Stuart Andrew said there was "more that we need to explore" on second home ownership.
Owners wanting to use their second homes as holiday lets would need to apply for specific permission from their local council under one idea being put forward by the Liberal Democrats.
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New executive agency Active Travel England will oversee the delivery by local authorities of 134 schemes, backed by £161m, including new footways, cycle lanes and pedestrian crossings across 46 local authorities outside London.
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The Treasury will not advance new Public Works Loan Board loans to councils where there is a “more than negligible risk” the loan will not be repaid without future government support, according to updated guidance for councils.
The updated guidance follows publication of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill last week which proposed beefing up the secretary of state’s borrowing powers over councils by enabling him to issue “risk-mitigation directions” including issuing borrowing caps and forcing councils to sell their assets, if they are deemed to have breached certain risk thresholds.
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Plans to tackle second home ownership by allowing councils to charge a 100% council tax premium on properties that sit empty for a year are unlikely to deal with the issue, council leaders have said.
As part of the draft Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill, the government said that councils will be able to target second-home owners by doubling their council tax bills.
Current legislation stipulates that councils may do this on homes which sit empty for two years, however the new legislation would see this reduced to a year.
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The Department for Education has been urged by a county to provide funding for school pupils arriving from Ukraine, regardless of how they came to UK.
Children who have come to the UK through the Homes for Ukraine scheme are eligible for funding from DfE, but children coming through the Ukraine Family Scheme or any other ad-hoc sponsorship arrangement are not.
This discrepancy has been pointed out in a letter to education secretary Nadhim Zahawi from Staffordshire CC's cabinet member for communities and culture Victoria Wilson (Con) and cabinet member for education and SEND Jonathan Price (Con)..
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The number of adults waiting for social care in England has risen to more than 500,000 says the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (Adass), similar research last year put the figure at about 294,000. Adass cities a growing shortage of care workers as a reason for the increase, made worse by low pay rates and the cost-of-living crisis.
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The chair of the UK COVID-19 Public Inquiry has asked that the terms of reference be expanded to include the impact of the pandemic on children and young people’s health, wellbeing and education. The impact on the mental health and wellbeing of the entire population should also be investigated, as well as the collaboration between central government, devolved administrations, local authorities and charities.
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The Government could come up with a plan which could cut up to 91,000 civil service jobs to tackle the cost of living, seeing civil service staffing levels drop to 2016 levels. A civil service union warned an "ill thought-out" plan could affect services.
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People could be able to vote on planning applications, such as house extensions and loft conversions, on their street, under proposed planning reforms introduced as part of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill. In an interview with Radio 5 Live, Cllr David Renard, housing spokesperson for the LGA, said: “We all want nice places to live, and we want a planning system that enables that to happen. The current system has checks and balances in it which allows all parties to take a view on a planning application."
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The UK economy shrank by 0.1 per cent in March, as rising living costs and the war in Ukraine halted recovery, Office for National Statistics data reveals. Experts warn that the risk of a recession in the UK is growing, with Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak confirming that retail sales had also slowed and consumer confidence decreased.
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The Procurement Bill has been published.
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Local authorities will be given new powers to double council tax on second homes under new draft legislation presented to parliament yesterday.
The Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill has stipulated that councils will be able to introduce a new discretionary council tax premium on second homes of up to 100%.
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The Government is leaving open the possibility of abandoning or changing the White Paper's levelling up missions and can delay reporting on them until after the general election.
Published yesterday, the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill states that ministers may decide not to pursue a levelling up mission, and that they can revise the list of missions.
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The Department for Education today announced a further £7m for schools and colleges to train a senior mental health lead.
Senior mental health leads are tasked with creating a culture of openness in schools and colleges when it comes to mental health, as well as forging stronger links with local health services.
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More than 100,000 extra tonnes of rubbish was sent to landfill during lockdown, the latest figures reveal as Government misses 50% recycling target.
Household recycling rates in England fell from 46% in 2019 to 44% in 2020, according to the Government’s data.
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The Government has published the levelling up Bill which promises to transform struggling towns and cities and support local leaders to take back control of regeneration.
The Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill will enshrine in law the Government’s commitment to long-term missions to spread opportunity, drive productivity and boost local pride in every corner of the country.
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With the UK Government pushing its Levelling Up strategy, Lancashire County Council are set to establish a new levelling up fund of their own, in order to help kick-start some of the multi-million pound projects that they have in the pipeline.
This fund is designed to compliment the central government’s Levelling Up agenda and can be used to support district councils in making their bids to the nationwide fund, as well as supporting them with getting started with their major projects, with Preston’s pitch for £20 million for everything from replacing the Old Tram Bridge to investing in some of its parks.
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CIPFA has welcomed government proposals to take greater intervention powers over council finances, saying they could help identify potential problems at an earlier stage.
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North Somerset Council has earmarked its Castlewood offices for sale, having bought them in 2009 for £12.6m and used them since 2010 as the primary office location for many services, including public-facing services such as the Job Centre Plus and registration service.
The unitary authority said in a document that an office amalgamation programme in 2012 had “substantially reduced” the number of buildings the council uses, and “efficiency exercises” have reduced the workforce from about 1800 people to about 1400.
But the effect of Covid-19 on working habits has had the largest impact, it said.
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People will be given the right to vote on proposed property extensions in their area as part of new planning reforms, the government says.
Minister Michael Gove said the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill would help "build communities that people love and are proud of".
The plan sees previous proposals which made it harder to block development dropped after a backlash from Tory MPs.
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Senior local government figures have warned that there needs to be a "far bolder" approach to achieve levelling up, and have urged ministers to speed up the pace of devolution.
The government revealed details of its Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill in the Queen's speech yesterday.
Local Government Association chair James Jamieson (Con) responded by warning that areas outside city regions have "remained stuck in the devolution slow lane”.
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The Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill announced in the Queen’s speech has not “taken us further forward from the white paper”, the chair of the Commons' levelling up, housing & communities committee has said.
Speaking to LGC, Clive Betts (Lab), said he didn’t think the announcement was doing “much more to help the most deprived communities” and pointed out that there wasn’t “any more money announced” for levelling up in the speech.
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Levelling up secretary Michael Gove has ditched his targets to build 300,000 homes in year in a bid to get public support for developments.
Speaking to Radio Four’s Today programme this morning, he said he would do ‘everything we can’ to increasing supply, but admitted: ‘I don’t think we are going to hit that target this year.’
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After much delay, last month the Government finally announced how its replacement for EU regional development funding – the Shared Prosperity Fund – will be allocated across the country.
In spite of it being almost five years since the fund was first announced, the answer for England at least, is: in much the same was as EU funds were prior to Brexit. This is a real missed opportunity, with inequities in the EU funding regime that could have been addressed instead entrenched in the new system.
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The government will not be bringing forward an emergency budget in light of the cost of living crisis, but "will be saying more and doing more to help people", Michael Gove has said.
Responding to the government's Queen's Speech on Tuesday, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer claimed the government was "bereft of ideas" as the nation heads towards a "stagflation crisis".
In response, Boris Johnson replied: "We will continue to use all our ingenuity and compassion for as long as it takes and the chancellor and I will be saying more about this in the days to come."
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The UK economy shrank in March, as soaring living costs and the war in Ukraine hindered recovery from the pandemic.
Experts warned that a plunge in household incomes meant trouble ahead for the economy and that the risk of a recession was growing.
Official figures show the economy grew by 0.8 per cent between January and March, down from growth of 1.3 per cent in the previous three months.
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Conrad Hall has written an open letter to the levelling up secretary suggesting an unusual (and tongue-in-cheek) proposal to help councils predict next year’s government grant.
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Local authority borrowing from the Public Works Loan Board remains low following four Bank of England interest rates hikes, after councils capitalised on record low finance last year, according to experts.
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The local government secretary will get new powers to direct asset sales and borrowing levels at councils deemed to be at financial risk, under a clause in this week's Levelling Up Bill.
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Council-maintained schools in England outperform academies in Ofsted rankings, according to analysis published on the day the government’s ambitions for all schools to join multi-academy trusts (Mats) are expected to be outlined in the Queen’s speech.
Research conducted on behalf of the Local Government Association (LGA) found 92% of council-run schools were ranked outstanding or good by Ofsted in January 2022, compared with 85% of academies that have been graded since they converted.
It also found only 45% of academies that were already an academy in August 2018 managed to improve standards from inadequate or requires improvement to good or outstanding, compared with 56% of council-maintained schools.
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Boris Johnson has promised to get the country "back on track" as the government unveils its plans for the year ahead in the Queen's Speech.
The speech is expected to focus on boosting economic growth, but the PM will say that the UK cannot spend its way out of trouble and will need to grow the economy.
In all, 38 parliamentary bills are due to be unveiled.
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The Government has committed to an overhaul of business rates in the Queen’s Speech.
Although absent from the speech itself, it has been confirmed a ‘Non-Domestic Rating Bill’ will form part of the agenda during the next Parliamentary session.
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The Queen’s Speech has confirmed a levelling up Bill will include legislation on planning and regeneration reform.
In his speech Prince Charles said the government would ‘level up opportunity in all parts of the country’ and that ‘a Bill will be brought forward to drive local growth, empowering local leaders to regenerate their areas, and ensuring everyone can share in the United Kingdom’s success’.
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Boris Johnson warned today that Britain must take short-term pain to boost the economy in the longer term as he unveiled a Queen’s Speech to “create jobs and spread opportunity” around the country.
In a speech delivered for the first time by the Prince of Wales, the government said its priority was to take a “responsible approach to the public finances” and committed itself to continue bringing down debt despite the cost of living crisis.
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Councils in England will be able to double council tax on unoccupied second homes to boost funding for local services, under plans to be confirmed in the Queen’s Speech this week. English councils will be given powers to levy a premium of up to 100 per cent on council tax bills for second homes that are furnished but not occupied as a sole or main residence. They will also be able to discourage owners from leaving other properties vacant for long periods by doubling the standard council tax rate after just one year.
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Ukrainian refugees have been placed with hosts who are unvetted and in unsuitable homes as the Government is yet to give councils any funding for vital safety checks. The LGA said councils had reported issues with the information they are getting from government, saying it is arriving too slowly, there is data missing, host contact details are not always correct, and it does not provide refugees’ arrival dates.
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Michael Gove, the cabinet minister for levelling up, has said that rising prices are making the Government’s plans to reduce regional inequalities more difficult and more important. A BBC Panorama investigation, to be aired tonight, has raised questions about whether the money is reaching the most deprived areas in England.
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This week’s local elections packed a few surprises. PF examines the results in authorities whose finance departments have been in the news during recent months.
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Councils have called for clarity over proposed compensation levels after the government announced it will press ahead with plans to remove large telecom companies and railway services from local authority business rates billing lists.
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Boris Johnson will reportedly reshuffle his cabinet before the summer recess which begins on July 21
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Twenty-eight councils in the most deprived areas of England have had their bids for a £1.7 billion levelling up fund rejected, according to an investigation.
Described by Boris Johnson as the “defining mission” of his government, levelling up aims to reduce geographic economic, social and health inequalities.
Last year ministers allocated the first round of levelling up funding — £1.7 billion — from central government, but questions have been raised over the process.
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High inflation could remain until 2024 and will be a “massive shock to the system” for a generation, a former chief economist at the Bank of England has warned.
Andy Haldane, now a government adviser, said inflation had “surpassed my worst expectations” and was likely to exceed 10 per cent. He also said the Bank should have acted sooner than last autumn when raising interest rates.
Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, admitted yesterday that the government “can’t do everything to help” but confirmed that he was preparing to do more. He told BBC Look East: “We are not the only country facing higher energy prices or higher inflation. We can do things to support people and we are going to do what we can. I wish I could make it completely go away, but I can’t.”
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The results of the local elections across the country will continue to roll in throughout the day, with many English councils already declared. As it stands, the Conservative party have lost control of six councils. Barnet, Wandsworth and Westminster councils in London have all been gained by Labour as well as Southampton on the south coast, and the Liberal Democrats gained control of Kingston upon Hull.
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Bristol was given the choice of a mayor or a committee system, and decided to abolish its directly elected mayor following a referendum. Some 56,113 voted to remove the post, with a turnout of 29 per cent.
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The Bank takes a big red pen to its earlier forecasts and sees a risk of economic contraction ahead as inflation is now predicted to surge to levels not seen for four decades.
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Some households across the country are still waiting for the £150 council tax rebate, aimed at helping millions to combat the rising cost of living. Councils have been told to pay the money “as soon as possible” but some have reported delays in receiving the money.
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Clive Betts, chair of Parliament's Levelling Up, Housing and Communities?Committee has urged the government to provide additional funding to help authorities mitigate services pressures stemming from the housing of Ukrainian refugees.
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The government has announced initial payments to help cover local authorities’ costs incurred when delivering the council tax rebate policy aimed at helping the public through the cost-of-living crisis.
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Central government inaction on giving councils in England the ability to hold remote meetings is preventing authorities from reducing the financial and environmental cost of transport, according to two industry bodies.
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Government negotiations with the nine areas in the first wave of county deals are not progressing as quickly as some had expected, as authorities await more details of legislative changes.
However, a source close to negotiations told LGC those willing to adopt the government’s preferred directly elected mayor model under the ‘level three’ deals are being “pushed to the front of the queue”.
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The government has revealed the amount of money every billing authority will get to help it deliver the £150 council tax rebate.
The Department of Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has written to all authorities to announce the £28m of grants, which range from £14,557 for City of London Corporation to £525,034 for Birmingham City Council.
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Councils have been warned by local government employers to budget for pay rises of at least 4% this year, The MJ understands.
A senior local government source said they had been told to factor in the rises covering the pay settlement for the year 2022-23.
However, it is understood many councils have not allowed for such a rise in their budgets and fear it will be difficult to fund.
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The Government will not provide funding to councils to support refugees arriving under the Homes for Ukraine scheme if they fail to supply timely data.
A letter to council chief executives said the funding of £10,500 for each refugee was subject to conditions, including data returns on the number of beneficiaries and when checks have been carried out.
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The Government has been urged to reinstate the COVID infection control fund (ICF) by groups representing care providers and staff.
Trade union Unison and the Care Provider Alliance (CPA) have written a joint letter to health secretary Sajid Javid calling for the fund, which ended in March, to return.
They argued the removal of the ICF at a time when virus rates are still high was an ‘incredibly dangerous move’ that will ‘cost lives’.
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Hundreds of thousands of people are facing long waits for cash designed to ease the cost of living crisis because of council failures.
Minister have written to all local authorities to warn that they are “monitoring the delivery” of the Treasury-funded £150 council tax rebate.
Councils have been told to pay the money “as soon as possible” but people across Britain have reported delays in receiving the money
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Councils are seeing a “concerning increase” in the number of Ukrainian new arrivals presenting as homeless, says Cllr James Jamison, LGA Chairman, with 144 households approaching 57 councils as homeless, according to an LGA survey conducted in April. Labour MP Clive Betts has written to refugees minister Lord Harrington, suggesting that Ukrainian refugees should be able to transfer on to the Homes for Ukraine sponsorship scheme if their relative cannot provide accommodation under the family visa scheme, and should not require a sponsor before arriving.
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The Bank of England has raised the base rate of interest to 1% - the fourth consecutive increase as it continues to move against surging inflation - despite issuing a warning about a recession ahead.
The Bank forecast that the UK economy will shrink later this year in the face of double-digit inflation and an unprecedented squeeze on household incomes.
In its first forecast since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Bank said it now expected the energy price crunch to leave a lasting scar, pushing up unemployment and contributing to weak or negative growth throughout 2023.
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Lawyers suggest that many of the more than 800 businesses fined for COVID-19 breaches during the pandemic could have strong claims for an appeal. Lucinda Nicholls, of the London law firm Nicholls & Nicholls, said that she had brought 25 challenges on behalf of businesses so far with only two being quashed.
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The number of unaccompanied children making the journey across The Channel to Britain has increased by three and a half times compared to last year. Analysis of government figures shows 7,240 people have reached the UK in small boats in just the past four months since the start of 2022.
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Pensioners could reportedly be left on council waiting lists to qualify for the new cap on care costs. Almost 300,000 pensioners who pay for and arrange their own care will need to enter into the local authority system if they want to take advantage of the changes to funding coming into effect next year. Older people qualifying to have their care paid for the first time because the upper capital limit is increasing from £23,250 to £100,000 will also have to join the waiting list. The LGA warned that the “additional demand is coming at a time when there’s already a backlog of 400,000 people waiting for an assessment of their social care needs”. A spokesman said: “The care cost cap is just one strand of the Government’s charging reforms and we remain concerned that the funding earmarked for the reforms in their entirety is insufficient. The Government must commit to keeping funding and timescales under close and regular review.”
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Poorer areas have been hit disproportionally by a combination of cuts to neighbourhood services such as parks, libraries, refuse collection and children’s centres that have left English councils “hollowed out” since 2010, a major report into local government has concluded.
The study by the Institute for Government thinktank found that while some councils coped better than others, and reduced spending did not necessarily mean worse results, a lack of information made it difficult to learn lessons.
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Boris Johnson wants to give millions of people the right to buy the homes they rent from housing associations in a major shake-up, it is reported. The Prime Minister has asked officials to develop the plans after believing the idea would help “generation rent”, with the proposal intended to give 2.5 million households in England who rent properties from housing associations the power to purchase their homes at a discounted price.
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The flagship Covid tutoring scheme to help pupils catch up has not been used by two in five schools, it has emerged, prompting the Education Secretary to write to teachers. The National Tutoring Programme has been criticised, with many teachers still not using the schemes and schools reporting problems with an online portal.
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Ex-Barking & Dagenham chief says councils have the ability to stop many vulnerable people from tipping into crisis
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Financial pressure on councils means some pupils with additional needs can’t access the help they need, data also shows that some children are travelling hundreds of miles to get to school. The LGA said that "no council will be wanting to raise thresholds, but the extreme financial pressure is probably meaning some are making decisions for reasons they may not necessarily choose to".
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The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities is not making public the data it holds on Ukrainians presenting to councils as homeless, LGC can reveal.
The revelation prompted alarm from the chair of the Commons levelling up committee who has blasted the scheme and the withholding of information as a “dysfunctional disaster”.
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Public bodies could face pressure from growing direct costs alongside impacts from inflated prices for third party suppliers, according to the Office for National Statistics.
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Shropshire Council is set to scale back its capital spending plans by more than £100m by 2025-26 amid concerns over debt servicing costs.
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Councils are facing soaring costs to re-procure outsourced services as new financial pressures begin to bite.
Suppliers are hiking prices, leading to warnings that inflation will ‘make or break’ council budgets this year.
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The government has been urged to pay higher wages to workers in the "Cinderella" social care sector - or risk an acceleration of the exodus to higher-paid jobs in "warehouses, supermarkets and with online retailers".
That is the message from Unison in the wake of a hard-hitting Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) report published yesterday, which recommends an eventual minimum pay rate of 39% above the national living wage (NLW).
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Organised criminal fly-tipping gangs are on the rise - and costing councils millions.
A new report says the government is fighting a losing battle against the menace and latest figures show the reported number of complaints against it has topped a million.
A National Audit Office (NAO) investigation shows the number of reported fly-tipping incidents, most of which involve small van-loads of household waste dumped on highways, has soared over the past decade, reaching more than 1.13 million in 2020/21 - costing local authorities £11.6 million to clear up.
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Every seven minutes a private renter in England is handed an eviction notice even though they have done nothing wrong, new figures reveal.
Nearly 230,000 private renters have been served with so-called Section 21 evictions since 2019 - also known as a 'no-fault eviction' notice - meaning they have just two months to leave the property.
It's feared the rising cost of living combined with a hike in evictions could make thousands of private renters homeless and worsen the housing crisis.
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Asylum seekers’ accommodation is “unsafe” due to inadequate healthcare, while poor living conditions are exacerbating or creating mental and physical health problems, according to a new report by Doctors of the World.
The charity’s research, published on Wednesday, details the barriers to medical care and medication for asylum seekers in initial accommodation across the UK.
Evidence gathered by Doctors of the World shows that a failure to meet basic human standards in hotels and former military barracks such as Napier in Folkestone has exacerbated depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other mental health concerns among asylum seekers.
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Local authorities will receive £5.4bn from the Health and Social Care levy up to 2024-25, but it is unclear how the government will allocate £1.7bn of that pot which is currently unallocated, Adrian Jenkins Director at advisors Pixel Financial Management said.
Speaking to the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee yesterday, voiced disappointment that this lack a clarity on funding is hampering planning.
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The gap in local government income and spending fell by £6.4bn from the £7.1bn surplus in 2020-21, according to end-of-year net borrowing statistics published by the ONS today.
Overall public borrowing shrank to £151.8bn in 2021-22, from the £317bn of debt financed in the previous year, the ONS said.
The report said that the Covid-19 pandemic “has had a substantial impact on the economy as well as public sector borrowing”.
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Council tax rebates worth £150 are starting to be paid into bank accounts up and down the country from this month.
But whether you have already received the payment or not is down to a postcode lottery.
Some households face waiting months for the £150 to land in their account, with councils officially having until September 30 to issue the money.
The Mirror has checked in with dozens of local authorities and has highlighted ten places where the rebate hasn’t yet been processed.
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Local authorities are not immune to the inflationary pressures consumers are experiencing, writes the local government policy manager at the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountancy.
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Local authorities will struggle to meet a government deadline to submit evidence about social care fair funding to Whitehall, senior figures in the sector have warned MPs.
Sarah Pickup, deputy chief executive of the Local Government Association, was among those raising concerns while giving evidence to the Commons levelling up, housing & communities committee's inquiry into the long-term funding of adult social care.
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The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities sought to allow private accountancy firms to bid for some of the LGA's annual sector support grant, LGC can reveal.
However, after what a source close to the negotiations called a “big under the radar pushback” from the LGA, the decision was reversed and the lobbying body will now receive 4% more in government grant than it received last year.
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The cost-of-living crisis “risks levelling down Britain”, the former education secretary has said.
Speaking to LGC, Justine Greening who was formerly the MP for Putney and now leads the social mobility pledge, said this was down to families and communities who already faced challenging circumstances being hit the hardest by the current crisis.
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A call has been made for an investigation into how the infection control fund was spent during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Giving evidence to MPs, Unison’s officer for social care, Gavin Edwards, said the funding stream, which ended last month, was not always used for its intended purpose by care providers.
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Councils are in the dark on how much funding they will receive for adult social care funding under central government reforms, MPs have been told.
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Councils received £700m more than they spent last year, down 90% on the 2021-22 surplus, while the overall public sector deficit fell by more than a half.
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Further delays to the audits of 2020/21 local authority accounts have been attributed to issues over the valuation of infrastructure assets that are affecting a significant number of upper-tier councils.
Chris Tambini, president of the Society of County Treasurers (SCT), told Room151 that this was “potentially a major issue for all upper-tier local authorities”. It is currently affecting those authorities that have not already had their 2020/21 accounts signed off and is likely to impact a larger number of councils for their 2021/22 accounts.
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Almost half of councils in England and Wales now use parking machines that don’t accept cash, but instead require drivers to pay via a mobile phone app or bank card, a Freedom of Information Act request reveals. Campaigners at Age UK are concerned that with just 50 per cent of people over 65 using a smartphone, cashless parking could be difficult. Cllr David Renard, transport spokesperson for the LGA, said: “Like so many organisations, councils have found the public welcome the convenience of online technology. But they also pay close attention to the needs of those for whom online payment isn’t attractive.”
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Between 2015-16 and 2018-19, awards from the council’s Mayoral Neighbourhood Fund (MNF) regularly lacked application forms or other relevant paperwork, a report going to an audit committee this week said.
It said the council failed to provide terms and conditions to charities, which received around half the fund’s £1m yearly budget, and it did not request or collect data on how the money was spent.
Prior to a council review in February 2019, third sector organisations were given funding without providing evidence that the money was spent in line with the objectives of Liverpool's city plan, the report said.
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Families will have to wait for up to six months for their £150 council tax rebates after local authorities failed to prepare and missed government deadlines.
Only a fraction of councils have credited taxpayers with the handout, designed to help some 28 million pay for soaring energy bills, despite assurances that the "vast majority" would receive support this month.
Many said residents would not receive payments until late May or in some cases even September because they needed to implement new software to facilitate the payments.
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Former Treasury minister Lord Agnew’s resignation speech in the House of Lords in January will not be easily forgotten.
In it, he characterised oversight by the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy and the British Business Bank as “woeful” and described the Treasury as having “no knowledge or little interest in the consequences of fraud to our economy or society”.
Lord Agnew drew on what has been an enduring organisational problem, especially during Covid-19, for the public and private sector alike — the failure to implement a systemic approach to anti-corruption.
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Balfour Beatty Living Places (BBLP) has operated a facilities management contract since 2013, but Grant Thornton’s 2020-21 audit report found that the firm has been dormant through the duration of the agreement.
In January 2021, the council found that BBLP was dormant on Companies House, but the authority failed to take legal advice until GT raised concerns in March 2022, the report added.
The report said: “We consider the council’s contract appointment and management arrangements include a significant weakness, as it did not establish the validity of contracting and continuing to trade with a company that was dormant or otherwise non-trading from a formal perspective.”
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In December, the two authorities agreed to submit a request to the government to form South Warwickshire District Council from April 2024, in a bid to streamline services and save money.
However, the councils confirmed in a joint statement that they will abandon the merger, as Stratford said it would be unable to complete due diligence on a Warwick housing company before a government response next month.
The joint statement said: “There is a significant difference between the approaches and ambitions of the two councils that have proved to be irreconcilable, and this means that a joint request, subject to council approval, will now be made to the government to stop the merger process.
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Margaret Thatcher created an entire new class in Britain.
Her flagship ‘right-to-buy’ policy redefined housing across the country, providing legal rights to shift ownership from councils to their former tenants at a knock-down price, and with it moving the state’s control over peoples’ lives. The prime minister won swathes of voters as a result.
“Thousands of people in council houses and new towns came out to support us for the first time because they wanted a chance to buy their own homes,” Thatcher said in May 1979, just after the election when she ousted the incumbent Labour government of James Callaghan.
“It will give to more of our people that freedom and mobility and that prospect of handing something on to their children and grandchildren which owner-occupation provides.”
Fast forward more than 40 years and multiple governments, and housing secretary Michael Gove has invoked some of the same spirit - if in a slightly unexpected direction. He has proposed boosting social rented property as a cheaper alternative to private rents.
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The government plans to axe section 106 agreements in favour of an infrastructure levy, but Richard Harbord warns that consultation paralysis, levelling-up concerns and developer opposition could block any progress.
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Voters want their local councils to improve roads and provide more affordable housing, a new poll has found.
The survey carried out by Ipsos ahead of the local elections on May 5 found 50% of people thought improving the condition of roads and pavements should be a top priority for councils.
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Inflation is back. If you are under 35 years of age you were probably still in school when it was something that had to be taken seriously so it’s fair to say that corporate memories are fading.
A little bit of inflation can actually be desirable for the economy. It incentivises investment and allows the real value of debt to fall.
However, it is a very delicate balancing act. Once the inflation rate outpaces wage growth, workers experience a pay cut (in real terms).
How can treasurers in the public sector manage inflation challenges?
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The council completed construction of a new office building in The Sands area of Durham city last month, accommodating up to 1,200 staff members.
However, next week, councillors will consider proposals in a report outlining a plan to sell the property to Durham University, with the receipts funding the construction of three smaller offices.
The report said that this would mean a slightly reduced office capacity, but that "any shortfall can be readily accommodated through the revision of capacity in the council’s other facilities, following the introduction of flexible working practices”.
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Chief executives of some of the UK’s largest energy suppliers have called on the Government to abolish the existing energy price cap in favour of a new system that would see the better off pay more. The Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) committee heard how these “unprecedented” measures are needed to prevent a fuel poverty crisis next winter.
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LGC reveals concerns that the government’s slowness to respond to consultations is affecting councils’ work.
Ministers have failed to respond to more than 40 consultations which impact on local government’s work, leading to concern that councils are being hindered by limited central capacity, LGC research shows.
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Civil servants must stop working from home and return to the office to ensure government buildings are at full capacity, ministers have been told.
Cabinet Office minister Jacob Rees-Mogg has written to cabinet colleagues urging them to send a "clear message" to the civil service about returning.
The FDA union said his comments were out of step with practice in the private sector.
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After years of disruption, many firms are hoping for things to return to normal. But it's not yet business as usual.
The recent spike in Covid cases has caused havoc, with staff sickness impacting entire supply chains.
The British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) is now calling for all companies to be given free or cheap lateral flow tests.
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The war in Ukraine will "severely set back" the global economic recovery with the UK hit harder than most, the International Monetary Fund has said. This means the UK will no longer be the fastest growing economy in the G7, and will be the slowest in 2023, it says.
The UK's economy is now predicted to grow by 3.7% this year, down from the previous forecast of 4.7% made in January.
However, next year, the UK is expected to have the slowest growth in the G7 and across Europe's main economies, at just 1.2%, a near halving from the 2.3% expected previously. The 2023 UK figure is the slowest apart from heavily-sanctioned Russia in the wider G20,
UK inflation is expected to be 5.3% next year - the highest in the G7, and higher than all EU members, and only exceeded in the G20 by crisis-ridden Argentina, Turkey and Russia.
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Britain’s economy is at risk of falling into a summer recession amid a squeeze on household incomes, according to economists at the bank IMG. Analysts warned that economic activity would also be reduced by an extra bank holiday for the Queen’s platinum jubilee in June.
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The national living wage could rise by 20% in two years, sparking alarm for senior finance officers who are in the eye of the inflation storm.
There are fears councils will need to make further service cuts as they face surging costs to heat their buildings, plus significant price rises in many other areas.
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Proposals to abolish section 106 charges in favour of a new infrastructure tax could disincentivise investment in poorer regions, working against 'levelling up', according to experts.
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Britain’s economy is at growing risk of falling into a summer recession amid the biggest squeeze on household incomes since the mid 1950s, as soaring inflation curtails consumer spending power, forecasters have said.
Economists said the double blow from slowing post-lockdown growth and rising living costs after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine could result in a fall in gross domestic product (GDP) for two consecutive quarters, which is the definition of a recession.
After a weaker-than-expected growth performance in February, and with the inflation rate reaching the highest levels since 1992 last month, City forecasters said UK GDP was now on track to grow by about 1% in the first quarter of 2022 before slipping into reverse this summer.
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Councils in England are paying more than £1m a year for a single place in privately run children’s homes, with operators citing the cost of living crisis as a reason for raising their prices, the Guardian has learned.
Private providers have been accused of making “obscene” profits out of some of society’s most vulnerable children, as local authorities reveal they are being quoted as much as £50,000 a week (£2.6m a year) for one child.
Children with complex needs – such as having received death threats, behavioural problems, autism spectrum disorders or being a danger to themselves or others – may require supervision from staff with specialist training, or numerous carers.
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Council leaders have welcomed a Government announcement of additional funding for local areas to tackle drug dependency as an ‘important step forward’.
Communities in England most affected by drug-related crime and addiction will receive over £300m of additional funding over the next three years to strengthen treatment and recovery services, the Department of Health and Social Care announced yesterday.
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UK households feeling the squeeze of the cost of living crisis will receive a council tax rebate this spring to mitigate rising prices.
The one-off £150 payment forms part of a series of a £9.1bn Treasury support package unveiled by Rishi Sunak in February.
Unlike a separate £200 energy bill rebate being made later in the year, the rebate will not need to be repaid.
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The annual rate of inflation shot up to a fresh 30-year high of 7% in March reflecting, for the first time, the immediate effects of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
The largest contributors to growing inflation were increased fuel prices and energy bills, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
The consumer prices index (CPI) rose from 6.2% in February and was higher than expected, with economists having predicted a rate of 6.7%.
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Developers have pledged to pay a combined £5bn to fix buildings with dangerous cladding and other fire safety issues, according to the housing secretary.
Thirty-five of the UK's biggest housebuilders have signed an agreement to pay a minimum of £2bn to fix their buildings.
Another £3bn is expected to be raised through an expansion to the Building Safety Levy that will be chargeable on all new residential buildings in England.
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Communities across the United Kingdom will benefit from £2.6bn of government funding being allocated today to help spread opportunity and level up the country.
The UK Shared Prosperity Fund will see places that need it most draw up plans this year to deliver on their local priorities, based on a conditional allocation of funding over the next three years.
This could include regenerating rundown high streets, fighting anti-social behaviour and crime, or helping more people into decent jobs, helping to revive communities, tackle economic decline and reverse geographical disparities in the UK, the government said.
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Councils should drill deeper into their data to provide the government with more "granular" and more regular reports, an official review recommends.
But, despite the probable extra workload, an expert from the Chartered Institute of Public Finance & Accountability said it could "help decision making" and improve relationships between the government and local authorities.
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Public sector pay for jobs such as NHS workers, teachers and civil servants fell further behind price rises in the three months to February, figures show. While wages rose for public sector workers, price rises outpaced them meaning a 3% drop in spending power, the biggest fall in 20 years. In contrast, an average private sector employee's wage bought 0.5% less.
The latest inflation figures show the cost of living is rising at its fastest pace for 30 years. "Basic pay is now falling noticeably in real terms," said Darren Morgan from the Office for National Statistics describing the fall in spending power. The most recent figures show that inflation reached 6.2% in February and new data, due out on Wednesday, is expected to show a further rise in March.
The ONS said the unemployment rate fell to 3.8% from 3.9% last month. Capital Economics said the fall in unemployment was mainly due to people taking themselves out of the workforce by retiring or by looking after family or long-term sick.
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Councils could be stripped of responsibility for Britain’s counter-terror programme under recommendations in a long-awaited review of Prevent.
William Shawcross, the former chairman of the Charity Commission leading the review, is expected to propose an independent network of Prevent professionals free from council control and with a greater focus on national security.
It follows growing criticism that the programme has failed to stop numerous terrorists in the past five years, including Ali Harbi Ali, the killer of Sir David Amess who was referred to Prevent but left unchecked after only one meeting to carry out the attack.
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By Richard Humphries (Senior adviser to the Health Foundation and Newton Europe):
Last September the Government announced its ‘Build Back Better’ plan for health and social care.
This featured the introduction of an £86,000 cap on lifetime care costs, a far more generous upper financial means test threshold, the ability for self-funders (people who pay for their own care) to access care and support at the council-funded rate, and plans for councils to pay providers a ‘fair rate of care’.
The Government deserves credit for resurrecting plans to protect people from catastrophic costs, after three decades of inaction where successive governments failed to grasp the nettle. But six months on from the announcement, there are worrying signs that delivery of the reforms is heading for trouble.
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By Simon Edwards (CCN):
It has taken three years, but the end of last month saw the release of the Government’s Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) Green Paper.
In the years since a review was first announced in 2019, County Councils Network (CCN) member authorities’ collective SEND deficits have risen dramatically and could reach £1.3bn this year. Only a handful of councils are in the black, so it is an understatement to say this paper has arrived at a critical time.
The root cause of the costs spiralling out of control are the legislative changes in the 2014 Children’s Act have which led to a huge increase in demand for education, health and care plans (EHCPs). The number of young people on EHCPs rose by 72% from 2016 to 2021 in county areas alone.
Proposals to address the future demand pressures in EHCPs through a set of national standards are welcome... However, it remains to be seen whether the paper can adequately address the substantial deficits many of our member councils currently have. Beyond the ‘Safety Valve’ programme, which are bespoke agreements with individual councils, there appears little to address the serious financial issues local government faces.
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The local authority sector has warned that government plans to ban charges for disposing of DIY waste from households threaten to pressure council finances further “beyond breaking point”.
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The section 151 officer at Cornwall Council has called on the government to implement reforms to planning and tax rules to help local authorities urgently respond to the housing crisis.
Tracie Langley, who is also Cornwall’s chief operating officer, told Room151 that the county faced a number of housing issues including: a seasonal workforce that increases demand; private sector rental owners “flipping” their properties into holiday lets; and derelict former tin-mining areas that are difficult to regenerate without government investment.
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Proposed government reforms to adult social care will place huge additional burdens on local authorities with significantly increased costs. Leigh Whitehouse discusses the forecast impact at Surrey County Council and calls for a pause in the implementation to review the policy.
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Families who offer their second homes to Ukrainians will get a 50 per cent council tax discount under new laws to be laid before Parliament today. Discounts for lone householders who take in new arrivals will also be protected.
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Fees for disposing of DIY waste at council recycling centres in England could be banned under government plans set out in a consultation today.
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Local Government Pension Scheme employers could face discrimination claims over concerns the scheme is not compliant with sharia law and staff are not offered an alternative.
A legal opinion commissioned by the LGPS advisory board found that a discrimination claim in an employment tribunal or a broader human rights-based challenge in the civil courts was possible.
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The nation relies on councils’ ingenuity to deliver in response to repeated crises – but they are unlikely to get significant extra resources, writes the director of LSE London.
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Programmes to tackle obesity will have to close because the government is pulling the plug on a £100m grant for weight management services, despite evidence obesity is still rising.
Hopes have been dashed that the £100m weight management grant, which was shared between the NHS and councils, will continue into the current financial year.
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Only central government can do something to stop profiteering in the children’s social care sector, the new president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services said.
Speaking to LGC following his inaugural speech as president, Steve Crocker, who is also the director of children’s services at Hampshire CC, said neither local nor regional government had "sufficient muscle to deal with” the issue.
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A number of councils in England will be awarded grants to tackle fly-tipping through trial projects, including CCTV to target hotspots, the government has announced.
Fly-tipping is a crime which blights communities, poses a risk to public health and the environment, costing up to £392m a year.
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Thousands of civil service jobs created to tackle the pandemic and Brexit face the axe as the Treasury attempts to rein in soaring Whitehall headcounts.
Plans to slash as many as 40,000 roles will focus on cutting pandemic-related staff in the Department of Health and workers no longer needed after Brexit, The Telegraph can reveal.
The push comes as unions are warned by ministers to expect a new attempt to slash civil service exit payments as they prepare to cut the public payroll.
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Families who offer their second homes to Ukrainian refugees will get a 50 per cent council tax discount worth as much as £1,000 under new laws to be laid before Parliament on Monday.
Councils will also be barred from removing the discounts of lone householders who take in refugees under the legal changes to be unveiled by Lord Harrington, the refugees minister.
The moves are designed to ensure that no household is financially penalised if they take part in the Homes for Ukraine scheme. More than 200,000 individuals or organisations have registered, of which more than 40,000 have applied.
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NHS beds are being blocked by “well” patients with three quarters still on wards despite increasing COVID-19 pressures. Of the 87,775 patients in ward beds as of April 5, around 16 per cent had Covid, the highest proportion since February 17. But separate figures published by NHS England show 71 per cent of patients deemed medically fit to leave remained stuck.
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Homeowners will be unable to object to new solar panels, wind turbines and nuclear reactors under government plans. Its new energy strategy includes a push to build eight new nuclear reactors by 2050, carpet an area larger than Exmoor with solar panels and allow communities to be offered lower energy bills if they permit new onshore wind turbines to go ahead.
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As West Northamptonshire and North Northamptonshire unitary councils register their first full year in existence, James Smith looks at the progress made since the demise of the ill-fated county council.
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Chris Buss says that any review of local government finance must address social care, business rates and council tax, but the danger is that these are just too difficult to resolve.
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The funding committed to social care bodies through Health and Social Care Levy, which went live today, is not enough to meet cost pressures and sector reforms, according to an expert.
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Council leaders have defended senior pay in response to a report that found the number of staff receiving more than £100,000 increased.
Research by the right-wing libertarian think-tank TaxPayers’ Alliance (TPA) found the number of council staff receiving more than £100,000 increased by 119 to at least 2,921 people during the pandemic.
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The Government is to press ahead with plans to scrap Section 106 agreements in its forthcoming shakeup of planning.
Proposals for a standard Infrastructure Levy to replace the current system will be included in an overhaul of planning, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) has confirmed.
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Councils are being urged to apply for funding to clean chewing gum off of pavements and help prevent people from dropping gum in the first place.
Grants of up to £20,000 are being made available to individual councils from the Chewing Gum Task Force Grant Scheme.
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The Government has launched a consultation on replacing an 'outdated' law that criminalises homeless people.
It announced earlier this year it was looking to repeal the Vagrancy Act 1824, which makes it an offence to sleep rough or beg in England and Wales.
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Sustainability reporting is, by and large, a new endeavour for most of the public sector. While some jurisdictions have some form of environmental reporting, it's often not integrated with other forms of reporting, such as the annual financial statements or an organisation's annual report.
As a relatively recent addition to public sector reporting, a number of fundamental questions need to be addressed regarding how a reporting entity’s boundary should be defined. Specifically, to what extent will the reporting entity’s upstream and downstream activities be addressed by sustainability reports? This could include the impact of everything from activities in an organisation's supply chain to the funding or services they provide. Should both financial and non-financial impacts of the entity should be included?
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Around 12,000 Afghan refugees are still living in hotels as they wait for permanent housing, more than seven months since their arrival in the UK. The arrangements cost the Home Office £1.2 million a day and are reportedly prolonged by a combination of a lack of affordable housing and delays to paperwork. LGA Chairman Cllr James Jamieson, said: “Families should not be living in hotels. Government need to engage more fully with local authorities and share regular data to enable proper planning of placements, housing, school places and other support across the UK.”
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Money raised from business rates is set to jump to £22.5bn in this financial year - but will still be well short of the amount collected before the Covid pandemic.
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has compiled returns from England's 309 billing authorities, outlining what they expect to get from non-domestic rates in 2022-23.
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Councils have been warned they will have to find more in their budgets to fund the sector’s increasing wage bill.
Most councils have budgeted for an increase of around 2% for future pay awards but many are now planning to revisit this amid significant increases in the rate of inflation.
The sector is particularly under pressure to increase salaries for the lower pay points as the minimum wage increases over the next few years.
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The government outlined the change in a statutory guidance letter sent to finance directors at local authorities this week, extending the flexible capital receipts regime until the end of 2024-25.
Authorities are allowed to use income from property sales to fund the revenue costs of transformation programmes aimed at reducing costs, but will now be unable to use the money to fund redundancy payments.
The guidance said: “Discretionary redundancy payments cannot be qualifying expenditure and must not be capitalised under the direction.
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Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) will receive £375,000 funding from central government this year, as bodies prepare plans to merge with combined authorities.
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Essex County Council is set to invest £1m to help improve its cyber security, after experts warned of heightened risks of Russian interference in public bodies.
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Headteachers’ leaders have criticised Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi for his “continued failure” to respond to them over the “acute” Covid situation in schools as they call for a reintroduction of free lateral flow tests.
Free lateral flow tests for pupils and staff were discontinued on April 1.
In the open letter from the Association of School and College Leaders and the NAHT school leaders’ union, headteachers’ leaders said they are “deeply concerned” about the Government’s “apparent lack of concern and support” for pupils and staff as they faced the next phase of Covid.
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The Child Poverty Action Group’s senior policy and research officer says the chancellor needs to make long term investments in an adequate social security system and decent local crisis support.
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Thirty-one areas of England have won the race for a share of funding that could see cheaper bus fares and more frequent services
The Department for Transport (DfT) today named the 31 counties, city regions and unitary authorities getting money to fund their bus service improvement plans.
Successful SCT areas are:
* Central Bedfordshire: £3.7m
* Cornwall (including Isles of Scilly): £13.3m
* Derbyshire: £47m
* Devon: £14.1m
* East Sussex: £41.4m
* Hertfordshire: £29.7m
* Kent: £35.1m
* Norfolk: £49.6m
* Nottinghamshire: £18.7m
* Oxfordshire: £12.7m
* Somerset: £11.9m
* West Sussex: £17.4m
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The withdrawal of the infection control and testing fund, a financial “lifeline” for care providers during the pandemic, has sparked fears it will lead to a wave of care providers going bust.
The fund, which has provided £1.35bn to adult social care since May 2020 and £288m for testing, will not continue from this month onwards.
One of its aims had been to help providers pay care staff off sick or forced to self-isolate as close to a full wage as possible as workers only become eligible for statutory sick pay after three days.
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A Warwickshire council has been forced to step up security at depots following attempted fuel thefts.
Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council said thieves had attempted to steal fuel at their Gresham Road depot, but had been stopped after security systems prevented the crime.
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People working in adult social care in England are set to benefit from a £500m boost that will go towards improving the recruitment and retention of staff.
The funding will come out of the £36bn that the Health and Social Care Levy, which comes into force tomorrow, is predicted to raise over the next three years.
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Government funding for the New Homes Bonus was £622.3m for 2021-22, according to figures released by local government minister Kemi Badenoch.
Responding to a Parliamentary question from Labour MP Liam Byrne, the minister outlined the Department for Levelling up, Housing and Communities’ expenditure for the financial year.
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New restrictions have been imposed on the use of capital receipts by local authorities.
An updated direction published by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) states that councils will be able to continue use funds from asset sales to cover revenue costs of projects that reduce costs, increase income, or improve efficiency, as has been the case since 2016, until the 2024-25 financial year.
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Northumbria Police and Crime Commissioner Kim McGuinness has spoken out about rural poverty across the North East as she outlines how plans to tackle it will help reduce crime.
Highlighting the impact of austerity on rural communities, the Commissioner’s ‘Fighting Poverty, Fighting Crime’ Plan is the first Police and Crime Plan of its kind to focus on poverty.
The plan focuses on reducing crime through boosting jobs and youth opportunities for the region as a crucial way of supporting operational policing.
The new approach covers the whole force area – all of which is impacted by poverty, including the rural communities – from Gateshead in the south to Wooler in the north.
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Vulnerable families across the UK are set to receive around £1bn of support to help them access advice and services, the Government has announced.
Seventy-five local authorities have been announced as eligible for a share of £302m to create new Family Hubs. These hubs give parents advice on how to take care of their child and make sure they are safe and healthy.
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Local authority leaders have welcomed the Government’s announcement of a multi-million-pound funding package to tackle serious violence and homicide.
Around £64m of the funding will go to the existing 18 Violence Reduction Units (VRU), which bring together local partners in policing, education, health, and local government to identify and help those who might become involved in crime.
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The government has promised to not preside over the "death" of local economic partnerships (Leps) as it set out its long-awaited vision for their future as council devolution gathers pace.
Just over a year after it was announced, the government has set out the conclusions of its Lep review in a 13-page letter to Lep chairs and combined authority mayors.
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The Resolution Foundation's chief economist and deputy chief executive writes that the extra support announced in the spring statement is not enough for local authorities to protect their worst-off residents.
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Thirty-one areas in England including Liverpool, Norfolk and Cornwall have been picked to receive government funding to boost bus services.
However, other places such as Blackpool and Slough will miss out on the £1.08bn pot of money allocated by government.
The transport department said it gave money to areas which had the "ambition to repeat the success achieved in London - which drove up bus usage".
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Headteachers’ leaders have criticised Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi for his “continued failure” to respond to them over the “acute” Covid situation in schools as they call for a reintroduction of free lateral flow tests.
Free lateral flow tests for pupils and staff were discontinued on April 1.
In the open letter from the Association of School and College Leaders and the NAHT school leaders’ union, headteachers’ leaders said they are “deeply concerned” about the Government’s “apparent lack of concern and support” for pupils and staff as they faced the next phase of Covid.
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Councils are facing growing challenges as the cost-of-living crisis impacts around the country. The highest rates of inflation for at least three decades are causing a sharp rise in the cost of the raw materials, labour and services they have to buy to provide public services. The LGA has estimated that even before taking account of inflation, councils will have a £1 billion funding gap in the next few years as they face growing pressures from an ageing population and an economy still dealing with COVID-19.
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Research by the Campaign for Better Transport has found that 27 per cent of bus services in England have disappeared in the last decade, with the pandemic accelerating the decline.
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The government’s promise to build 300,000 homes per year could be placed in jeopardy by new regulations put in place by Natural England.
A report by The Times said that as many as 100,000 homes have been delayed due to new ‘nutrient neutrality’ regulations.
Advice previously issued by Natural England has stated local planning authorities in areas affected by nutrient pollution may only approve projects if they are certain they will not increase the levels of nutrients in the development’s catchment area.
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The Education Secretary, Nadhim Zahawi, has said councils should work with newly arrived Ukrainian families to make sure children can attend school as soon as possible. This includes going above published admission numbers or exceeding infant class sizes where appropriate. The LGA said councils had “concerns” about “what happens if children arrive in an area and schools are already at capacity, or schools are unwilling to take children”. It said there were potential issues with academy schools, which councils cannot direct to take pupils. The LGA’s lines were also reported by the Evening Standard.
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The first UK government-funded scheme pairing sponsors with Ukrainian arrivals has been launched. The charity Reset Communities and Refugees has launched a service to link sponsors with new arrivals, provide training and help with safeguarding.
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Cumberland Council could face a difficult start when it launches next April - thanks to a host of "significant" financial issues being tackled by one of its three successor authorities.
Copeland BC, which will merge with Allerdale BC and Carlisle City Council to form Cumberland Council on April 1 2023, is in a "financially challenging position", according to a Grant Thornton audit report, seen by LGC.
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Experts fear the fight against Covid will be hampered after the government axed outbreak funding to councils, while it emerged that future variants would be managed nationally, not locally.
Local authorities are letting go public health staff taken on during the pandemic, after yesterday's announcement that there would be no more Covid outbreak management funding (Comf) - even though cases and hospitalisations continue to rise.
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Councils will have to pick up the bill for accommodating homeless Ukrainian refugees from their own budgets, a minister has said.
Latest figures from the Local Government Association found 144 Ukrainian refugees have presented to councils in England as homeless so far.
Shadow communities spokesperson Baroness Hayman pressed refugees minister Lord Harrington on what was being done for those who ‘urgently need housing’.
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