Cash needed for next-stage Total Place deals
25/07/2024 A funding stream should be created to drive the second iteration of Total Place, a report has argued. |
Councils ‘struggling to cope’ with complaints
24/07/2024 More than one in five remedies by councils who have received complaints are being implemented late, Ombudsman finds. |
Homelessness pressures 'unsustainable'
24/07/2024 Councils face ‘unsustainable financial pressure' due to record levels of homelessness, according to a public spending watchdog. |
Analysis reveals £30bn funding hole in care reforms
19/07/2024 Council chiefs have called for a delay in the introduction of the cap on adult social care costs, describing it as ‘unfunded’. |
Councils stuck in social care and hospital ‘doom loop’
16/07/2024 Over-stretched councils are struggling to meet the increasingly complex social care needs of people being discharged from hospital, a new survey has revealed. |
Council housing landlords warn of £2.2bn ‘black hole’
11/07/2024 Twenty of England’s largest local authority landlords have warned council housing finances are ‘unsustainable’ with housing budgets facing a £2bn ‘black hole’. |
Local authority third-party spend rises 17% to £83bn
10/07/2024 Local authority third-party spend rose by 17% on 2021 to £82.7bn in 2023, with vulnerable citizens and public health and buildings the largest categories. |
Corrie star helps save local theatre
10/07/2024 A national campaign led by Coronation star Julie Hesmondhalgh and her husband Ian Kershaw has saved the Oldham Coliseum theatre. |
East Sussex could face £55m funding gap
10/07/2024 East Sussex County Council is already warning it could be left with a £55m deficit in its budget next year. |
Leeds council proposes SEND transport overhaul
02/07/2024 Leeds City Council has proposed reducing transport support for post-16 learners with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). |
Middlesbrough to trial auto-enrolment for free school meals
28/06/2024 Eligible children in Middlesbrough will be automatically signed up to receive free school meals from September. |
Middlesbrough aims to recover £67m in debts
26/06/2024 Middlesbrough Council is progressing ‘thousands more’ debt cases after stepping up efforts to recover more than £67m. |
Service cuts likely, think-tank warns
21/06/2024 Councils could be forced to cut back service provision if cost and demand pressures continue to grow, researchers have warned. |
Lib Dem £300m pothole pledge ‘won’t scratch the surface’
20/06/2024 The Liberal Democrats have committed to spending £300m over the next Parliament to fill 1.2 million potholes a year. |
Questions raised over funding for housebuilding pledges
19/06/2024 A think-tank has warned that a lack of cash for affordable housing will make political parties’ ambitious housebuilding targets difficult to achieve. |
Labour pledges leave questions over council funding
18/06/2024 Questions hang over the future of local government finance in the event of a Labour victory in next month’s General Election. |
Councils face £1bn SEND shortfall
18/06/2024 Local authorities in England are facing a critical shortfall of almost £1bn in special needs budgets this year, new research has found. |
UNISON: To whoever forms the next government…
14/06/2024 Christina McAnea, general secretary of UNISON, tells LocalGov.co.uk what the sector’s biggest union hopes to see from the next government. |
UNISON: More than two-thirds of council youth centres lost
14/06/2024 Funding cuts have led to the closure of more than two-thirds of council-run youth centres in England and Wales since 2010, according to a trade union. |
Greens to push for council tax revaluation
14/06/2024 Elected Greens will push for a re-evaluation of council tax bands to ‘reflect big changes in value’ since the 1990s, the party has pledged in its manifesto. |
Labour manifesto pledges Right to Buy curbs
13/06/2024 Labour has opened the door to reining in Right to Buy in its manifesto, published today. |
Councils looking after record 576k children with SEND
13/06/2024 Local authorities are looking after record numbers of children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), council chiefs warn. |
Conservatives pledge business rates retention expansion
11/06/2024 Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has pledged to create business rates retention zones as he launched the Conservatives’ General Election manifesto today. |
Lib Dem bid to fix care and end council funding crisis
10/06/2024 The Lib Dems have pledged multi-year settlements and a cross-party solution for social care to help end councils’ current funding crisis in their manifesto today. |
IFS: Funding increases have not reversed austerity
10/06/2024 Councils in England have outspent cash boosts in recent years, leaving core funding 18% lower per person than at the start of the 2010s, think-tank reveals. |
‘Existential crisis’ for councils as £6bn funding gap revealed
06/06/2024 A new Local Government White Paper has uncovered a £6.2bn funding gap facing councils in England over the next two years. |
Councils only respond to third of housing complaints
06/06/2024 Local authorities only responded to a third of complaints about hazardous private accommodation between 2021 and 2023, freedom of information data reveals. |
EXCLUSIVE: Whitehall warning over 'heightened' care provider failure risk
06/06/2024 The risk of adult social care provider failure is ‘currently heightened due to additional pressures in the market,’ a Whitehall document has warned. |
Council chiefs call for 10-year sexual health strategy
04/06/2024 Council leaders have called on the next Government to launch a 10-year sexual health strategy after new figures reveal rise in sexually transmitted infections. |
Competitive bidding ‘not working for anyone’
31/05/2024 The next government must end the ‘begging bowl culture’ of local growth funding, a think-tank has argued. |
Public health grant cut by over 20%
30/05/2024 Services such as sexual health and drug and alcohol programmes have seen their budgets reduced by more than other health care services, a think tank has revealed. |
Council bosses call on next government to deliver ‘fundamental reform’
30/05/2024 Local services could reach ‘breaking point’ if the next government fails to deliver long-term funding and ‘fundamental reform’, a cross-party group of council leaders has argued. |
Resource concerns over funeral director visits
29/05/2024 Councils fear scarce resources will be stretched to breaking point by Government requests for visits to funeral directors. |
National service threat to Shared Prosperity Fund
28/05/2024 Conservative proposals to create a national service scheme could spell the end of the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF). |
Stoke-on-Trent council welcomes last-minute £20m levelling up funding
28/05/2024 Stoke-on-Trent City Council has welcomed the approval of £20m in Levelling Up Partnership funding, describing the last-minute decision as a ‘relief’. |
Windsor and Maidenhead council issues bankruptcy warning
23/05/2024 The Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead has warned it could be facing effective bankruptcy if financial support is not agreed soon. |
RAC: Councils take ‘wildly differing approaches’ to potholes
23/05/2024 Local authorities take very different approaches to deciding whether potholes get fixed, which means many go unrepaired, say RAC and Channel 4’s Dispatches. |
Torbay Council secures £20m regeneration boost
22/05/2024 Torbay has been named as the latest place to benefit from a multi-million-pound tailored levelling up regeneration programme. |
Nearly 30,000 elderly people die waiting for social care
20/05/2024 Almost 30,000 elderly people died last year before ever receiving the social care for which they were waiting, a new analysis has revealed. |
Welsh Government backs digital library platform with £900k
16/05/2024 A new digital platform improving access to library services is set to be rolled out across Wales after receiving a £900,000 boost from the Welsh Government. |
Government advisers urge overhaul of infrastructure funding
16/05/2024 Councils should be given more funding to play a greater role in developing infrastructure projects, according to Government advisers. |
Wales pushes back council tax reform
15/05/2024 Council tax reforms will not come into force until 2028, the Welsh Government has announced. |
Funding restrictions leave climate playing ‘second fiddle’
15/05/2024 The Government’s reliance on competitive funding pots is undermining the ability of local authorities to deliver on climate targets, a new report says. |
Third of councils fear being unable to meet Care Act duties
14/05/2024 Only around two thirds of local authorities are confident they will be able to meet all their legal duties under the Care Act next year, council chiefs warn. |
Scottish councils face £585m funding gap
14/05/2024 Council leaders across Scotland have called on Holyrood to find a ‘meaningful solution’ to the half a billion pound shortfall faced by local government. |
Council invests emergency £5m to tackle ‘potholes menace’
13/05/2024 Lancashire County Council has announced an emergency £5m to deal with the ‘potholes menace’ ruining the county’s roads. |
Selling the family silver
09/05/2024 Ryan Swift, research fellow at IPPR North, urges the next Government to stop the mass sell off of council assets. |
Government cash call for council housing firms
09/05/2024 Central Government should provide £750m funding to help local government establish housing firms in temporary accommodation hotspots, an expert has suggested. |
Watchdogs call for long-term funding for Start for Life
08/05/2024 A scheme to support new parents should be given a minimum level of long-term funding to enable councils to plan provision for longer periods, watchdogs say. |
Council forced to close school meal service
03/05/2024 Cheshire East Council has been forced to close a council-run school meal service due to ‘significant budget pressures’. |
Council debt up by £52bn since 2010
02/05/2024 Local government debt has increased by 78% since 2010 as councils attempted to make up for cuts to Government funding, new research has revealed. |
Call for powers to back up funeral director inspections
01/05/2024 Councils have said they ‘urgently’ need more powers and resources after being tasked with inspecting funeral directors. |
What really caused the council funding crisis?
30/04/2024 Max Mosley, NIESR, explores the origins of the local government funding crisis and warns the next government will have to act quickly to address it. |
Elderly forced to wait over six months for home adaptations
30/04/2024 Elderly and disabled people are being forced to wait over six months for the installation of home adaptations due to poor administration at the local level. |
Will local government pick up the tab for increased defence spending?
30/04/2024 Cllr Graham Chapman, SIGOMA, looks at what the PM’s announcement of an increase in defence spending means for local authorities. |
Schools in disrepair due to funding ‘failure’, union warns
29/04/2024 More than four-fifths of headteachers (83%) have said they do not have enough money to maintain their school buildings. |
Council rejects MP’s ‘inaccurate’ funding claim
26/04/2024 Chesterfield MP Toby Perkins has accused Derbyshire County Council of leaving unspent millions of pounds for school spaces for children with special needs. |
Wirral assurance panel ‘no longer required’
19/04/2024 Wirral MBC’s Independent Assurance Panel (IAP) has officially stood down after declaring it was ‘no longer required’. |
How the government can support road improvements
16/04/2024 Jake Michael, RS Bonds, sets out a number of ways the Government can help local authorities improve the condition of the local road network. |
Defra withholds £6m of air quality funding
16/04/2024 Around £6m in funding promised to local authorities to help tackle air pollution will be withheld, a Defra spokesperson has confirmed. |
Councils face £332m youth homelessness shortfall
15/04/2024 Local authorities in England are facing a £332m annual shortfall in youth homelessness funding, new research has revealed. |
Schools face losing over £1bn, think tank warns
11/04/2024 A decline in the number of school-age children could lead to schools losing over £1bn in funding by 2030, education experts warn. |
Councils publish pothole battle plans
10/04/2024 Local authorities have published which pothole-stricken roads will benefit from the first tranche of an over £8bn package of reallocated HS2 funding. |
Seven heritage projects allocated nearly £15m
09/04/2024 Seven heritage projects across the UK have been allocated £14.8m by the National Lottery Heritage Fund to ‘reimagine and protect’ historic sites. |
IFS: £2.5bn Sure Start delivered ‘substantial benefits’
09/04/2024 Children eligible for free school meals who grew up near a Sure Start centre performed up to three grades better at GCSEs than those further away, IFS finds. |
Green Liverpool projects win European funding
08/04/2024 Greening projects designed to complement new active travel routes in Liverpool will be funded by a European climate grant worth almost £80,000. |
Scottish councils’ debt is one-and-a-half times funding
08/04/2024 The debt of councils in Scotland is more than one-and-a-half times the latest local government funding settlement, the Scottish Conservatives have found. |
Council responds to ‘Daventry Banksie’ pothole complaints
08/04/2024 West Northamptonshire Council has responded to an anti-pothole protester with a computer-generated image of a roadside sign laden with song titles. |
Museums and libraries receive £33m cash injection
26/03/2024 Nearly 70 museums and libraries across England are to receive £33m in the latest round of the Government's Cultural Investment Fund. |
Councils get £295m boost for food waste collections
26/03/2024 Councils in England will share up to £295m in funding to help them introduce weekly food waste collections, Recycling Minister Robbie Moore has announced. |
Scottish councils in tax U-turn
25/03/2024 Argyll and Bute and Inverclyde councils had both voted to raise tax in defiance of the Scottish Government's efforts to secure a nationwide freeze. |
Bristol SEND services get £54m bailout
25/03/2024 Special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) services in Bristol are to receive a nearly £54m bailout, the Government has confirmed. |
DfT hands councils £38m for road safety
22/03/2024 Ministers have announced £38.3m to improve the safety of 17 high risk local roads in England. |
EV charge point rollout gets £185m boost
21/03/2024 Forty-four local authorities are set to receive a share of £185m to help accelerate the rollout of electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure. |
Winners announced on £40m signals cash
21/03/2024 The Department for Transport has published the list of 80 councils sharing £40m to upgrade traffic signals. |
PAC: Government has ‘no roadmap’ for fixing social care
20/03/2024 The Government has ‘no roadmap’ for fixing the failing social care system and ‘nothing meaningful’ in place that might demonstrate progress, MPs warn. |
Only a third of councils have enough childcare places
19/03/2024 Only a third of English councils are reporting sufficient childcare for parents working full-time, a new survey has revealed. |
ALARM: Pothole-riddled roads need £16bn investment
19/03/2024 The condition of roads in England and Wales has continued to decline despite councils spending £143.5m filling in two million potholes this financial year. |
CCN: Two-thirds of council budgets spent on care
18/03/2024 Council chiefs have called for an ‘honest discussion’ about services as new research reveals local authorities spend two-thirds of their budgets on care. |
Adult social care receives £20m boost
15/03/2024 The struggling adult social care system is set to benefit from a £20m boost, the Government announced today. |
Adult social care requests hit record high
13/03/2024 The number of new requests for adult social care support have hit an unprecedented two million, a health and social care charity has revealed. |
The elephant in the budget
12/03/2024 The budget provided support to strengthen growth, but bolder action is required to tackle finances, says Amanda Kelly, local government lead at PA Consulting. |
Combined authority set to approve £45m transport scheme
12/03/2024 A multi-million-pound transport scheme is set to transform the centres of Harrogate, Selby and Skipton. |
Budget: West Midlands to get £15m culture funding boost
06/03/2024 West Midlands Combined Authority is to get a £15m boost in funding for culture, heritage and investment projects in the region, the chancellor has announced. |
Budget: Household Support Fund extended
06/03/2024 A scheme aimed at supporting the most vulnerable households will be extended for another six months, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has announced in the Budget. |
Brum members approve £300m of cuts
06/03/2024 Councillors at Birmingham City Council have signed off on £300m of cuts over two years and dramatic council tax increases. |
Basic efficiency savings all ‘long gone’, Chancellor told
05/03/2024 No more 'basic efficiencies' left to make, leaders tell Chancellor in response to reports he will call for consultants and diversity schemes to be cut. |
Chancellor needs to show compassion to most vulnerable
05/03/2024 Cllr Elizabeth Campbell, leader, Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, urges the Chancellor to renew the Household Support Fund. |
Councils in crisis: time to stop the cycle of decline
04/03/2024 Claire Ward, partner and local government sector specialist at Anthony Collins, discusses the state of local government finances ahead of the Spring Budget. |
Less than 20% of levelling up projects completed
04/03/2024 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, FOI requests have revealed. |
Council funding crisis ‘existential’
01/03/2024 Local government’s funding crisis threatens to derail ambitions to level up the north of England, it has been claimed. |
More areas get level four devolution powers
01/03/2024 West Yorkshire, South Yorkshire and the Liverpool city region will all receive level four devolved powers, local government secretary Michael Gove has announced. |
Majority of northern councils face ‘financial failure’ within five years
01/03/2024 More than half of councils in the north of England are at risk of ‘financial failure’ within the next five years, analysis has found. |
Councils set for £2.5bn in exceptional financial support
29/02/2024 The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has agreed to grant 19 local authorities ‘in principle’ capitalisation directions worth almost £2.5bn. |
£220m boost for homelessness services
28/02/2024 The Government has announced £220m for councils to prevent families from becoming homeless and provide support for people sleeping rough. |
Eastbourne BC to vote on declaring housing emergency
28/02/2024 Eastbourne BC, the local authority behind a recent Westminster summit on the temporary-accommodation crisis, will today vote on declaring a housing emergency. |
Twenty-four mental health hubs announced
28/02/2024 Twenty-four early support hubs are set to be rolled out in local communities across the country to provide mental health support for young people. |
Councils should be given more flexibility over fund, says LGA
27/02/2024 Councils should be given more flexibility over funding, a senior councillor has said in the aftermath of reallocated funding from HS2. |
Durham secures £6m to tackle homelessness
27/02/2024 Durham County Council has successfully secured over £6m in funding to tackle homelessness. |
£4.7bn local transport cash to support 'smaller cities and towns'
26/02/2024 Local authorities in the North and Midlands have been given a capital boost under a £4.7bn Local Transport Fund, and have a year to prepare plans. |
Shell is helping power the journey towards a circular paving industry with Shell Bitumen LT R, a new product for roads that uses plastics destined for landfill as part of the additives to make the bitumen.
Effective Energy Group is now offering its support to the 40 Local Authorities who have received a share of the £430m to deliver their projects on the ground by surveying properties and installing measures.
Dougie Belmore explains how one of the main interfaces between you and Bacs is about to change.