26/05/2020

A cross-party agreement that the Local Government Association (LGA) would lobby for a coronavirus payment to staff was ditched after senior councillors blocked the move, The MJ can reveal.

22/05/2020

Councils have called for a single system for the distribution of personal protective equipment (PPE) to avoid local government employees being treated as ‘second class workers’.

22/05/2020

Councils in England will be handed £300m by the Government as they are given a key role in driving forward testing and tracing. 

19/05/2020

A top union official has branded English councils’ refusal to rally behind a campaign for a workers’ coronavirus bonus as a ‘slap in the face’.

11/05/2020

Trade union Unite is expected to recommend that its members reject the employers ‘final’ 2.75% pay offer at a national committee meeting later this week.

05/05/2020

Leisure providers are at a ‘crisis point’ as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, English and Welsh councils have warned.

27/04/2020

Councils may need up to another £12.8bn from the Government to get through the coronavirus crisis, the chairman of the Local Government Association (LGA) has suggested.

24/04/2020

Dwindling supplies of vital life-saving personal protective equipment (PPE) for frontline care workers will run out within days, the Local Government Association (LGA) warned today.

20/04/2020

Council leaders in England, Scotland and Wales have called for a temporary lifting of the immigration rules that stop some migrants accessing public funds.

17/04/2020

Plans to publish a league table of how quickly councils are doling out grants to help businesses have been met with anger from local government.

15/04/2020

Health secretary Matt Hancock has promised to increase supplies of personal protective equipment (PPE) to social care.

14/04/2020

Almost 100,000 small businesses across the country have already been paid a share of more than £1bn to help support them through the coronavirus crisis, the Local Government Association (LGA) has said.

27/03/2020

Councils have been asked to support rough sleepers into accommodation by the end of the week amid the coronavirus pandemic.

19/03/2020

Almost £3bn of the Government’s £5bn Covid-19 funding will go towards freeing up at least 15,000 English hospital beds by the end of next week, the Department of Health and Social Care has announced.

02/03/2020

A comprehensive review of economic decline and social division has called for a ‘large-scale, comprehensive, long-term and devolved’ plan of action to deliver change.

21/02/2020

Demand and funding pressures have forced councils to overspend on children’s social care budgets by more than £3bn in the past five years, new analysis has revealed.

19/02/2020

Councils have called on the Government to use its White Paper to give them powers to take action on unbuilt land that has planning permission.

28/01/2020

Councils have been sent back to the drawing board after a quango ripped apart their plans to recover massive special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) deficits.

28/01/2020

Seven out of 10 English councils overspent their homelessness budgets in 2018/19 by a combined total of nearly £115m, Local Government Association (LGA) analysis has found.

26/09/2019

The proposed UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) must be worth at least £28bn over seven years if the UK is to deliver its devolved policy objectives, a leading sector body has warned.

02/09/2019

Councils will be legally required to publish deals with housing developers after new rules were introduced.

14/08/2019

‘Indicative numbers’ for the amount councils will receive in 2020/21 will not be published before next month’s Spending Review, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) has admitted after it missed a self-imposed deadline.

26/06/2019

The Treasury’s view of children’s services has been dealt a further blow after research linked 70% of spend variation to factors outside councils’ control.

09/05/2019

Brokenshire moves to impose fresh conditions on ‘top slice’ cash

17/04/2019

Council chiefs have raised concerns with Government about the sector’s capacity to run EU elections so close on the heels of local polls.

10/04/2019

Council chiefs have urged Whitehall to be ready to ease pressures on the sector for up to six months if Brexit threatens to stretch capacity.

03/04/2019

Chief executives should confront directors to ensure children’s services are well delivered, fresh guidance published by the Local Government Association (LGA) has suggested.

01/03/2019

Sandwell MBC has made ‘significant progress’ following an independent review last year.

21/02/2019

Councils have threatened to walk away from Government attempts to engage with them on Brexit amid growing frustrations about the response to their concerns.

21/02/2019

MPs have urged ministers to assess specific proposals for reforming business rates by the autumn.

11/02/2019

Labour would create a new commission that would allow councillors to influence every decision that affects local authorities if they won a General Election.

04/02/2019

Councils are not doing enough to prepare for Brexit and need to step up their game, the concerned Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) has told sector figures.

31/01/2019

Chief executives have told communities secretary James Brokenshire Whitehall needs to be more joined up between departments and in its communications with councils over Brexit.

25/01/2019

Smith Square has acknowledged the financial challenges it faces as it freezes subscriptions while grappling with declining Government grants and a pension scheme deficit.

23/01/2019

A nine-fold variation in spending on children’s social care could largely be down to ‘differences in characteristics’ between councils, according to a National Audit Office (NAO) study.

15/11/2018

Communities secretary James Brokenshire has threatened to withhold the shared prosperity fund (SPF) from areas that fail to remove local enterprise partnership (LEP) overlaps.

31/10/2018

Senior councillors have been warned not to talk about a secret Local Government Association (LGA) report that models what fiscal devolution might look like, The MJ has been told.

31/10/2018

Local authorities have been warned to prepare for up to three months of disruption in the event of a no-deal Brexit.

24/10/2018

Senior Marsham Street officials have stepped up their preparations for Brexit after complaints from frustrated councils that they were being shut out of the process.

19/09/2018

The sector’s ability to respond to crises such as a care provider failure could be hit after Whitehall demanded cuts to a key improvement programme, senior councillors have been warned.

07/09/2018

The Local Government Association (LGA) has defended its support of the struggling UK Municipal Bonds Agency.

06/09/2018

Fresh concerns have emerged about local enterprise partnerships (LEP) as the Government considers whether to use them to funnel UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) cash.

23/08/2018

The struggling Municipal Bonds Agency has pleaded for councils to ‘pull behind us’ amid warnings it could run out of money before issuing a bond.

04/07/2018

Parts of the country could be left behind when Whitehall rolls out its local industrial strategies, a senior Local Government Association (LGA) figure has warned.

09/05/2018

New local government secretary James Brokenshire has today announced the two commissioners appointed to help rescue troubled Northamptonshire CC.

19/04/2018

Labour would scrap right to buy, and give councils new borrowing freedoms and central funding in a bid to kick-start house building, the party said today.

20/03/2018

The Government will need to scrap its funding reforms, significantly boost top-ups or centralise care if it is to plug the social care funding gap, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has warned today.

20/03/2018

The Government has ordered a review after being forced to admit a second mistake in as many months in the way it calculates council payments.

05/03/2018

Ministers today rejected calls for the mandatory reporting of suspected child abuse – claiming an effective case for a new law has not been made.

20/02/2018

Key Whitehall departments involved in attempt to bury changes to provisional finance settlement data.

18/01/2018

The local government finance settlement has descended into a shambles after it emerged allocations in the provisional document were wrong, The MJ can exclusively reveal.

09/01/2018

Local government secretary Sajid Javid has ordered a best value inspection of Conservative-led Northamptonshire CC amid continuing concerns over its financial management and corporate governance.

04/01/2018

Social care directors have warned delays to operations and hospital admissions will continue without a long-term sustainable funding solution for their sector.

21/12/2017

A cut to councils’ public health grants has been criticised by the Local Government Association (LGA) for being ‘short-sighted and extremely counter-productive’.

27/11/2017

Newcastle-under-Lyme BC has suspended its chief executive and monitoring officer after an independent review into problems faced by voters at the General Election.

22/11/2017

The Housing Revenue Account cap will be lifted for councils in ‘high-demand areas’ and stamp duty will be scrapped for most first-time buyers, chancellor Philip Hammond announced in his Budget speech today.

21/11/2017

Local authorities have used this year’s 24-hour tweet-a-thon as an opportunity to showcase the huge range of services they provide ahead of a crunch Budget.