Digital Transformation, AI and Local Government: The Case for Workforce Upskilling
The new LocalGov and Multiverse report explores how workforce upskilling is driving smarter, more efficient, and inclusive local government transformation.
Council staff demand pay rise amid rising pressures
01/12/2025 Unions representing council workers have today submitted their joint pay claim for 2026–27, calling for a wage rise of at least £3,000. |
Staff shortages ‘blighting’ children’s education, union warns
28/11/2025 Staffing shortages in UK schools are putting children’s education – and safety – at risk, warns the union UNISON. |
Budget: Councils to be impacted by minimum wage and threshold freeze
26/11/2025 Councils, along with other employers, will be impacted by the chancellor's decision to increase the minimum wage and freeze national insurance tax thresholds. |
EXCLUSIVE: Chiefs' pay slump
20/11/2025 Advertised salaries for local government chief executives have failed to keep up with inflation, an analysis has revealed. |
Agency workers join escalating Birmingham bin strike
18/11/2025 Agency workers have now joined Birmingham City Council’s directly employed refuse collectors in the long-running bin strike. |
Reed: Reorganisation will contribute to 'fair' pay
14/11/2025 Local government reorganisation will help pay council workers a ‘fair wage', communities secretary Steve Reed has suggested. |
Autumn Budget Insights: A chance to rebuild councils
11/11/2025 Mike Short, head of local government at UNISON, argues that the Autumn Statement is a chance to protect services and staff, and renew local government. |
Autumn Budget Insights: What the local government workforce really needs
04/11/2025 Pam Parkes, President of PPMA, argues that local government cannot deliver reform or growth without investing in its workforce. |
Mayors call for real Living Wage for care workers
28/10/2025 Mayors Andy Burnham and Kim McGuinness have signed an open letter urging Government to guarantee all adult social care workers are paid the real Living Wage. |
Councils to fund half of increased labour costs under fair pay agreement
27/10/2025 Local authorities are projected to fund over half of increased labour costs passed on by providers as a result of the fair pay agreement for social care. |
Council called out for failing to pay minimum wage
20/10/2025 Coventry City Council has been named among nearly 500 employers found to have underpaid staff the National Minimum Wage, according to the Government. |
Domestic recruitment challenges persist in adult social care
15/10/2025 The adult social care sector in England continued to grow in 2024/25, but challenges in domestic recruitment and workforce sustainability remain, a new report reveals. |
Birmingham and unions finalise landmark equal pay deal
14/10/2025 Birmingham City Council and trade unions have reached a final agreement to settle historic equal pay claims. |
Social care fair pay 'unlikely to be sufficient'
10/10/2025 Doubt has been cast on whether the adult social care fair pay agreement will have the impact claimed by ministers. |
10 ways councils can boost staff retention
30/09/2025 Budget strain and heavy workloads are driving council staff away. Here are 10 simple changes that can make a big difference. |
Care sector to benefit from £500m fair pay initiative
30/09/2025 The UK Government has announced a £500m investment to establish the first ever Fair Pay Agreement for adult care workers in England. |
Labour conference: Reed puts councillors back into LGPS
29/09/2025 Councillors in England will be allowed back into the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS), communities secretary Steve Reed has announced. |
Sheffield reaches landmark £36m equal pay deal
23/09/2025 Sheffield City Council has reached a landmark equal pay agreement with the trade unions Unison, GMB and Unite, resolving long-standing pay disparities. |
Glasgow redundancy payouts 'deeply concerning'
04/09/2025 Redundancy payouts totalling £1m made to senior officers at Glasgow have been described as ‘deeply concerning' by a financial watchdog. |
Bin workers in Brum back further strike action
03/09/2025 A vote has seen bin workers in Birmingham ‘overwhelmingly’ agree to extend strike action until spring next year, according to Unite. |
EXCLUSIVE: Director suspended by county amid reorganisation vacuum
30/07/2025 A director remains out of the office on full pay almost three months on from being suspended, The MJ understands. |
Calls for higher pay for social care workers
29/07/2025 The Government has faced calls for higher pay and better conditions for social care workers as the numbers of British recruits has continued to fall. |
Employers and unions agree pay deal
24/07/2025 Local government employers and the Unison and GMB trade unions have agreed a pay deal for the sector. |
BCP Council announces new pay structure
24/07/2025 Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP) Council has approved proposals for a new ‘fair and transparent’ staff pay structure. |
Union ballots Wrexham bin workers on strike action
21/07/2025 Refuse workers in Wrexham are being balloted on strike action, with their union Unite claiming changes in working patterns by the town’s council will see them lose half a day’s pay. |
Employers double down on pay offer
16/07/2025 Council employers have unanimously reaffirmed their April offer of a 3.2% pay increase as ‘full and final' despite unions urging them to better their proposal. |
Unitary achieves pay harmony six years after reorganisation
16/07/2025 A deal to harmonise legacy pay and terms for Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP) Council workers is finally expected to be signed. |
Unions back Scottish local government pay offer
11/07/2025 Local authority leaders in Scotland have welcomed the decision by Unite and GMB members to accept the latest two-year pay offer. |
Job loses loom as Birmingham bin dispute talks collapse
10/07/2025 Attempts to resolve the long-running waste service dispute between Birmingham City Council and Unite have collapsed with job loses the likely result. |
Union members accept two-year pay offer
08/07/2025 Local government staff in Scotland have voted to accept a two-year pay offer. |
Unions call for ‘better and fairer’ pay offer
04/07/2025 Trade unions representing council staff across the country have called on local government employers to improve on the 3.2% pay offer. |
GMB members vote against 3.2% pay offer
01/07/2025 Members of the trade union GMB have voted to reject a 3.2% local government pay offer. |
Unite set to take Brum bin dispute to Liverpool
30/06/2025 Unite members are set to protest Birmingham City Council’s leader at this year’s LGA conference as part of the ongoing bin strikes, says the trade union. |
Unite members reject 3.2% pay offer
24/06/2025 Unite members have voted to overwhelmingly reject this year's pay offer of 3.2%. |
COSLA makes two-year pay offer
16/06/2025 The Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA) has offered a 4% pay rise for 2025-26 and an increase of 3.5% the year after. |
Spending Review: Chancellor vows to improve pay for social workers
11/06/2025 The Chancellor has backed a fair pay agreement for social care workers in a Spending Review that failed to address many of the care sector’s concerns. |
‘Urgent’ call for sustainable homecare funding
06/06/2025 New research reveals local authorities are ‘consistently failing to fund homecare’, with 27% of contracts falling below minimum wage. |
Brum bin strikes could last 6 months longer
06/06/2025 Almost 400 Birmingham bin workers voted for continued strike action in a recent ballot. |
Reform UK launches DOGE teams to investigate council finances
02/06/2025 A new DOGE-style team of auditors, led by a UK ‘tech entrepreneur’, will be tasked with reviewing the finances of Reform UK-controlled councils, party chair Zia Yusuf has announced. |
Unions demand pay talks
29/05/2025 A union boss has called for employers to come to the negotiating table as they accused bosses of ‘undermining' their collective bargaining agreement. |
Birmingham council secures court order to stop bin lorry protests
25/05/2025 Birmingham City Council has been granted a court order to stop protests outside of its bin lorry depots as the latest move in the long-running pay dispute. |
Call for £1.5bn boost to care worker pay
19/05/2025 A think tank has urged the Government to boost social care funding by £1.5bn to support a £2,000 pay rise for care workers. |
UNISON calls on members to reject pay offer
13/05/2025 The UK’s largest union has urged its members to reject the latest local government pay offer. |
GMB urges members to reject pay offer
07/05/2025 The trade union GMB has recommended that its members reject the latest local government pay offer. |
Lambeth defends Dosunmu payoff
29/04/2025 Lambeth LBC has defended a payoff totalling almost £88,000 to its former chief who admitted failing to stop after a collision and driving without insurance. |
Unite advises members to reject latest pay offer
28/04/2025 Public sector trade union Unite has advised its members to reject this year’s local government pay offer and threatened industrial action this summer. |
Council employee pay offer announced
23/04/2025 Council employees have been offered a 3.2% pay increase from 1 April 2025. |
Making payment processes smarter
22/04/2025 It can be challenging to find the right software to streamline payment processes. Lewis McKenna-Crisp argues SmarterPay has the ideal solution for councils. |
Union announces strike ballot over pay
16/04/2025 Scottish council workers are to be balloted over strike action in response to what a union has described as a ‘pitiful' pay offer. |
Striking Brum bin workers reject pay offer
14/04/2025 Refuse collection workers in Birmingham have rejected the city council’s latest pay offer in long-running dispute. |
Council chiefs defend six figure salaries
01/04/2025 Local authority leaders have defended local government salaries exceeding six figures, arguing it is important to attract the ‘right people’. |
Brum council declares ‘major incident’ amid bin strikes
01/04/2025 Birmingham City Council has declared a major incident to address the impact of the bin strikes in a move branded by Unite as ‘disgraceful strike breaking’. |
Aberdeen council accused of ‘fire and rehire’ threat
28/03/2025 Unite has accused Aberdeen City Council of threatening workers with ‘fire and rehire’ proposals as part of an industrial dispute, a claim the council denies. |
Brum council threatens redundancies to end bin strike
28/03/2025 Birmingham City Council will begin a consultation on compulsory redundancies in an effort to end the bin strike, a move Unite describes as ‘bully boy tactics’. |
UNISON: Reorganisation must not be ‘cover for job cuts’
20/03/2025 The abolition of district councils as part of local government reorganisation puts thousands of frontline jobs at risk, says UNISON. |
Leaders call for tough pay negotiating stance
05/03/2025 Council leaders have warned a tough stance is needed during pay negotiations as local government struggles to meet union demands. |
Birmingham strikes escalate
04/02/2025 Strikes by more than 350 Birmingham bin workers will ‘intensify’ over the next two months, trade union Unite has announced. |
Unions call for £3,000 pay rise
31/01/2025 Council and school employees in England should receive a wage rise of £3,000, according to trade unions representing public sector workers. |
Unions lodge pay claims in Scotland
24/01/2025 Unions have put in their pay claims on behalf of local government employees in Scotland. |
Union warns of risk of ‘two-tier workforce’
20/01/2025 Council trading companies have created a two-tier workforce as their employees are paid less and receive inferior pensions than town hall staff, UNISON says. |
South Cambs to consult on four-day week ‘at long last’
20/01/2025 South Cambridgeshire District Council will launch a consultation this month to ask residents about their experiences of its four-day week trial. |
Unions warn council over potential strikes
14/01/2025 Trade unions have warned Belfast City Council that leisure centre staff could strike if a pay dispute with an outsourced management company is not resolved. |
Call to monitor second jobs of four-day week staff
09/01/2025 Senior councillors in South Cambridgeshire will discuss whether the council should monitor staff working second jobs during its four-day week trial. |
Schools face ‘death by a thousand cuts’, union says
08/01/2025 Headteachers have warned that schools and colleges will be forced to make cuts if costs continue to outstrip the growth in school funding. |
350 Birmingham workers to strike
20/12/2024 Refuse workers at cash-strapped Birmingham City Council are set to strike in January in a dispute over pay. |
Council staff reject ‘insulting’ pay offer
13/12/2024 Outsourced Peterborough City Council employees are considering industrial action after rejecting a pay award. |
Council U-turn on clawing back chief's pay-out
12/12/2024 Croydon London Borough Council has given up trying to recover cash from the settlement payment made to former chief executive Jo Negrini just before its financial collapse. |
UNISON accepts revised pay offer
28/11/2024 Trade union UNISON has accepted the revised pay offer from local government employers in Scotland. |
Social care and the alarming impact of the NIC rise
12/11/2024 The Budget leaves the social care sector alarmed about the rise in national insurance contributions, says Rachael Dodgson, chief executive of Dimensions. |
Four-day week council holds back from permanent adoption
08/11/2024 South Cambridgeshire DC is holding back from permanently adopting a four-day working week despite winning the backing of deputy prime minster Angela Rayner. |
COSLA: Council leaders offer to ‘supplement’ pay offer
08/11/2024 Local authority leaders in Scotland have offered to ‘supplement and enhance’ the latest pay offer to trade unions to prevent further strikes. |
Mayor urges employers to embrace living wage
06/11/2024 North East Mayor Kim McGuinness has urged employers to embrace the real living wage as part of the region’s fight against child poverty and low pay. |
Budget: Minimum wage and National Insurance rises to hit councils
30/10/2024 Chancellor Rachel Reeves has confirmed rises to the minimum wage and employers' National Insurance contributions, piling further pressure on council budgets. |
Sector pay deals agreed
23/10/2024 Unions have struck a deal with employers on pay increases for chief executives and the wider workforce for 2024-25. |
Council attempts to recover payments to late chief executive
15/10/2024 A council is to launch legal action over payments to a former chief executive, who has since died. |
Planning departments hit hardest by staff shortages
14/10/2024 Planning departments are facing the worst workforce shortages, with eight out of 10 experiencing recruitment and retention issues, new research has revealed. |
Union threatens strike action after pay award decision
27/09/2024 Local authority leaders in Scotland have decided to impose a wage rise prompting UNISON to threaten strike action. |
CCTV operators in Hounslow call off pay strike
10/09/2024 Strikes by London borough of Hounslow CCTV operators employed by NSL have ended after a deal for the workers’ outstanding 2023 pay claim was reached. |
Social care wage rise call
09/09/2024 Unions have called for wages to rise in social care to resolve the ‘recruitment crisis'. |
Unite ‘overwhelmingly’ backs COSLA pay offer
05/09/2024 Unite members have voted to accept the revised pay offer from local government employers in Scotland. |
Stark inequalities leave women in north with ‘heavy burdens’
04/09/2024 Women in the North of England are more likely to be an unpaid carer than women in other regions of England, a new report on regional inequalities has revealed. |
Councils draining ‘dwindling’ reserves to stay afloat
04/09/2024 Three in five (60%) city leaders have warned they will have to draw on already depleted financial reserves this year to ‘stay financially afloat.’ |
Unison starts balloting staff on strikes
03/09/2024 More than 360,000 council and school support staff across England and Wales will begin voting today on whether to take industrial action over pay. |
Union rejects latest COSLA pay offer
03/09/2024 Members of Scotland’s largest trade union have voted overwhelmingly to reject the latest pay offer from local government employers. |
Council staff face ‘hardship’ as they wait months for pensions
02/09/2024 Former council workers in the West Midlands are waiting months to receive their pensions after retiring, creating ‘huge hardship issues’, trade unions and a council have warned. |
Scottish Government asks councils to divert funds to cover pay deal
28/08/2024 The Scottish Government has asked councils to divert funds from a Nature Restoration Fund to help them meet the revised local authority pay deal. |
Birmingham slated over pay cut plans
16/08/2024 A union has slammed cash-strapped Birmingham City Council over plans to cut the salaries of refuse workers. |
Union submits first tranche of equal pay claims
14/08/2024 Trade union GMB has lodged the first tranche of 400 legal equal pay claims against Brighton and Hove City Council. |
Council worker pay strike suspended
13/08/2024 A strike over pay that was set to hit Scotland this week has been suspended after council leaders made a new offer. |
COSLA makes improved pay offer
12/08/2024 Councils have made an improved pay offer to staff in a bid to avert strike action across Scotland. |
Staff stage fresh strike over pay
09/08/2024 Staff in social care teams across Lancashire have walked out today in their second bout of strike action over pay this year. |
Labour reaffirms commitment to National Care Service
07/08/2024 Care minister Stephen Kinnock has reaffirmed Labour's commitment to a National Care Service. |
Bin strikes threaten ‘significant disruption’ during Edinburgh Fringe
31/07/2024 Edinburgh CC has urged COSLA, unions and the Scottish Government to resolve the pay dispute to ‘prevent significant disruption’ during Edinburgh Fringe. |
Fixing care’s recruitment and retention issue
31/07/2024 Ben Weatherall, co-founder and director of Curam, looks at what local authorities can do to fix the care sector’s recruitment and retention issue. |
Council support staff declare strike over salary grades
26/07/2024 Around 200 support staff in Lancashire County Council’s social work team today began strike action in a dispute over salary grades and working arrangements. |
Unions threaten ‘stinking’ summer after rejecting pay offer
22/07/2024 Residents in Scotland will be faced with a ‘stinking Scottish summer’ unless local government employers improve their pay offer to workers, union says. |
COSLA offers 3.2% pay uplift
18/07/2024 Local government employers in Scotland have made a new pay offer in an effort to resolve the ongoing pay dispute. |
Public sector productivity hampered by payroll and HR software limitations
18/07/2024 Nearly half of all public sector organisations across the UK and Ireland are wrangling with payroll and HR systems that are not fit for purpose. |
Care sector needs 540,000 workers by 2040
18/07/2024 The care sector will need 540,000 additional social care posts by 2040 to cope with the aging population, care workforce body Skills for Care estimates. |
King's Speech: Waiting lists, prevention and mental health top health agenda
17/07/2024 Reducing waiting times, prevention and improving mental health provision topped Labour's agenda in today's King's Speech but there were no social care reforms. |
