A group of councils is to submit radical proposals to the Treasury detailing how a shake-up of capital spending rules and estate management could save some 50bn across the public sector.
Details of the forthcoming Localism Bill revealed in the government’s business plan for DCLG indicate that local residents will be given powers to challenge councils on a range of issues
Councils’ annual performance assessments (APAs) that rate adult social care are to be scrapped after this year’s ratings are announced later this month.
The Department for Communities and Local Government have announced trials focusing on local flexibility in service provision and community-based budgets
Twenty areas are to investigate the scope for ?budgets focused at a very local level? and community-designed-and-delivered services, ministers have announced.
Three London councils have announced plans that could see them merge all their services and create the UK’s first “super-council”.
Alex Thomson, Chief Executive of Localis, sets out the guiding principles of Localis’s latest research project on local government finance
So-called “community budget” arrangements, which will allow councils to pool budgets, will be rolled out in 16 areas from next year, the chancellor has announced in his spending review.
Central government funding to councils will fall by ?around 26% over the next four years?, the spending review has confirmed.
Alex Thomson said Tax Increment Financing which would allow local authorities to borrow against predicted growth in business rates to fund capital projects was not a cure for all ills.