Councillor Kevin Bentley My preliminary discussions with council leaders over recent weeks, ahead of February budget setting, continually brings to bear the reality of the Labour Government’s seismic increase to employer National Insurance contributions.
The first Budget for any government is an opportunity to sell their agenda for the course of a Parliament.
Conservative Party conference this year demonstrated that the Conservative local government family is now the dominant pillar of our party.
All politics is local and that is precisely the message the LGA Conservative Group has been getting across to the candidates in the Conservative leadership election.
Recent months have been difficult for Conservatives, particularly in local government. We lost some great Conservative councillors during the local elections in May, and we experienced an incredibly gruelling general election campaign.
The LGA’s Local Government White Paper sets out how to deliver more and better for residents.
Astonishingly, by the time you read this, we will already be half-way through the general election campaign.
All of us will welcome the additional uplift in funding announced in the final local government finance settlement, while acknowledging that much more support is necessary.
The past few weeks have been a whirlwind for local government, not least because of the announcement of the provisional finance settlement, but also because of the outstanding work that our colleagues across the sector have done in response to the flooding and damage caused by recent storms (including Henk, Isha and Jocelyn, as the February edition of first was going to press).
