Empowering local decision-makers
Let me take the opportunity in this first first magazine of 2025 to wish all LGA member councils a very happy new year.
group leaders
Local consensus needed on reorganisation
I hope colleagues across local government had a good Christmas and I am sure everyone is back into the swing of things as we enter 2025.
Unitary debates and social care commissions
It will be another busy year for local government in 2025.
Devolution looks like centralisation
Wishing you a healthy and successful 2025!
Councils let down by funding system
The local government funding reforms announced on 28 November are welcome.
Ministers don’t get it on National Insurance
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.
Don’t lose the ‘local’ in local government
As first was going to press, we were awaiting a delayed white paper on devolution. The Government’s intentions may be to decentralise power, but I am concerned that some of its proposals will undermine local democracy, rather than empower it.
Devolve to councils as they are
We are in tempestuous times, with UK Government announcements expected in a white paper on devolution, local government reform, and the provisional finance settlement – all in the week before Christmas.
A government that ‘gets it’
Like many local government leaders, I watched carefully the first Labour Budget in more than 14 years and the first Budget ever delivered by a woman.
Expect seismic increase in EHCPs
The first Budget for any government is an opportunity to sell their agenda for the course of a Parliament.