news - first magazine for councillors

Grid connections ‘delaying’ solar and wind farms

Around 1,300 clean-energy projects with planning permission are waiting to be built because of delays connecting them to the National Grid, the LGA has warned.

Councils ‘want power to hold hybrid meetings’

by The Editorial Team

The recruitment and retention of councillors will be hampered if councils are not allowed to hold hybrid meetings, the LGA has warned.

Bus pass scheme costing councils £452 million

by The Editorial Team

Councils had to spend £452 million last year to support the Government’s national concessionary bus fares scheme, LGA analysis shows.

Two women smiling and looking at a laptop.

Councils warn of skills shortages

by The Editorial Team

Local skills shortages could last longer just as demand increases and dedicated European funding ends, the LGA has warned.

A teacher sat with a group of nursery kids.

Nursery closures threaten free childcare

by The Editorial Team

Nearly nine in 10 councils fear that nursery closures will undermine capacity ahead of the extension of the 30-hours free childcare scheme, research for the LGA shows.

‘Ban single-use vapes’ – LGA

by The Editorial Team

Single-use vapes should be banned on environmental and health grounds, councils and the LGA have said for the first time.

Call for ‘step change’ in council housebuilding

by The Editorial Team

Every area in England should be handed a new local housing deal by 2025 that combines funding from multiple national housing programmes into a single pot to spark a “generational step change” in council housebuilding.

Four-day working week ‘on trial’

by The Editorial Team

Councils should be free to pilot innovative solutions to local challenges, the LGA has said, in response to ministerial demands for a council to abandon its trial of a four-day working week.