Council Tax Benefit Support Grant NALC meet Minister Brandon Lewis MP

COUNCIL TAX BENEFIT SUPPORT GRANT

NALC Chairman Cllr Ken Browse, Chief Executive, Head of Policy and Cllr Dave Roberts from Stratton St Margarets Parish Council, Swindon one of the councils most affected by the Council Tax Reduction Scheme changes, met Brandon Lewis MP on 26th November to address the issue of Council Tax Benefit Support Grant. 

They also had a meeting immediately afterwards with the Shadow Local Government Minister, Andy Sawford MP, who is very supportive.

They set out to the Minister our serious and continuing concerns about this issue:

• the impact on town and parish councils in the current year: even though many billing authorities had passed on the grant, where they had not it had caused major problems for our councils
• the widespread uncertainty about the forthcoming year, with many billing authorities threatening to withhold all or part of the grant; and our councils as a result being unsure of what precept to set
• the potential impact on communities, with our councils either reducing services or increasing precept and council tax levels (which councils in some areas have already done)

They pressed the Minister to issue statutory guidance, or take other measures, to ensure that billing authorities pass on the grant. They pointed out that if our councils were forced to increase precept, they might then be at risk of capping/referenda on council tax.
 
It was stressed that all this uncertainty, and possible cutbacks in spending, ran counter to the Government's expectations of the new and developing localism role for our councils.

In response, the Minister stressed that he continued to be very supportive in ensuring the grant was passed on to our councils. He undertook to approach directly any billing authority where the grant might be withheld.

He explained that he had reiterated on Monday, at the House of Commons despatch box, that all billing authorities should pass on the grant.

He further explained that he would be addressing this issue in the Autumn Statement on the financial settlement for local government (the grant paid by Government to all principal authorities). This was welcomed, but NALC questioned whether it would be a requirement on billing authorities, or just an expectation. He indicated that he would consider this and let us know the outcome 'before Christmas'.

He assured NALC that there would be 'no nasty surprises' on capping and referenda, although he was watching developments in our very largest councils where their precept exceeded that of the district council. We reiterated that these precept figures were misleading, because they did not explain that district councils were heavily subsidised by Government grant.

The rest of the email from NALC Chairman can be read here, all member councils should have received the email directly from NALC.

ONS consultation on the form of the next Census - important

For over 200 years every household has been required to respond to the census. The census provides a huge amount of extremely accurate and useful information which is fundamental to decision making on billions of pounds of public and private development and investment. As well as for family history enthusiasts

The Office for National Statistics has to carry out a review after each census. The 2011 census cost £482m ONS predicts that the next full census could cost £625m. ONS is consulting on two possible approaches to the next census in 2021:

• primarily online every 10 years as existing
• using existing government and private data and compulsory annual surveys.

This is your opportunity to respond to these options. The census provides extremely important fine grain information for town and parish councils.There is a danger that the cheaper option (annual surveys) would not go down to the same geographical detail as a full census which would make it difficult for well evidenced decision making at our level of local government.

The full consultation document is on the ONS website

Responses to ONS by 13th December

Sec. 137 limit for 2014 - 2015

SECTION 137 EXPENDITURE: LIMIT FOR 2014/2015

The Department for Communities and Local Government has confirmed that the appropriate sum for parish councils for the purposes of section 137(4)(a) of the Local Government Act 1972 (“1972 Act”) for 2014-2015 is £7.20.

This is the amount that results from increasing the amount for 2013-2014 (£6.98) by the percentage increase in the Retail Prices Index between September 2012 and September 2013 (of 3.2%), in accordance with Schedule 12B to the 1972 Act.

Clerk wanted for Leckhampstead Parish Council

Leckhampstead is a small parish in the Berkshire Downlands of approximately 230 electors. 
Parish clerk required from March 2014. Three hours per week.  Pay dependent on experience. 

The role would include:

• Responsible Financial Officer
• Minute taking at 5 council meetings per year
• Administration of the parish including common land.

Knowledge of email, wordprocessing and spreadsheets essential.

For further details or send CV to Lesley Pace  email:  leckhampsteadpc@hotmail.co.uk  phone: 01488 638330

Community Right to build

Community groups are invited to apply for a share in the £17.5m fund which is being made available to provide seed corn funding to help groups to formally establish, build up their development proposals and submit a Community Right to Build Order.

The funding is available until the end of March 2015 or until it has run out.

Any community group or parish council can seek access to the funding if they have constituted a formal organisation that meets certain basic standards.

More information on the HCA website

NALC Larger Councils Conference 27th November - last chance to book

 Last chance to book..... 
 

With less than two weeks until NALC's Growing Local Conference, it’s time to book the last few delegate places.

Nick Boles MP, minister, department of Communities and Local Government is our headline speaker. He has very strong views on the role of local (parish and town) councils especially around planning and the local economy. Here is your chance to directly influence Government's thinking and policy direction.

Other keynote speakers include:

• Cllr Sir Merrick Cockell, chair of the Local Government Association 
• John Findlay, chief executive of NALC 
• Howard Midworth, chief executive of the Society of Local Council Clerks 
• Michael Burton, editorial director of The MJ

There is a choice of a number of interesting workshop themes including:

• Neighbourhood Planning
• Community Infrastructure Levy
• Localisation of Council Tax Support
• Data transparency

See the events section of the BALC website for more information.

BOOK NOW

DCLG #neighbourhoodplanning

If you are interested in Neighbourhood Development Plans sign up to receive the Department of Communities and Local Government Notes on #neighbourhoodplanning

Edition seven is out now, it contains articles on the latest plan to go to referendum - Tattenhall, Cheshire. The independent Inspector, Nigel McGuirk of the Tattenhall Plan has been appointed to do a number of upcoming plans in this area - Ascot and the Sunnings, Woodcote. Other articles are on the support available to communities interested in doing a plan, a Champions event and contacts at DCLG for help, advice and information.

If you are interested in reading a case study on Thame Town Councils experience of successfully producing a Neighbourhood Development Plan go to the PAS website

Best places to raise a family - Crowthorne and Wokingham

Crowthorne, Berkshire. Photograph by Sleepmyf.

Congratulations to Crowthorne and Wokingham for being in the top ten places in the country to raise a family according to a survey done by Family Investments.

The survey covers education, safety, local amenities, property and green spaces.

Wokingham Baptist Church. Photograph by Dahliarose.

Electronic Banking nearly there but not quite

LRO laid before parliament - Electronic Banking nearly there but not quite

Graham Fletcher, local government accountancy adviser, DCLG has confirmed that the Cheques Legislative Reform Order (The Legislative Reform (Payments by Parish Councils, Community Councils and Charter Trustees) Order 2013) has been laid in Parliament.

This doesn't mean that local councils can start legally using electronic payments yet – though this is a major step forward. There are more parliamentary hoops to go through yet.

See the LRO and DCLG press release.

We will keep you updated over the coming weeks. NALC and the Joint Practitioners Advisory Group (JPAG) have produced revised Financial Regulations and guidance on Safeguarding Public Money which will be issued when the LRO has passed through all its legislative procedures.

Interested in studying to improve your qualifications?

Now is the time to apply for Community Governance modules starting on February 1st 2014

If you are a clerk, an aspiring clerk, a councillor, or a local council adviser, then Community Governance could be for you, whether you are someone with CiLCA or someone who prefers a more advanced way of studying.

Take a look at the SLCC web pages - they explain exactly how Community Governance works (and contain an application form).

Sustainable Communities Act your chance to submit proposals

Parish councils are being encouraged to make direct proposals to DCLG under the Sustainable Communities Act, 2007. The legal order  formally commenced on Monday 14th October 2013.

NALC is promoting parish use of the Act. All parishes in England need to have sight of the link on the NALC SCA web page before making proposals under the Act (at
http://www.nalc.gov.uk/About_NALC/SustainableCommunitiesAct2007.aspx).

Parishes should read all of the documents and text on the web-page before submitting proposals to DCLG. Proposals should either benefit the residents of the submitting parish council, or if appropriate can benefit the residents of all parished areas nationally.

The method of submission couldn’t be simpler. Parishes are advised (by NALC) to formally agree their proposals (through council resolution) after compulsorily consulting with and involving their communities on the ideas in the draft proposal. Proposals should be submitted by a proposing parish – by completing the Barrier Busting Form on the DCLG Barrier Busting web-site http://barrierbusting.communities.gov.uk/.

More details about what DCLG will be looking for are also available at the Barrier Busting link.
 
A submitting parish council should

1.    Consult its community as to which ideas residents would like to have considered for a direct proposal

2.    Formally agree with its community the wording of a formal proposal

3.    The council needs to formally resolve to pass the proposal and send it to DCLG at the Barrier Busting web-site 

4.    DCLG responds saying either ‘yes’ the proposal is passed (in which case the council uses the Barrier Busting Tracker to track progress with implementing the proposal) or ‘no’. If DCLG say ‘no’ the council can leave it at that and not re-submit a proposal, or can re-word a proposal and submit it to chris.borg@nalc.gov.uk to ensure that the NALC SCA Board makes a decision as to whether to re-submit it (or not), to DCLG. If the Board says ‘no’, it must give reasons to the council. In most cases the Board will probably re-submit a (possibly amended) proposal to DCLG on the council’s behalf and the same process outlined above is followed.

Councils are encouraged to start the process of submitting direct proposals to DCLG as soon as possible.