Local Government Transparency Code in effect from 3rd Oct 2014

NALC have issued a legal briefing on the new code of recommended practice in relation to information that parish councils have to publish.

The briefing is here 

The Code is recommended not mandatory for parish councils with a gross annual income or expenditure exceeding £200,000. The Code replaces the previous Code issued on 1st May 2014, see other Legal briefing L01-14

Part 2 of the Code is mandatory for large councils with a gross annual income or expenditure of £6.5 million - this obviously affects very few parish councils. Part 2 requires the publication quarterly of:

• expenditure over £500
• invitations to tender for contracts for goods for services with a value over £5000
• details of contracts or purchase orders over £5000

Delivering Differently in Neighbourhoods

The Department for Communities and Local Government has recently launched Delivering Differently in Neighbourhoods, a new programme which aims to support principal authorities to redesign services to deliver at neighbourhood level, with the involvement of community organisations or parish councils.

The department is offering direct grants to around 25 local authorities in total to kick-start innovative projects in 2014/15 and 2015/16. An expert panel will provide advice and challenge, and there will be opportunities for different projects to exchange learning and network.

DCLG are interested in projects that seek to devolve greater responsibility to parish and town councils, and expect that a minimum of 3-4 projects funded in each of the two phases of the programme will involve parish and town councils in some way.

We would encourage parish councils to discuss the programme with their local authorities, who will need to submit expressions of interest to DDneighbourhoods@communities.gsi.gov.uk by 15 December.

For further information about the programme, please see the prospectus.

CiLCA review

The Certificate in Local Council Administration (CiLCA) is the qualification clerks need to be recognised as 'qualified' for the purposes of exercising the General Power of Competence and for Quality Council Status (also being reviewed for relaunch next year as Local Council Award). CiLCA is undergoing a thorough review, the national Improvement and Development Board (IDB) met recently and a number of decisions were made about the CiLCA refresh. Below is a summary of the key updates:

Understanding the changes to CiLCA
The key message is that there is one CiLCA. There are no versions or years that are better or worse – eg if you are qualified under CiLCA 3 years ago you have the same quality qualification as someone who will take it next year.

This focus helped shape a number of decisions:

• There will not be a ‘bridging module’ or anything similar to bring those with an older CiLCA qualification ‘up to date’.
• There will not be a CiLCA ‘Finance bolt-on’ or similar proposed optional additions.
• There will be no exemptions – all students will have to complete the full set of tasks
• There will not be an option to register for the refreshed CiLCA before launch. This is because the current CiLCA is still a valid and valuable qualification. Our advice is that if clerks would like to be qualified under CiLCA they should go ahead and register with the existing CiLCA rather than waiting for the refreshed version to launch

Time frames 

• We aim to launch CiLCA 2015 on 1 April. This is still tbc subject to scoping how long it would take to set up the new assessment process.
• Students currently registering for CiLCA will have 2 years to complete the current version.
•  Registrations received after 1 January 2015 will have 1 year to complete the current version.
•  Applications after 1 April (tbc) will enter CiLCA 2015.
•  CiLCA 2015 will have a one year time limit to complete after registration. With the option to extend as in the current existing arrangements.

Assessment and verification

•  The existing processes and assessment team will continue with the current CiLCA version until the final candidate has completed
•  A key difference of CiLCA 2015 will be how it is assessed and verified. The aim being a more flexible approach where candidates are more likely to pass first time
•  To reflect our commitment to this, the fee for CiLCA 2015 will include the cost of the first resit. This will be trialled for a year and then re-assessed. 

Overtime pay – Employment Appeal Tribunal ruling 4th November 2014

You may have noticed the recent ruling of the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) under the Working Time Regulations (WTR) that non-guaranteed overtime should be factored in when calculating the amount of holiday pay that an employee is entitled to.

Before jumping to any conclusions the advice from Bethan Osborne, B

ALC HR advisor is to wait because the employers have 42 days in which to appeal to a higher court. The judge has given them leave to appeal, so it is highly likely that an appeal will happen.

The retrospective application of this ruling appears to be limited in scope as employees will potentially only be able to go back 3 months in their claims due to the Tribunal rules.

Bethan advises that councils keep robust records of authorised overtime from this month onwards in case the appeal sides with the Unite union and the workers. It is the employers who have staff on zero-hours contracts who treat additional hours as overtime who have the most to lose, and their employees who have the most to gain. It would also be prudent for councils to calculate how many hours of voluntary but authorised overtime are worked annually and what level of holiday leave or pay entitlement those extra hours are likely to generate onto staffing costs should the EAT judgement be confirmed.

VAT reclaim delays?

There have been a few reports of HMRC being very slow in processing VAT reclaims. NALC Financial Advisor, Derek Kemp would like to know if these are isolated instances or if there is a more wide ranging problem. Slow processing of a VAT reclaim on a large project can lead to cash flow problems for a council.

Have you experienced severe delays in reclaiming VAT from HMRC? If you have please could you let the county officer Christine Lalley know.

NALC and SLCC agree to work more closely

 

The National Association of Local Councils (NALC) and the Society of Local Council Clerks (SLCC) have joined forces for further mutual working and co-operation. The leadership teams of NALC and SLCC signed a joint protocol between the two bodies at the annual SLCC Conference 2014.

Both organisations agreed to work together to promote the best interests of the local councils sector and its employees and their contribution to the wellbeing of communities. These aims will be achieved through regular communication at all levels, mutual promotion and collaboration in representations to Government and other bodies when there is common interest. 

Specifically in 2015/16 our two organisations will encourage:

• participation in the new Local Council Award Scheme and
• take-up of CiLCA (This is the accredited certificate for our sector, designed to test basic levels of competence for the role of parish clerk);
• establish a Sector-Led Body to procure audit services;
• provide joint advice to councils including on part-time working hours;
• prepare new model terms and conditions of employment;
• and work towards a complementary conference programme and joint events.

Cllr Ken Browse, chairman of NALC, claimed that: “NALC and SLCC have a long and positive history of working together to promote the work of both organisations and the all important role that councillors and officers play in community leadership and representation. This protocol cements the partnership working between NALC and SLCC and long may this continue.” 

Commenting on the new protocol, SLCC’s chief executive, Howard Middleton, said: “We have always enjoyed a close working relationship with our colleagues at NALC and this builds on the previous agreement to take us forward working together in a spirit of mutual co-operation for the ultimate benefit of the communities which clerks and councils both serve.”

CEO of NALC speaks at Berkshire AGM

Berkshire Association of Local Councils held its AGM on Bonfire night at Grazeley Village Hall. The speaker was Dr. Jonathan Owen, Chief Executive Officer of NALC.

Representatives from member councils agreed at the AGM to no increase in the BALC element of the subscription and received the accounts and annual report. 

The title of Jonathan Owens talk was Improving Local Communities together! He  talked about his first 6 months in the job and the challenges facing our sector as we come up to elections next year. Jonathan outlined how NALC was seen as the 'go to' organisation by central government for the town and parish councils sector, although that didn't always mean that we were listened to!

The presentation is here. All members councils will have received a copy of the BALC Annual Report with their invitation to the AGM which includes the accounts. Please come to next years AGM which will be at the beginning of November 2015