Local Authority round-up 08/09/23

Commercial

Welsh and English councils announce new partnership

Local authorities on either side of the border between Wales and England are set to join a new partnership in a bid to seek Government funding for areas of shared interest. The new Marches Forward Partnership includes Herefordshire Council and Shropshire Council in England, and Monmouthshire County Council and Powys County Council in Wales. The aim of the partnership is to help the local authorities better address areas that require cross-border cooperation. These areas include transport, skills, housing, energy, climate change and digital connectivity.

For more information please click here.

Regulatory

Councils failing to tackle antisocial behaviour

In a recent report published by The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (LGSCO), it was reported that councils are not doing enough to help victims of anti-social behaviour.  The report, ‘Out of Order’, notes that the Ombudsman’s has upheld nearly three-quarters of the cases it has investigated in the past year.  It says that whilst councils have the powers to tackle anti-social behaviour, they are either not using them or do not fully understand the powers they have.  Some issues identified in the report include delays in responding to residents’ calls for help or acting on evidence presented to them, failing to bring in other agencies such as the police – or believing such matters are purely for the police. The report sets out ways councils can improve their services as well as including good practice notes for council officers.

For more information please click here.

Planning and housing

RSH launches consultation on proposed changes to fee principles

The Regulator of Social Housing has launched an 8 week consultation on proposed changes to the way it charges fees to social landlords, following the government announcement that from July 2024 social landlords will need to pay for the full costs of their regulation.  Its proposals include:

• increasing the fees social landlords pay, to recover the full cost of regulation including its expanded consumer remit;
• continue to charge a flat annual fee to smaller housing associations (those with fewer than 1,000 homes), and charge larger social landlords for each social home they provide;
• start charging fees to councils owning over 1,000 homes; and
• charge organisations when they apply to become registered social landlords.

The consultation is open now and closes on 31 October 2023.

For more information please click here.

Chief Planner writes to LPAs about government’s announcement on nutrient neutrality

On 1 September 2023, the Chief Planner wrote a letter to chief planning officers about the government’s announcement on nutrient neutrality. The letter provides more detail on the changes the government is introducing, including explaining what the amendments to the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill 2022-23 mean in practice when commenced, the breadth of the environmental package that sits alongside these amendments and how local planning authorities should approach this issue prior to the provisions coming into effect.

For more information please click here.

Upcoming webinars

Webinar series: Data Protection

Register your interest for our on-going webinar series on ‘Data Protection’ for in-house lawyers, DPOs and senior management in private and public sector organisations. The series will run throughout 2023 providing attendees with up to date information on key Data Protection topics. The short one hour sessions will be delivered by our experts with allocated time for you to ask any questions you may have. The next in our series ‘Marketing and data protection’ will take place on 12 September 2023.

For more information or to book your place, please click here.

If you have any questions about the issues raised in this update, please do not hesitate to get in touch.