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Final Local Government Finance Settlement, our Annual Local Government Finance Conference, and more...

Local Government Association sent this bulletin at 31-01-2019 01:24 PM GMT

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31 January 2019

Finance bulletin

Welcome to January’s finance bulletin.

The Government announced the 2019/20 Final Local Government Finance Settlement on 29 January in the form of a written ministerial statement and published associated documents on the MHCLG website. On the day of the settlement, we issued a media statement. There have been no major changes compared to the provisional settlement published in December 2018. The settlement will be debated in the House of Commons and the LGA will provide a briefing for parliamentarians to assist them in this debate.

Leaders of the LGA’s political groups met this month with the Minister for Local Government, Rishi Sunak MP, to discuss the provisional local government finance settlement. Members raised the key issues in our response to the 2019/20 Provisional Local Government Finance Settlement as well as the need to meet the funding gap facing local government in the next Spending Review period. We offered to help MHCLG make the case for local government.

Our 2019 Annual Local Government Finance Conference took place this year on 8 January. The sold out event was chaired jointly by myself and Cllr John Fuller, the Vice Chair of the LGA’s Resources Board and was a great success, receiving highly positive feedback from our delegates. It featured speakers from across the political spectrum including the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Liz Truss, the Secretary of State, James Brokenshire, and the Shadow Secretary of State, Andrew Gwynne, as well as leading officials and technical experts from the sector.

We are continuing our work with the Government on Business Rates Retention and the Fair Funding Review. In conjunction with MHCLG, we are running a series of free regional events in January and February for councils to hear about proposals in the MHCLG Further Business Rates Retention consultation and the Fair Funding Review consultation, and to feed in their views. We are currently working on our responses to the consultations and will send them to you shortly.

We are also continuing work on preparing for the 2019 Spending Review. In conjunction with MHCLG we are organising a series of round tables at officer level as an opportunity for key representatives across the sector to discuss a number of cross-cutting and service-specific themes relating to the Spending Review directly with relevant Government department officials. The first round table covered Special Educational Needs and Disabilities and Dedicated Schools Grant and the second will cover welfare reform in early February.

I am keen to listen to your ideas and thoughts from across the country, so please do not hesitate to get in touch.

Best wishes,

Cllr Richard Watts
Chair, Resources Board

Stories

LGA response to the 2019/20 Local Government Finance Settlement

The LGA responded to the 2019/20 Provisional Local Government Finance Settlement recognising the additional money provided by the Government in the Autumn Budget and provisional settlement. However, this does not meet funding gap facing local government and it is vital that the Government provides new funding for all councils in the final settlement, and uses the 2019 Spending Review to deliver truly sustainable funding for local government. The Government announced the Final Local Government Finance Settlement 2019/20 in the form of a written ministerial statement

LGA response to the consultation on the Business rates treatment of self-catering accommodation

LGA submitted a response to the consultation on the Business Rates Treatment of Self-Catering Accommodation. The LGA welcomed the proposal to try to eliminate this form of avoidance and believes the Government should go further and tackle other forms of business rates avoidance.

Council finances

This month MPs debated local government funding. We provided a briefing, outlining the financial pressures facing councils and the importance of the 2019 Spending Review. A wide range of MPs called on the Government to provide councils with long-term financial certainty.

Events

Business Rates Retention and Fair Funding Review consultation events

The LGA has organised a series of regional consultation events to enable councils to hear from officials on the consultations, to ask questions and to make contributions.

The next regional event will be taking place in Leeds on 8 February 2019.

first

First Magazine - now online

'first' is LGA's membership magazine and is received as a hard copy by over 18,000 councillors and 400 chief executives. In a response to demand, we have made it easier to read online by creating a dedicated website to read all of its articles, interviews and opinion pieces.

Both the hard copy and online pdf are still available to readers, and subscriptions can be amended online.

HIghlights of the latest issue include:

Balancing the books
Spending Review to look at human capital, Truss tells LGA
An independent voice

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