|
Feel free to circulate this email to your colleagues and suggest that they sign up to receive it themselves. Create or manage your LGA bulletin subscriptions or read previous editions of this bulletin.
Councils in England to use a national database for taxi drivers
The Department for Transport (DfT) has announced that councils will be mandated to use a national database for taxi drivers who lose their licence – to stop them from applying elsewhere. Building on existing legislation, councils in England will now be mandated to record instances where taxi and private hire vehicle (PHV) drivers have their licences removed for misconduct. This new law will prevent them from reapplying for a licence in other areas by alerting the authority to concerns about their prior behaviour.
The existing database is already used voluntarily by 74 per cent of councils in England. Hosted by the National Anti-Fraud Network, the register records all instances where taxi and PHV driver licences have been refused, suspended or revoked on either safeguarding or road safety grounds.
For queries relating to:
Schools in England to benefit from funding
The Department for Education (DfE) announced that every primary and secondary state school in England is to receive additional funding for the next academic year. This funding is part of £2 billion of new funding for schools being made in 2023 and 2024. Schools can choose how to invest the funding, however it is primarily expected to support salary uplifts for teachers and teaching assistants and help with increased running costs, school trips and learning materials. The remainder of the £2 billion government funding will be used to increase pupil premium funding rates, which are rising by five per cent in 2023/24, to support disadvantaged pupils and councils’ high needs budgets, which support special schools.
DfE is also today responding to a consultation on the National Funding Formula (NFF) which is used to allocate school funding. Among the changes being introduced is the removal of a requirement for schools to be rated by Ofsted (the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills) as 'good' or 'outstanding' in order to be eligible for additional funding.
Fighting fraud and corruption locally
We have updated our Counter-fraud hub to reflect Cifas’ latest offer. Cifas is the pro bono secretariat for Fighting Fraud and Corruption Locally (FFCL), the local government counter-fraud and corruption strategy for the 2020s. This strategy is developed by councils for councils, and is specifically aimed at council leaders, chief executives, finance directors, and all those charged with governance in local authorities. The Fighting Fraud and Corruption Locally (FFCL) strategy provides a blueprint for a co-ordinated response to fraud and corruption perpetrated against local authorities. It contains major recommendations for local authorities and other stakeholders and is produced as part of the FFCL initiative – a partnership between local authorities and key stakeholders.
Find out more about FFCL as well as information about its Board.
Learn how to detect, report and minimise procurement fraud happening in your local authority in Government Commercial College's procurement fraud course and videos. Watch the hour-long video series on your own or with your team
Moving Communities data acknowledged as crucial in proving the importance of swimming pools to local communities
Sport England would like to thank councils and their service providers for their ongoing efforts to share data on leisure facilities on the Moving Communities platform. The data played an instrumental role in demonstrating the challenging financial position facing the public leisure sector and to position this alongside the potential loss in participation and social value, helping to facilitate the £63 million swimming pools fund announced in the Spring Budget. Moving Communities provides a real-time view of local authority facility performance, with benchmarking and data insights. To learn more, or arrange a one-to-one demo of what the platform can do for you please email movingcommunities@4global.com
Digital switchover partner toolkit
We have launched a Digital switchover partner toolkit for councils and partners to use to raise awareness of the digital switchover – in which the telecommunications industry is replacing all old copper telephone lines in the UK, hoping to upgrade to a fully digital internet-based service by 2025. Devices that are lifelines for people, such as personal alarms and health monitoring systems, and traditional plug-in telephones could be affected.
Local government has a critical role to play in the digital switchover to implement the solutions required to support residents and prevent impact on their daily life. The toolkit contains assets aimed at residents to raise awareness of the upcoming switchover, including assets to use on social media and draft copy for websites and bulletins. This first wave of awareness-raising aims to educate those around ‘telecare’ users. The next stage is to have a printable newsletter template for partners to distribute directly to residents who may be digitally excluded, or for voluntary, community and faith (VCF) organisations to have out in libraries, and other community hubs. If you have any questions, please email socialcaredigital@local.gov.uk
Shiva Foundation modern slavery – reporting and remediation
Tuesday 2 May, 1.00pm–2.00pm | Online
The Local Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (LEVI) Fund
Friday 12 May, 2.00pm–3.30pm | Zoom
CIPFA Conference – Unleash the power of procurement to deliver better public services
Tuesday 16 May, 8.30am–3.30pm | The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) auditorium, 1 Moorgate Place, London EC2R 6EA
Supplier Development Programme (SDP) Meet the Buyer Conference
Wednesday 17 May, 10.00am–4.00pm | Edinburgh International Conference Centre (EICC), The Exchange, 150 Morrison St, Edinburgh EH3 8EE
Heat networks and heat pumps (Net Zero Go innovator workshop)
Thursday 18 May, 10.00am–12.00pm | Microsoft Teams
Accelerating decarbonisation through public procurement
Thursday 25 May, 10.00am–11.30am | Zoom
Procurex National Conference
Thursday 1 June | Birmingham National Exhibition Centre (NEC), North Ave, Marston Green, Birmingham B40 1NT
Towards a Social Value Economy – The Social Value Conference
Tuesday 13–Wednesday 14 June | Church House, Great Smith Street, Westminster, London SW1P 3AZ | In person and online
The Children's Services Commissioners' Conference
Wednesday 28–Thursday 29 June | The Hayes Conference Centre, Hayes Lane, Swanwick, Alfreton, Derbyshire DE55 1AU
The LGA Procurement team manages several LGA webpages dedicated to your needs. Please email guy.head@local.gov.uk if you would like any information added to our webpages:
The LGA's membership magazine, 'first', is delivered free each month to just under 17,000 councillors and local authority chief executives. Access first online to browse all news articles, features and opinion pieces, including those from past issues.
Councillors who receive the magazine should also be receiving the first e-bulletin. If you find that first online and the first e-bulletin satisfy your need for information from the LGA, please consider helping us reduce our carbon footprint by opting out of receiving the magazine. Councillors and officers can sign up for the first e-bulletin using their council email addresses.
|
