Whitehall
Fury at short notice of asylum targets
Home Office chiefs were this week accused of dumping responsibility for strict new asylum targets onto councils while mandarins head for their summer breaks.
Tory-led council given green light to take legal action against Government
Medway Council has been given permission to take legal action against the Government over its refusal to take on any more unaccompanied asylum seeking children.
MPs call for return of hybrid council meetings
A cross-party coalition of MPs has called for the power for local authorities to hold hybrid council meetings to be restored.
Whitehall unit targets council websites
Council websites are being disproportionately targeted by a Whitehall unit tasked with monitoring their accessibility, new figures have revealed.
Call for new PM to boost role of LEPs
The incoming Conservative Prime Minister must better support small businesses through Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) if the UK is to ride the forthcoming recession, leadership candidates Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak have been warned.
Think tank calls for beefed up levelling up
A think tank has demanded the next government reverse council funding cuts and beef up the levelling up Bill after new figures revealed public spending continues to leave the North behind.
Government urged to scale up levelling up
The Government is focusing on the right issues as part of its levelling up agenda but needs to dramatically scale up investment and effort, according to the Institute for Government (IfG) think-tank.
Health security agency may probe council COVID spending
More than 200 councils have been scolded for failing to account for their spending of Government funding given to help them deal with COVID outbreaks.
Four in 10 trust councils
Just four out of 10 UK residents trust local government compared to 80% who trust the NHS, according to an inaugural survey of attitudes to public services.
EXCLUSIVE: Ministers pile pressure on councils to find homes for Afghan refugees
Councils are struggling to find permanent homes for refugees from Afghanistan as ministers pile on the pressure.
Ombudsman raises role change fears
Questions remain about the future of the Local Government Ombudsman’s long-standing role in the redress system for children with special educational needs and disability (SEND).
'Do as they say' devo must end
Central-local relations require reform before efforts at devolution and levelling up can truly work, writes Dr Arianna Giovannini.
Fixing Government’s blind spot
As the Conservative leadership hopefuls jostle for the top job, Jonathan Werran asks what a change of regime may mean for the levelling up agenda.
The familiarity of uncertainty
With the re-emergence of Greg Clark, Heather Jameson assesses the short and long-term prospects of the levelling up agenda.
Government extends not-for-profit company's grant
A not-for-profit company that finds good quality affordable homes in the private rented sector has had its Government grant extended for a further two years.
Finance directors unhappy with audit delay communication
Almost six out of 10 finance directors believe delays to 2020-21 audits were not communicated in a timely fashion, putting pandemic-hit processes under further strain, a new survey has found.
EXCLUSIVE: Chiefs make offer to Whitehall amid rising pressures
Council chiefs have offered to co-produce detailed data to persuade the Treasury to ease the mounting pressures facing local government, The MJ understands.
Peers highlight lack of progress improving 'flawed' Act
Little progress has been made in addressing the lack of coordination between the licensing and planning systems, a House of Lords committee has reported.
Minister delays self-funding care reforms
Residential care self-funders will not be able to ask their council to arrange care for them at the lower local authority rate until April 2025, minister Gillian Keegan has announced.
Outgoing Johnson appoints Greg Clark to return as local government secretary
Former local government secretary Greg Clark has been appointed to replace sacked levelling up secretary Michael Gove.