Innovation in local government is about improving the lives of the people in our
communities. Browse through our case studies to see the many innovative programmes councils are involved
in.
Growing backlogs, tightening deadlines, staffing pressures and a national push to accelerate house building mean that officers in Local Planning Authorities are under increasing levels of pressure. To address these pressures, Leeds City Council collaborated with Xylo for over six months, to co-design, test and launch Xylo Core, an AI workspace that is designed to help planning officers do their best work.
In August 2024, Bradford Council, along with Norfolk and West Northamptonshire Councils, partnered with CC2i and Bullet AI to collaboratively co-produce and pilot a new Adult Social Care (ASC) front door solution using AI Digital Assistants. This approach has been live with all three collaborating councils for six months and is now a product called AIDA.
Each district in West Yorkshire has benefited from a year of culture, concluding with Bradford as UK City of Culture in 2025. Plans for 2026 and onwards have been co-designed with districts and wider stakeholders including arms-length bodies.
North Northamptonshire is a largely rural unitary authority in the East Midlands. It emerged from local government reorganisation (LGR) on 1 April 2021. The council has established a performance and intelligence team, which provides bespoke data analysis and reporting support for adult social care, children’s services, education, and corporate services.
OSCAR (Orchestrated Service & Citizen AI Router) is a vendor agnostic, strength-based framework designed to provide a single digital front door for local government services.
This case study demonstrates how a single, dedicated role can act as a catalyst for system-wide change—ensuring Service children are not only supported, but recognised, connected and able to thrive.
Wigan Council and partners implemented a targeted, insight-led programme to increase uptake of the Measles, Mumps and Rubella (MMR) vaccine in response to rising measles cases and declining vaccination coverage.
Families Thriving Together is a charity founded in Southeast England in 2022 by CEO Michelle Tucker, which brings parenting support to hundreds of families each year – most of them through referrals from the local authority. Michelle has years of experience delivering local authority settings and has a unique understanding of how local authorities and local charities can work well together.
The Rochdale Flood Poverty Project, funded by the North West Regional Flood and Coastal Committee (NWRFCC) with support from Rochdale Borough Council (RBC), examined how socio‑economic disadvantage shapes local flood vulnerability. Introducing the concept of “flood poverty” (analogous to fuel poverty), it analysed flood literacy and home insurance uptake to identify barriers to community resilience.