Briefings and responses

The Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill acts upon long running asks from councils and the LGA for further devolution in England. We are pleased that the Government has proposed to speed up the process and make good on its commitment to offer all of England the opportunity to benefit from a devolution deal by 2030. It is also important that councils of all sizes are engaged in the devolution process.

We are pleased that the Government has proposed to speed up the process and make good on its commitment to offer all of England the opportunity to benefit from a devolution deal by 2030.

This briefing sets out the headline announcements in the Government's Levelling Up White Paper, summarises elements of the 12 missions relevant to local councils and provides details of our improvement and support offer for areas looking to take forward a devolution deal.

The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities held a consultation on reforms to national planning policy between 22 December 2022 and 2 March 2023. The consultation sought views on proposals to develop new and revise current national planning policy.

Councils are best-placed to understand the range of needs faced by disadvantaged children.

Councils play a strong role in providing good school places, with 91 percent of maintained schools rated as Good or Outstanding by Ofsted, compared with 85 per cent of academies and 84 per cent of free schools.

Read our Autumn Budget on-the-day briefing.

In this submission we detail the unfunded cost pressures facing local government and why, with many local services facing significant funding gaps, it is vital that the Budget recognises that councils cannot continue without sufficient and sustainable resources.

We have been calling for an overhaul of the current Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS) process to ensure there is adequate protection for human rights. The decision to focus on how we best protect people’s liberty is positive and we support it.

The programme of reviews, covering further education and sixth form colleges, is taking place in waves and is due to completed by end of March 2017. Read the full briefing: