Briefings and responses

Sound financial management is crucial to the financial resilience of councils and Cipfa’s proposed new code is a welcome addition to the tools and guidance that councils can use to achieve that.

In our view, the revised code as drafted exceeds this brief of determining how much a council can afford to borrow. The proper place for detailed guidance on local authorities’ investments is the Government’s statutory guidance on local government investments, which itself is another part of the Prudential Framework for local authority capital finance.

Keeping children safe is one of the most important roles a council fulfils. While England remains one of the safest places in the world to grow up thanks to the tireless work of our children’s services colleagues and their partners, we agree that significant reform is needed to ensure the right systems are in place to not only protect children, but to help them and their families to thrive.

This briefing sets out the LGA’s key messages on the subject and our analysis of council revenue account budgets.

Making sure all children and young people have the bright future they deserve is a key ambition of every council. Councils want all young people to be able to enjoy their lives, reach their full potential and make a good transition to adulthood with good health and wellbeing.

The latest annual data on NHS spending in 2016/17 reveals there were 42,911 extractions of multiple teeth in under 18s in England at a cost of £36.2 million.

Finding loving homes for children is one of the most important jobs that councils do.

Key summary points and briefings for local government on the Child and Social Work Bill.

An introduction to the Act and its consequences for local government.

Local government has a huge, central role to play in tackling this problem.