In June to July 2024, the LGA distributed a survey to all councils in England and Wales which employed Soulbury officers, a special category of the local government workforce which includes a range of related roles in education and young people’s services. The aim was to collect information related to pay and grading, working status, vacancies, workforce characteristics, and recruitment difficulties for these officers.
This research sets out to address what are the most important drivers or indicators of economic inactivity across England, and how do trends in inactivity vary across area.
In February 2025, The Procurement Act (2023) will come into force, changing the way that public bodies – including local authorities – procure goods and services. In order to gauge councils’ awareness of and readiness for the procurement reforms, the Local Government Association (LGA) sent an online survey to Heads of Procurement of all 317 local authorities in England.
In preparation for the upcoming government consultation on councillor standards announced in October 2024 by the Deputy Prime Minister, the Local Government Association ran a series of focus groups to consult the sector on the issues with the current standards regime.
In July 2024, the government announced that, as of 1 January 2025, the exemption of value added tax (VAT) on fee-paying school fees will come to an end, which is to say that school fees are, from that date, subject to VAT at the rate of 20 per cent.
Between October and December 2024, the LGA conducted an online survey of all councils and combined authorities in England, asking them to share views on their organisation’s use of data, including strategy, management, governance and skills development.
The survey was conducted to inform and support anti-social behaviour policy development and explores the local authority’s threshold used to initiate a case review, the choice of case hearing chair, as well as promotion of the process among the community.
From December 2024 to February 2025, the LGA repeated its survey to explore the use of artificial intelligence in English councils. This will enable the LGA to build an evidence base for its support to councils in this space, and to ensure that local government is part of the national conversation.
