News Roundup: Funding devolution, Record fraud, Crowdsourced finance, Liverpool take back ICT…
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LGA in plea for funding devolution
The Local Government Association has called on chancellor George Osborne to devolve more funding freedoms to local authorities in his Autumn Statement. The association called on Osborne to “make place based finance the default method of funding and delivering local public services, empowering local partners to work towards shared outcomes”. It also said that all funding for local growth, regeneration, skills and employment should be devolved to local enterprise partnerships, and allow the complete local retention of business rate revenue.
Councils detect record fraud levels
English councils detected £188m of fraud in 2013/14, a ten-fold increase since 1990, according to a new report by the Audit Commission. Jeremy Newman, Chairman of the commission, urged the government to mandate the provision of fraud data from all local authorities, after the body’s closure next year. The report arrived as the Chartered Institute for Public Finance & Accountancy launched a new code of practice on counter fraud.
Council funding venture gains momentum
Rushcliffe Borough Council has become the tenth UK council to join a funding platform run by crowdsourcing website Funding Circle. The Local Business Lending Partnership initiative allows local authorities to invest in start-up and existing small businesses in their area while earning a rate of interest.
Liverpool estimates insourcing savings at £30m
Liverpool City Council estimates that it will save £30m over the next three years by taking services provided by a joint venture with supplier BT back in house. The authority announced last year that it would exit the Liverpool Direct Limited joint venture providing ICT and back-office functions. The savings would be made between 2014 and 2017, the council said.
LGA welcomes growth findings
The Local Government Association has welcomed the conclusions of the Cities Growth Commission report, released by the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce. LGA chair David Sparks said: “The Cities Growth Commission report confirms that the benefits of devolving powers to local areas in England are simply too big to ignore.”
Local borrowing surplus rises
Local borrowing in the financial year to September was in surplus by £6.5bn, an increase in surplus of £100m compared to the same period last year, according to new figures from the Treasury.
The department’s latest Public Sector Finances Bulletin attributed the rise mainly to “lower net investment so far in this financial year offset by the timing of grant payments from central government, which are lower in the year to September”. In September 2014 local government net borrowing was £1bn, a decrease of £0.2bn on last year.
