The Department for Communities and Local Government has published a business plan today that highlights the key role the keenly-anticipated Localism Bill will play in delivering its agenda.
The Bill is expected to be published sometime this month and – according to the plan – will (amongst other things):
- Give councils a general power of competence
- Give residents the power to instigate local referendums on any local issue
- Give residents the power to veto excessive council tax increases
- Give local businesses the power to veto supplementary business rates
- Increase transparency and local democratic accountability over decisions on local government senior pay
- Scrap bin taxes
- Abolish the Standards Board regime
- Allow councils the opportunity to return to the committee system should they wish to
- Give communities the right to save local facilities threatened with closure
- Give communities the right to bid to take over local state-run services
- Establish directly elected mayors
- Introduce the government’s reforms for social housing, including affordable rent, tenure reform, social housing allocations, mobility, homelessness, overcrowding and council house finance
- Incentivise local authorities to build new homes in the form of a New Homes Bonus and reform of the community infrastructure levy
- Reform the planning system to give neighbourhoods “much greater ability” to shape the places in which they live, based on the Conservatives’ Open Source Planning document.
Work on preparing and introducing secondary legislation will begin immediately the Bill is published, with the aim of it being passed by April 2012
The development of a programme of support “to help communities understand their new rights and support take-up of community ownership of assets and services”, will start in 12 months’ time – again with a completion date of April 2012.
The plan generally sets out the DCLG’s key priorities, which are to: “decentralise power as far as possible; reinvigorate accountability, democracy and participation; increase transparency by letting people see how their money is being spent; meet people's housing aspirations; and put communities in charge of planning.”
In addition to publishing the Localism Bill this month, some of the key actions and milestones set by the Department include:
- Ending the ring-fencing of government grants to local government, except for the dedicated schools grant and the public health grant (by April 2011)
- Delivering proposals for long term change to how local authorities are funded through the local government resource review (by July 2011)
- Developing and introducing proposals to implement local retention of business rates and tax increment financing (by April 2012)
- Holding referendums in England’s 12 largest cities and any other cities that choose to participate (May 2012)
- Developing a single, reduced list of the data requirements place on local government by central departments (April 2012)
- Evaluating the take-up and effectiveness of the 16 pilots for community budgets (March 2013) and if successful, implementing them across the country (April 2013)
- Putting a strategy in place for all public sector assets and capital, and identifying barriers including those that prevent decentralisation (March 2011)
- Facilitating the establishment of local enterprise partnerships, “including working with those local authorities and businesses who were not immediately ready to establish their local enterprise partnership boards (October 2011)
- Putting in place systems and funds to deliver the Regional Growth Fund (April 2011)
- Developing and introducing legislation so that officials who ban events on health and safety grounds should put their reasons in writing, and introducing a requirement that local authorities conduct an internal review of all refusals on the grounds of health and safety (May 2012)
- Deciding on proposals submitted under the Sustainable Communities Act and setting a date by which government will invite councils to submit more ideas (January 2011)
- Working with the Home Office and the Cabinet Office, developing a cross-government approach to integration and tackling all forms of extremism (May 2011)
- Requiring publication of items of spending above £500 and the job titles and salaries for senior council officers (November 2010). This will be achieved by a code of practice on council transparency, through the Local Government, Planning and Land Act 1980 or other legislation
- Laying the revised Code of Recommended Practice on Local Authority Publicity (January 2011)
- Implementing the Affordable Rent scheme, “which will allow housing associations to provide new homes at a rent between social and local market rents and with a tenancy agreement that will be reviewed after an agreed period of time” (April 2011)
- Making payments setting up the new self-financing housing revenue account system (April 2012)
- Handing first incentives to local authorities to build new homes (April 2012)
- Publishing and producing the “radically simplified and consolidated” national planning framework, covering all forms of development (April 2012)
- Transferring relevant functions from the Infrastructure Planning Commission to the new Major Infrastructure Planning Unit within the Planning Inspectorate (April 2012).
Communities Secretary Eric Pickles said: “Our purpose is to make a radical redistribution of power and funding from government to local people to deliver what they want for their communities, transforming public services.
"Localism isn't simply about giving power back to local government. We will push power downwards and outwards to the lowest possible level – so that power is held by local people. People want more for less in their services and we will free up councils to make that happen.”
