On behalf of its membership, the cross-party LGA regularly submits to Government
consultations, briefs parliamentarians and responds to a wide range of parliamentary inquiries. Our recent
responses to government consultations and parliamentary briefings can be found here.
In order to tackle the national housing shortage, councils need to be empowered to build more affordable, good quality homes at scale, and fast, where these are locally needed.
While we welcome the measures in the Bill, we have significant concerns about the capacity of councils’ housing teams to undertake all of the new responsibilities that are proposed. It will be vital for Government to fully fund the measures for them to be effective.
We welcome the proposal to increase planning application fees. However, our modelling has shown that even if all application fees were uplifted by 35 per cent, the overall national shortfall for 2020/21 would have remained above £80 million. Councils must have the flexibility to set planning fees at local level to cover their costs relating to planning, which could include the employment of additional qualified planners. This would put councils in a stronger position to address the skills and capacity challenges in planning departments.
Houses in Multiple Occupancy (HMO) licensing requirements sets out the national minimum standards that HMO accommodation must meet to ensure the safety and quality of accommodation.
This briefing outlines LGA policy on council tax and council tax reform and also highlights work commissioned by the LGA on council tax and alternative forms of funding for local government.
In principle, the LGA support the objective of the new proposed system of environmental assessment, to streamline the existing EU-derived processes and place an increased focus on delivering environmental ambitions in the UK. However the consultation does not contain the level of detail required to understand how Environmental Outcome Reports (EOR’s) will work in practice. We would urge Government to engage directly with local authorities when drafting the outcomes and ahead of public consultation, to ensure they are practical and can be monitored effectively.
The LGA, along with 29 other bodies across the sector, have written to government to urge them not to introduce the proposed Infrastructure Levy (IL). We have significant concerns that the proposed IL will result in fewer, not more, affordable homes delivered, will expose councils to excessive levels of financial risks, and be increasingly burdensome and complex for local authorities to implement and manage. The signatories propose that retention and improvement of the current developer contribution system is the most appropriate solution.
It has been councils’ priority to ensure that lessons from Grenfell are learned and that swift action is taken to ensure that every tenant has access to a safe and high-quality home.
Councils are determined that all tenants should have the security of a safe and well-maintained home, with any issues quickly and satisfactorily addressed.
Private rents have reached record highs, with private rents rising an average of five per cent in the 12 months up to May 2023 and more than 25 percent since the start of the pandemic. Rising housing costs are a significant factor in driving financial hardship and homelessness.