Local Authority round-up 06/10/23

Commercial

£1.1 billion levelling up investment for towns

The government has announced that fifty five towns will be given £20 million endowment-style funds over 10 years to invest in local people’s priorities. Under the Long-term Plan for Towns, local people will be put in charge through the creation of a Towns Board who will determine that the funding is spent on  local priorities in those towns and develop their own long-term plan for their town. This could include reviving high streets, tackling crime and anti-social behaviour, improving transport or growing the local economy. Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, said “Towns are the place most of us call home and where most of us go to work. But politicians have always taken towns for granted and focused on cities. The result is the half-empty high streets, run-down shopping centres and anti-social behaviour that undermine many towns’ prosperity and hold back people’s opportunity – and without a new approach, these problems will only get worse. That changes today. Our Long-Term Plan for Towns puts funding in the hands of local people themselves to invest in line with their priorities, over the long-term. That is how we level up.”

For more information please click here.

Planning and housing

Funding to upgrade social housing

Energy Security and Net Zero Secretary Claire Coutinho has announced that up to £80 million in additional funding will be made available through the Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund in order to upgrade energy efficiencies in social housing. The funding will allow a further 9,500 homes to be upgraded which will generate energy bill savings of around £240 a year. Eligible tenants will receive energy efficiency upgrades free of charge through their social housing provider. Local and combined authorities, registered providers of social housing and charities that own social housing will be able to bid for the additional funding to install energy efficiency upgrades in November.

For more information please click here.

Government delays mandatory biodiversity net gain to January 2024

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has announced that the government is delaying implementation of mandatory biodiversity net gain (BNG) of at least 10% for new planning applications under the town and country planning regime in England that result in loss or degradation of habitat. BNG aims to make a new development’s impact on the environment positive, by delivering improvements through habitat creation or enhancement after avoiding or mitigating harm as far as possible. By the end of November 2023, the government indicates it will publish all guidance and the implementing regulations, including:

• The statutory biodiversity metric used to calculate the correct biodiversity gain.
• The draft biodiversity gain plan template. A developer must prepare a plan as part of the planning application process.
• The habitat management and monitoring plan template, which will set out how long-term management will improve significant on-site and off-site habitats.
• A package of BNG guidance setting out further advice for landowners, developers and local planning authorities on their roles and responsibilities in delivering BNG.

For more information please click here.

Upcoming webinars

Employment Law Update

With many employment reforms coming out in April and October, Autumn is a great opportunity to look at recent updates in policy, legislation, and case law, and to keep an eye on upcoming changes and pending Tribunal decisions. In this webinar, we will review the right to request a predictable working pattern, recent decisions on equality and diversity, and proposed changes on trade union activity. The webinar is designed for HR managers and leaders who guide and assist their colleagues on dealing with these issues in the workplace. Our experts will ensure your team is kept up to date, focusing throughout on the practical points of what this means for employers and HR teams. Join us on 18 October 2023 at 10am for this webinar.

For more information or to book your place, please click here.

Housing Management Law School Autumn Term 2023

Our Housing Management Law School will be held via Zoom on Thursday 19th October at 9:30am. The Law School is free to attend and exists to deliver training to Registered Providers of Social Housing across the country, educating and updating their housing management staff with the essential legal knowledge that they need. Our regular round up of all things current and topical in the ever changing works of housing management law.

For more information or to book your place, please click here.

Webinar series: Data Protection

Register your interest for our on-going webinar series on ‘Data Protection’ for in-house lawyers, DPOs and senior management in private and public sector organisations. The series will run throughout 2023 providing attendees with up to date information on key Data Protection topics. The short one hour sessions will be delivered by our experts with allocated time for you to ask any questions you may have. The next in our series ‘Data transfers – crossing borders’ will take place on 14 November 2023.

For more information or to book your place, please click here.

If you have any questions about the issues raised in this update, please do not hesitate to get in touch.