Thank you to you and your community’s efforts to save water during the past four months. While the hosepipe (temporary use) ban may not have affected you directly, it’s both you and your community’s efforts that have helped significantly.

The temporary use ban was put in place by the company on 12 August following the driest start to summer since 1976, resulting in record demands for water.

These continued efforts will also help protect the precious local habitats that rely on our rivers and reservoirs too.

Looking ahead to next summer, we do need people to continue to be mindful about how much water they use so all the sources where we draw water from both in the reservoirs and underground can continue to recover.

We’ve also recently launched our draft Water Resources Management Plan public consultation which sets out how we will provide a reliable and resilient supply of drinking water between 2025 and 2075 while protecting the local environment.

Chief executive’s bulletin

Meeting with new local government minister 

NALC’s chair, Cllr Keith Stevens, had a positive introductory meeting with the new Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Local Government and Building Safety), Lee Rowley MP, this week to follow up his speech at our recent Empowering Communities conference. The minister’s responsibilities include elections policy and Elections Integrity Programme implementation, Integration Strategy and communities, planning casework and local government policy, finance, improvement, engagement in England. The minister reiterated his commitment to work closely with NALC and the sector and have regular engagement including by officials, and that he wanted to gain a better understanding of the issues we are facing which the department should be addressing. Keith took the opportunity to highlight a range of issues including: the role of local councils in levelling up and addressing big challenges such as the climate and cost of living emergencies; standards, where he urged the minister to reconsider the government response to the Committee on Standards in Public Life report; funding including sector support; urging the minister to publish the response to the call for evidence on remote meetings.
Local Council Award Scheme webinar 

This week NALC hosted a webinar on the Local Council Award Scheme which was attended by around 100 people. The free webinar covered how the scheme works, the benefits of applying for accreditation, and top tips on how to prepare a good application, followed by a question-and-answer session. You can find more details on the scheme and how to apply on the NALC website here.
NALC National Network: Coastal Communities 

Our head of policy and communications, Justin Griggs, hosted the latest meeting of the NALC National Network: Coastal Communities on 24 November. We were pleased to be joined by Beccy Lofts from the Local Government Association’s coastal special interest group who provided an update on their work and that of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on coastal communities. It was good to hear that 13 councils at all tiers have now backed the Motion for the Ocean which helps local authorities play their part in realising a clean, healthy and productive ocean and all of the direct economic, health and wellbeing benefits it will bring. The network also agreed to identify priority issues facing coastal areas which we can work with them to promote over the next couple of years.
Updated legal guidance 

We have updated Legal Topic Note (LTN) 54 on the protection of ownerless common land and village greens. We have added two links in paragraph 8 to government guidance on works to common land. You can find this and our extensive suite of other LTNs in the members’ area of the NALC website in the LTN’s section (login required).

Management Board 

Our Management Board met remotely on 22 November and discussed the future of our office at 109 Great Russell Street, how to engage smaller councils in shaping our services, and our programme of events including lobby day and a parliamentary event next Autumn. The Board also agreed to become a White Ribbon accredited organisation – more on that below!

White Ribbon Day

Today is White Ribbon Day, an international day for eradicating violence against women and girls. It’s easy to say we support this day, but it needs to be backed up by actions, which is why I’m delighted NALC’s Management Board approved NALC becoming a White Ribbon Accredited organisation this week. As part of the day, we released a video featuring men from the sector showing their support for White Ribbon Day, as well as this message from our chair, Cllr Keith Stevens. We also published a blog by Cllr Kay Wesley, a White Ribbon Champion for Congleton Town Council, on their journey to becoming accredited. I’d like to encourage councils to explore this themselves. Our health and wellbeing webpage has been updated with a new section on violence against women and girls. I’ll provide further updates on our progress to becoming accredited in due course.

Practitioners Guide technical working group 

The multi-stakeholder working group responsible for considering changes to the Practitioners Guide for the financial year 22/23 met this week. It is made up of representatives from NALC, the Society of Local Council Clerks, the Association of Drainage Authorities, and from one of the auditors appointed by Smaller Authorities Audit Appointments. The meeting covered several possible updates and will meet again in the new year to confirm those changes and set a timeframe for the update to the guide.

On the blog: planning applications in a digital planning system 

One of local councils’ essential duties is to analyse and comment on planning applications. Tristram Cary from Geoxphere has written for the NALC blog about how this task can be made easier if planning applications are loaded into a digital mapping system and analysed against all the relevant constraints.

NALC response to levelling up funding inquiry 

In our response to the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee inquiry into levelling up funding, we have stated that the government must act quickly to give local councils the same access to apply for central government funding, including for levelling up, as principal councils. We also highlighted the weakness of the government’s current system of assessing deprivation which was considered inaccurate and often needed to identify the most deprived communities in many of England’s parished areas.

Out and about 

I was pleased to join a panel session at the well-attended in-person Town and Country Planning Association conference on levelling up this week. I spoke about our view that local councils have a vital role to play in levelling up and the promised review of neighbourhood governance by the government should make it easier to set them up across the country. There was much interest in how best to engage communities and the role of neighbourhood planning being recognised, indeed perhaps it could help with local retrofitting strategies to help tackle climate change.

And finally… 

With village halls at the heart of so many communities, especially in rural areas, it was good to see BBC Radio Four’s Today programme this week highlight the impact of rising energy costs. According to our Rural Coalition colleagues Action for Communities in Rural England, over half of village halls are reporting financial difficulties, and one in ten may not be able to pay their energy bills and will be forced to close. The story also features Gamlingay Parish Council who helped protect their ‘eco-hub’ through future proofing with renewable energy sources. You can listen again here (21.13 to 25.06) and more information about ACRE’s support for village halls is here.