Town and Parish councils to get new powers to drive community services

The National Association of Local Councils (NALC) welcomes the calls in today’s (11th July) ‘Open Public Services White Paper’ for more powers over public service delivery to be in the hands of local communities and very local (parish and town) councils.
The National Association agrees with the White Paper in its statement of: “We also want to do much more to reinvigorate the most local forms of government – parish, town and community councils – and allow them to take control of key local services, ensuring that these opportunities are available to everyone in the community. We would expect local authorities to work much more closely with these bodies to deliver services that are tailored to the needs of local residents. That is why we are consulting on potential new rights for neighbourhood councils to take over some key local services.”
NALC as a supporter of localism and greater devolution of power and decision making to the grassroots level, believes that local councils should be at the heart of localism and this White Paper provides a major step in this direction. We believe that this Paper builds on the decentralisation aspects in the Localism Bill and gives real power to these councils over matters like parks, traffic, parking, pubs, nightclubs, libraries, and museums.
The chairman of NALC, Councillor Michael Chater said: “The National Association is very pleased in the framework set out in the Open Public Services White Paper which recognises that local councils with its democratic accountability, independence and being the closest tier of local government to the community should be enabled to take on more public service delivery if they wish to in collaboration with local people.
“We are very keen to explore with the Government and principal authorities (county, district, borough and unitary authorities) how we can develop schemes of service delivery delegation and much better partnership working.”


Notes for Readers/Editors
1.    The National Association of Local Councils (NALC) is the nationally recognised membership and support body representing the interests of 9,000 local councils and their 80,000 local councillors in England.
2.    Local (community, neighbourhood, parish, village and town) councils are statutory bodies and are the first tier of local government in England. They serve electorates ranging from small rural communities to towns and small cities; all are independently elected and raise a precept – a form of council tax – from the local community. Together, they can be identified as among the nation’s most influential grouping of grassroots opinion-formers.
3.    Over 15 million people live in communities served by local councils, around 35% of the population; while over 200 new local councils have been established in the last 13 years.
4.    Local councils work towards improving community well being and providing better services at a local level. Their activities fall into three main categories: representing the local community; delivering services to meet local needs; striving to improve quality of life and community well being.
5.    Through an extensive range of discretionary powers local councils provide and maintain a variety of important and visible local services including allotments, bridleways, burial grounds, bus shelters, car parks, commons and open spaces, community transport schemes, community safety and crime reduction measures, events and festivals, footpaths, leisure and sports facilities, litter bins, public toilets, planning, street cleaning and lighting, tourism activities, traffic calming measures, village greens and youth projects. These existing powers were recently strengthened by the extension of the well being power to eligible local councils.
6.    Prime Minister’s, Rt Hon David Cameron MP, speech on Open Public Services: http://www.number10.gov.uk/news/speech-on-open-public-services/
7.    Rt Hon Oliver Letwin MP’s , Minster of State – Cabinet Office, statement in the House of Commons on the Open Public Services White Paper: http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/news/open-public-services-commons-statement