NALC has recently published its new model financial regulations for 2024/2025. The regs are exclusively for use by local councils in membership of NALC and county associations. If your council has not yet downloaded its copy, it can do so by logging in to the SALC website’s Council Finance page.
The regulations are a vital framework, adaptable to all sizes of council. They provide guidance on statutory and good practice financial management to help councils undertake financial operations according to proper practices.
NALC considers that the model regs should be treated as a new document and not a simple update of the former regs, which means a breakdown of the differences between the old financial regs and the new version has not been provided. With that in mind, we do not recommend councils rush to adopt the document and instead the clerk/RFO first takes the time to familiarise themselves with it and to suggest amendments to suit the council. Please note that, just like your council’s standing orders, the financial regs include items in bold text that must not be changed because they reflect the statutory requirements.
The model standing orders requires review of the financial regulations at the annual meeting. If the council’s meeting has already taken place, or the clerk/RFO has not had the opportunity to review the new document, we suggest the council continues to use the old set of regs and considers the new model at the next appropriate meeting.
If you spot any errors in the document, or have any questions, we will be pleased to hear from you at info@somerset-alc.org.uk
The 2024 edition of The Good Councillor’s Guide is available for free download by logging in to the members’ area of the SALC website.
The guide is described as offering practical insights into the workings of local democracy and how good councillors can effectively contribute to it. The guide is a must-read for new councillors, ensuring they understand their responsibilities, limitations, and the reasons behind them.
NALC has launched a new survey to gather further information on parish basic allowances and
dependants’ carers’ allowances in parish and town councils.
The survey aims to gather data on the current practices regarding these allowances across different local councils with the aim of understanding the needs and challenges faced by local councils.
The new survey allows councillors and clerk from local councils to share their thoughts, experiences, and aspirations. By participating, councils can help directly influence NALC’s lobbying of the government and legislative changes.
The survey closes on 10th June 2024 and is designed to be quick and straightforward, only taking a few minutes to complete.
Parish basic allowance is a discretionary allowance that a local council can choose to pay following consideration of a recommendation from its parish remuneration panel. Dependants’ carers’ allowance is provided to individuals who are caring for another person and is designed to help alleviate some of the financial burden of caring responsibilities. Parish & town councillors cannot claim this allowance, whereas principal authority councillors can.
The Committee
on Standards in Public Life has issued a consultation on standards of behaviour in public bodies, including parish and town councils.
The consultation seeks views on accountability within public bodies – acting on early warning signs. The terms of reference for this exercise are here, and the main consultation document can be downloaded here.
SALC encourages everyone to submit their individual responses to the consultation by the closing date: 17:00 on Friday 14 June 2024.
NALC would also be grateful for your participation in completing its short snapshot sector survey. The survey will close at 23:45 on Friday 17 May 2024 – Take this survey
In response to concerns from elected members about intimidation in public life, the Minister for Local Government, Simon Hoare MP, wrote to all principal authorities in March to ensure that councillors and elected mayors are aware of the sensitive provisions in Section 32 of the Localism Act 2011.
The letter encourages monitoring officers to look sympathetically at accommodating requests for the withholding of home addresses from published versions of the register of interests where there are legitimate concerns of violence or intimidation.
These provisions apply equally to parish and town councillors, who can read the letter on the Gov.uk website, here.
From 1st April 2024, the Employment Rights (Amendment, Revocation and Transitional Provision) Regulations 2023 allows for an optional holiday entitlement and pay calculation for irregular hours workers (i.e., who work a different number of hours each pay period) and part-year workers (i.e., term time workers).
For holiday years starting on or after 1st April, employers can choose to pay these workers ‘rolled-up holiday pay’, which means a worker will not get paid at the time they take holiday because their holiday pay is spread over the year by adding an amount onto their normal pay. Under the regulations, holiday entitlement for these workers will accrue at the rate of 12.07% of the hours worked during that pay period.
Note that the 12.07% rate should only be used where a worker receives the statutory minimum holiday entitlement. Most council staff receive an enhanced holiday entitlement, which means a different rate will need to be calculated according to the contract of employment. SALC member councils are welcome to contact us if they need help with the calculation for their staff.
Employers do not have to use rolled-up holiday pay and they can continue to use the existing 52 week reference period for part-year or irregular hours workers, paying them when they take leave. However, if rolled up pay is introduced, care must be taken to ensure any changes to an employee’s contract follow lawful and correct procedures.
To find out if the new arrangements apply to your council’s staff, refer to the government’s guidance, here.
The legislation does not have any implications for staff who have regular hours as there is no change in how their statutory holiday entitlement is accrued.
6th April 2024, the Carer’s Leave Act 2023 came into force for employees in England, Scotland and Wales. Under the act, carers are entitled to an unpaid statutory leave entitlement of up to five working days every 12 months (a rolling 12-month period) to give or arrange care for a dependant who needs long-term care.
6th April 2024, the Employment Relations (Flexible Working) Act 2023 came into force and permits employees to make two statutory requests for flexible working every 12 months.
Employees do not have a right to flexible working, but they do have a right to make a flexible working request (for example, to change their hours or place of work) and the request must be fairly considered by employers.
From 20 May 2024 people working 18 hours or less a week on the statutory minimum wage will be required to look for more work, or be paid at an increased rate, before claiming Universal Credit. The change is part of the Government’s efforts to get people who are able to work back into employment.
October 2024, the Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023 will come into force. The act brings a major change for employers who will have a duty placed on them to take measures to prevent the sexual harassment of their employees. The duty will mean that:
To demonstrate reasonable steps, councils should ensure they review and refresh their harassment policies and reporting procedures, conduct regular training sessions, and take any harassment complaints seriously.
Guidance and resources about bullying and harassment are available on the SALC website, Civility & Respect page.
Parish and town council staff frequently work from home, which can bring freedom and flexibility. However, it can also bring data protection challenges.
The ico has developed guidance, Data Protection & Working From Home; What You Need to know, that aims to help homeworkers remain compliant with data protection laws, including ten top tips to make sure data protection isn’t compromised.
National Grid is running a community energy forum in Exeter on 14 June, 12:00-16:00 and it hopes parish and town councils and other local bodies who are exploring or have experience in community energy will attend.
These forums are open to a wide range of community energy organisations, local authorities, NGOs, local organisations, and individuals regardless of their level of experience in the sector. This forum will have a half-hour, optional ‘intro to community energy’ session before the commencement of the event to help get people up to speed. The topics will then cover subjects ranging from low-carbon heat to effective community engagement and how to form successful partnerships between local authorities, local organisations, and community energy organisations.
Full details for the event can be found on its website, here
The sign-up link for tickets is here
SALC was pleased to support
Glastonbury Town Council with its successful volunteer celebration event last month.
The event recognised the power of community volunteering and helped match-make new volunteers with the thing they love to do within the time they have to do it.
The Mayor, Cllr Donfranceso, described why the council organised the event and recognised that, “If everyone did a few hours a month of something they really loved, we would not just be surviving, we would be thriving.”
You can read more about the event, here.
The national Mental Health Awareness Week takes place once a year and aims to tackle stigma and get people talking about mental health. This year’s theme is “Movement: Moving More for our Mental Health.”
Somerset Public Health has produced a communications toolkit packed with information about the campaign as well as downloadable printable resources to help you and your staff/networks/communities make moments for movement in their daily routine to improve their mental health.
To share what you get up to across the week, don’t forget to tag any social media posts using #MHAWSomerset
The Health & Wellbeing programme Funding Fundamentals event for local councils took place on April 24th with presentations from key funding organisations including Somerset Community foundation, National Lottery, and Spark Somerset.
Focussed discussion groups explored how to enable community health and wellbeing related networks to be more sustainable, and how to support local councils in accessing funding to improve and support wellbeing and reduce health inequalities in Somerset.
You can catch up on the event by watching the presentation, here.
The Health Foundation has published an easy to access dashboard that allows councils to get insights to the state of health and health inequalities across all local authorities in England.
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