Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what estimate he has made with the Office for Local Government of the cost to the public purse for (a) setting up and (b) running the Local Authority Data Explorer.
Answered by Simon Hoare
The Government committed to Oflog’s independence in the Levelling Up White Paper, and Oflog has been instructed to act with a spirit of independence. Oflog is currently an Office within the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and therefore its expenditure is part of the Departmental accounts. After the 2024-25 financial year, Oflog will produce its own Annual Report which will include details of its expenditure.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what estimate he has made of the cost of (a) establishing and (b) running the Office of Local Government.
Answered by Simon Hoare
The Government committed to Oflog’s independence in the Levelling Up White Paper, and Oflog has been instructed to act with a spirit of independence. Oflog is currently an Office within the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and therefore its expenditure is part of the Departmental accounts. After the 2024-25 financial year, Oflog will produce its own Annual Report which will include details of its expenditure.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, how many best value inspections have been carried out in each year since 2010; and how many minded to notices have been issued in that period.
Answered by Simon Hoare
The following table has been drawn from publicly available data. Officials have taken “minded to notices” to mean seeking representations on using best value powers from the Local Government Act 1999 to issue directions to a council that the Secretary of State considers is failing its duty of best value. Note that the table includes extensions and reductions to existing notices as well as new interventions and therefore there is some ‘double counting’.
| Best Value Inspection | Sought representations on intervening using Best Value powers |
2010 | 0 | 1 |
2011 | 0 | 0 |
2012 | 0 | 0 |
2013 | 0 | 0 |
2014 | 2 | 1 |
2015 | 0 | 2 |
2016 | 0 | 2 |
2017 | 0 | 3 |
2018 | 1 | 2 |
2019 | 0 | 0 |
2020 | 0 | 0 |
2021 | 1 | 2 |
2022 |
| 4 |
2023 | 1 | 5 |
2024 | 0 | 0 |
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what estimate he has made of the size of the local government workforce in each year from 2010 to 2024.
Answered by Simon Hoare
The Office for National publishes workforce data at the following link.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, how many local authority accounts (a) were submitted on time and (b) remained outstanding after (i) 6, (ii) 12 and (iii) 24 months in each year from 2010 to 2024.
Answered by Simon Hoare
Public Sector Audit Appointments Ltd was created in 2014, and collects data on the proportion of local authority account audit opinions issued by the deadline each year.
This information is publicly available for example, 2014-15 to 2019-20 statistics are available at the following link; 2020-21 to 2021-22 statistics at the following link; and 2022-23 statistics at the following link.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what estimate he has made of the number of councils at risk of issuing Section 114 notices between 4 December 2023 and the Final Local Government Finance Settlement in February 2024.
Answered by Simon Hoare
As the Secretary of State explained before the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Select Committee on Wednesday 6 December, the Government monitors the financial health of local authorities on a regular basis using a wide range of data as well as through extensive direct engagement with councils.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy on the number of covid-19 Additional Relief Fund schemes which have (a) been established and (b) distributed funds to local businesses.
Answered by Neil O'Brien - Shadow Minister (Policy Renewal and Development)
Local authorities are responsible for setting up their own local schemes and awarding support to businesses. Ministers and officials have regular conversations with counterparts in other Government departments.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the effect of the response to the covid-19 outbreak on the (a) (i) direct and (ii) indirect costs, (b) income and (c) other liabilities of Oldham council; and how much additional funding his Department has allocated to that local authority (A) for its covid-19 response and (B) to mitigate the effects of the outbreak.
Answered by Luke Hall
We are providing local authorities with an unprecedented package of support, including over £4.8 billion in funding for?spending?pressures, comprising of £3.7 billion of un-ringfenced grants and over £1.1 billion for the Infection Control Fund.
Oldham has received £16.64 million from the three rounds of unringfenced grants. Oldham has received £4.6 million from the Infection Control Fund.
In total, over £28 billion has been committed to local areas to support councils, businesses and communities across government. This comprehensive package of support includes direct financial support and cashflow measures for councils, bus and tram services, support for the homeless and both grants and rates reliefs for businesses, as well as several other grants.
In addition the Prime Minister has announced a further £1 billion of funding for local authorities, details of which will be announced shortly.
We will continue to monitor the impact of Covid-19 on local government and are taking steps to address and support individuals and local authorities.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if he will place in the Library a copy of the Fair Funding Review formula.
Answered by Simon Clarke
The Government aims to implement the local authority Review of Relative Needs and Resources in 2021-22, and plans to publish a major consultation on this in the Spring. We will place a copy of the consultation in the Library at that time.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, with which councils and combined authorities is the Government currently consulting on devolution.
Answered by Jake Berry
Whilst we are not formally consulting any councils or combined authorities at present, the Secretary of State has had conversations with the leaders of councils in Yorkshire, as well as the Mayor of the Sheffield City Region, about future devolution to Yorkshire.