Asked by: John Pugh (Liberal Democrat - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what plans the Government has to devolve powers from central government to people resident in county council areas.
Answered by Lord Wharton of Yarm
The Government will empower the towns and counties of this country by extending the City Deal programme we ran in the last Parliament to cover counties and towns too. I look forward to discussing proposals from councils and Local Enterprise Partnerships that build on their strengths.
Asked by: John Pugh (Liberal Democrat - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, if he will allow public representations or petitions to be received directly by the Local Government Boundary Commission.
Answered by Marcus Jones
The Local Government Boundary Commission is a Parliamentary body independent of the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government. Any representations or petitions about the Commission’s work should be made directly to the Commission.
Asked by: John Pugh (Liberal Democrat - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how many public consultations his Department has conducted on the subject of mayors in Liverpool since 2010.
Answered by Lord Wharton of Yarm
There has been one public consultation, “What can a mayor do for your city?”, seeking views from 12 major English cities including Liverpool. The consultation together with the Government’s response can be found at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/what-can-a-mayor-do-for-your-city--3
Asked by: John Pugh (Liberal Democrat - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, on what dates and occasions Ministers or other representatives of his Department met the Mayor of Liverpool in the last six months.
Answered by Marcus Jones
Details of Ministers’ meetings and those of the Permanent Secretary with external organisations are published on-line here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/dclg-ministerial-data
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/dclg-permanent-secretary-data-2014#history
Asked by: John Pugh (Liberal Democrat - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, which local authorities have bid for each round of the Coastal Communities Fund but have so far received no funding.
Answered by Penny Mordaunt
The Coastal Communities Fund has had three bidding rounds to date, across the United Kingdom. My answer of 9 February 2015, PQ 223748, provided a list of areas which had received grants. I have placed in the Library of the House, a table listing the local authority areas from which bids have been received.
Ministers are not involved in the grant application or assessment process. The Big Lottery Fund is responsible for inviting and assessing applications to the Fund and makes recommendations to Ministers on which projects should be supported.
Whilst the Coastal Communities Fund is currently closed for further applications, I hope there will be further opportunities to support local schemes which have not benefitted from Government support to date.
Asked by: John Pugh (Liberal Democrat - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what the difference is between the amount that will be received from central Government by Sefton Metropolitan Borough Council under the (a) provisional and (b) final 2015-16 local authority settlement.
Answered by Kris Hopkins
The final local government finance settlement for Sefton Metropolitan Borough Council for 2015-16, which was announced on 3 February 2015, included an additional £485,000 compared to the provisional settlement. This was Sefton’s share of the additional £74 million provided to upper tier local authorities. This is to assist with continuing pressures on health and social care and in providing local welfare.
Asked by: John Pugh (Liberal Democrat - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, which coastal resorts have received support in more than (a) one round and (b) two rounds of coastal communities funding awards.
Answered by Penny Mordaunt
The Coastal Communities Fund has had three bidding rounds to date. A table has been placed in the Library of the House giving details of 164 coastal communities across the UK that have received grants from the Fund in one, two or three bidding rounds. The table covers all grants awarded in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland to date.
In addition to the coastal communities in the table, 22 grants were awarded to projects in local authority areas, and a further five grants awarded to cross local authority projects including two long distance coastal footpaths, where we do not have details of the individual coastal communities they will help.
Ministers are not involved in the grant application or assessment process. The Big Lottery Fund is responsible for inviting and assessing applications to the Fund and makes recommendations to Ministers on which projects should be supported.
The Coastal Communities Fund is currently closed for further applications. No decisions have been taken yet on whether there will be further bidding rounds. This will be a matter for the next Spending Review. However, I hope there will be further opportunities to support local schemes which have not benefitted from Government support to date.
Asked by: John Pugh (Liberal Democrat - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what information his Department holds on the level of Sefton Council's (a) allocated and (b) unallocated reserves.
Answered by Kris Hopkins
As at 31 March 2014, Sefton held £67.7 million in revenue reserves, of which £17.8 million was schools reserves and £49.9 million was non-ringfenced reserves. Of the non-ringfenced reserves, £39.7 million were earmarked reserves, and £10.2 million were unallocated reserves.
These figures are taken from the Revenue Outturn form which has been completed by all local authorities in England and published at the following link;
We have encouraged councils to make creative use of reserves, such as "invest to save" projects to reduce long-term costs.
Asked by: John Pugh (Liberal Democrat - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what recent assessment he has made of the uptake of the community right to challenge; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Stephen Williams
The Department for Communities and Local Government does not formally monitor the uptake of the Community Right to Challenge or require local authorities to report the number of challenges. Informally we collate responses from follow-up surveys of users of our support programme and other sources. From this, we are aware of 49 expressions of interest being submitted to date. A survey of users of the Community Right to Challenge support programme, carried out in the summer of 2014, found that 43 of the 105 respondents intended to submit an Expression of Interest in the next 12 months.
The Department for Communities and Local Government has funded a support programme to help voluntary and community groups, Parish Councils and local authority employees to use the Community Right to Challenge or to bid for local government contracts. The programme has awarded grants worth £3.7 million to a total of 216 groups since 2012 and has responded to over 4,000 queries.