'Growing Places' campaign

Question 1

Growing Places

1) Purpose
2) Description

Answer 1

1) Building local public services for the future
2) Aims to ensure residents and their families have access to the best possible opportunities to live a healthy, independent and prosperous life

Question 2

How can local gov benefit from Brexit (3)

Answer 2

• Central gov is usually too distant from local communities to be able to respond to their needs, ambitions and concerns
• As the most trusted part of the public sector, local gov provides the strong/ambitious leadership that ensures the country is safe and thriving
• Its cross-party nature also = best placed to prioritise people and communities, putting party politics aside

Question 3

‘Growing places’ general asks (2)

Answer 3

• Gov faces a changed and changing world with the coming years bringing some of the biggest changes seen in a generation
• Calling for local government to be given the powers and fiscal freedoms to ensure the nation remains economically buoyant and continues to thrive.

Question 4

‘Growing places’ specific asks (6)

Answer 4

• Financial sustainability
• Children’s services
• Employment and skills
• Housing
• Public health and adult social care
• Community safety, environment and transport

Question 5

GP - Financial sustainability (2)

Answer 5

Needs solid financial foundations

• Includes:
  1) Gov plugging the £5.8bn funding gap by the end of the decade
  2) Giving local gov the fiscal levers- such as full business rate retention and control over council tax

Question 6

GP - Children services:

the best start for children

Answer 6

Gov must urgently:

• Meet the 2bn gap in children’s social care
• Give back to councils the power and funding to open new schools

Question 7

GP - Employment and skills:

a good job close to home

Answer 7

Includes:

• £10.5bn of funding for employment and skills is still commissioned nationally, across 20 different schemes
• To equip our country’s workforce for the future, the gov must trust councils to deliver a ONE STOP SERVICE for employment and skills rooted in local areas

Question 8

GP: a good quality, affordable home (description)

• To support them, gov must…

Answer 8

Councils are best placed to help build the right houses in the right locations to help solve the housing crisis

• Enable councils to invest in housing by lifting the Housing Revenue Account borrowing cap, for example.

Question 9

GP: Health and independent lives

Gov must… (3)

Answer 9

Good local services are essential for mental and physical health and wellbeing

• Reverse the £20 million cut to public health grant
• Invest in prevention
• Plug the £2.3 billion funding gap for adult social care

Question 10

GP: a thriving community

• In order to ensure every resident lives in a safe environment in which they can prosper, Government must (3)

Answer 10

• Support the development of a 21st century fire service
• Give local areas the powers to make decisions about transport at a local level
• Drive fast and reliable digital connectivity across the country.

Question 11

GP: Foundations for change

Needs solid financial foundations:
- This includes (2):

Answer 11

• Plugging the £5.8 billion funding gap by the end of the decade
• Giving local government the fiscal levers – such as full business rate retention and control over council tax.