From our Chair - 17 November 2010

As London Councils launches its improved website it's worth reflecting on what this organisation is and what it does. London Councils is first and foremost a membership organisation representing London’s local authorities. It was established to lobby at all tiers of Government to ensure London gets the best deal possible. It also delivers a number of successful direct services for Londoners (most notably the Freedom Pass), and acts as a catalyst for driving better performance through sharing practice and ideas.

In my role as chair I am required to act not as the political leader of an authority, but as a convenor whose responsibility it is to establish the broad balance of opinion expressed by London's local councils. That means we endeavour to work wherever possible in a cross-party and collegiate manner, representing all of London's councils and their ambitions for London and for local government. 

Central to this are our common interests – which it would not be unfair to describe as “power and money”. We have pressed and will continue to press for more powers to be devolved to the local level and we hope to see some of the fruits of that in the forthcoming Decentralisation and Localism Bill. In a post-CSR world, however, our focus is increasingly on lobbying for the best financial deal for London. 

Analysis by London Councils suggests that the cuts could reduce London's level of government grant by more than £1.5 billion by 2014-15. On the figures released so far, it appears that the cuts are significantly front-loaded adding even greater pressure. In addition to any lobbying boroughs may be doing regarding the overall level of funding, we have asked the Secretary of State to revisit the extent of front-loading and to re-profile any cuts on a more even basis over the spending review period. In addition we are pressing that there should be no changes to the funding formula, which could see huge sums shifted from the capital.

Away from local government finance, London Councils, again on a cross-party basis, is calling for London’s need for more affordable housing to be addressed and for the government to reconsider its blanket caps to housing benefit and social rents, which will reduce the supply of affordable rented housing and disproportionately affect Londoners. With London needing more than £480 million to provide 28,000 permanent primary school places by 2014/15, and at the same time, losing in the region of £2.5 billion in anticipated BSF funding, we are calling for more support for capital investment to make sure our schools are of a decent standard and we can provide enough places to meet demand. We have also indicated support for the Mayor of London in his bid to restore lost funding for economic development in London.

The Coalition Government has spoken of its commitment to localism. In this tough financial climate some will see this as an opportunity – others, a necessity – to do things differently, to share services, and to reshape what local government does.  But there can be no doubt that the grant cuts being proposed for local government over four years will have far-reaching consequences. London’s local authorities and the communities we represent are likely to change beyond all recognition.