Posts Tagged ‘local authorities’
Wednesday, September 7th, 2011
The process of transferring RDA assets has taken place in stages and is expected to be completed by 19 September 2011. In July, the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills published a list of RDA land and property assets being transferred to the Homes & Communities Agency (HCA), who will be accountable to government for the effective management and disposal of the portfolio.
The majority of the RDA land and property portfolio will be transferred into a stewardship arrangement with the HCA through which local partners, including local authorities, businesses, local enterprise partnerships (LEPs) and others will be able to influence their development. As such, there is likely to be an increased number of interested parties who may each have potentially conflicting interests.
Those dealing with the development of former RDA land will need to factor in these changing arrangements for the holding of it. The transfer of land to the HCA may have significant impact upon current and future transactions and their timeframes.
Helene Maillet-Vioud
0115 976 6213
hmaillet-vioud@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 8.0/10 (1 vote cast)
Tags: department for business innovation ans skills, HCA, homes and communities agency, local authorities, RDA assets, RDA land
Posted in Local Authorities, Property | No Comments »
Thursday, August 11th, 2011
The Highways Agency, which oversees motorways and trunk roads is introducing rules requiring contractors to carry out emergency repairs only if the potholes are more than 4cm deep or 15cm wide, meaning that potholes under this size will not be repaired.
Previously contractors were required to ensure the road gave an “even, comfortable and quiet” ride and to patch even minor defects within 24 hours.
Concerns have been raised that this will lead to more temporary speed restrictions being imposed and cost more in the long term because there will be less preventive maintenance but the real concern must be to the safety of the road network with the increased risk of motor accidents and the increase in claims against the Highways Agency.
Posted by Steven Conway, specialising in: defence of claims on behalf of insurers, local and public authorities, in particular employers’ liability and public liability claims.
Steven Conway
020 7337 1037
sconway@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 9.2/10 (13 votes cast)
Tags: budgets, code of practice for highway maintenance, emergency repairs, Highways Agency, insurance, local authorities, potholes, steven conway
Posted in Insurance, Local Authorities | No Comments »
Wednesday, August 3rd, 2011
Public bodies acting in good faith to bring proceedings to the Court of Protection appropriately should not fear a costs order, but where delay in doing this makes the case more complicated and costly, they can expect to be punished in costs, as well as publicity.
In the long running Deprivation of Liberty case of G v E, Manchester City Council was named and shamed for breaching Articles 5 (liberty) and 8 (family life) of the European Convention by removing a young man with learning difficulties from his foster family, and putting him into a supported living arrangement without lawful authority.
The Court of Appeal has now (2 August 2011) upheld the costs order that the local authority should pay a hefty chunk of the family’s legal costs, rumoured to run to hundreds of thousands of pounds. After the recent judgment in Neary, this is another good reason to be getting appropriate cases to Court as quickly as possible.
Posted by Ben Troke, who specialises in clinical negligence; health law; access to NHS and social care and funding; Court of Protection / Mental Capacity Act; Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards; NHS Constitution and patient rights.
Ben Troke
0115 976 6263
btroke@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)
Tags: costs order, Court of Protection, deprivation of liberty, European Convention, G v E, local authorities, Manchester City Council
Posted in Local Authorities, Social Care | No Comments »
Wednesday, July 6th, 2011
This is a rare victory of local authorities in the current climate of frequent legal challenges to spending cuts.
Former prima ballerina Elaine McDonald has health problems. She needs to urinate several times each night. She also needs assistance to use a commode to avoid falling. She wants her council to pay for a night time carer. The council prefers the cheaper option of providing incontinence pads. She alleges this is a breach of her human rights, and disability discrimination.
All 5 Supreme Court judges, and no doubt the country at large, sympathise with Ms McDonald. However 4 out of 5 were very clear that the council’s decision to supply incontinence pads was lawful.
The emotive nature of the claim is clear from the judges’ unusually robust language. Lady Hale, who agreed with Ms McDonald, said her claim should succeed in “a civilised society”. The other judges described her conclusions as “remarkable…surprising…regrettable” and to be “deplored”.
Strong stuff indeed.
Posted by Chris Webb-Jenkins, who specialises in defending claims against education and care providers and their insurers; risk management, stress, information management and child protection issues.
Chris Webb-Jenkins
0115 976 6175
cwebb-jenkins@brownejacobson.com
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Tags: disability dicrimination, Elaine McDonald, former ballerina, local authorities, Supreme Court
Posted in Local Authorities, Social Care | No Comments »
Tuesday, June 28th, 2011
Last week saw a particularly challenging employment appeal tribunal decision for local authorities and managers in the care sector. An Iranian residential social worker successfully held his employer liable for acts of racial harassment carried out by an extremely challenging child. It was found that the employer was liable under the Race Relations Act 1976.
The tribunal concluded that the employer had known the employee had his accent mocked and that the child said he should go “back home”. The tribunal also decided that the local authority had not acted to put in effective measures to prevent the behaviour. The behaviour was harassment for which the employer was liable given its inaction.
The tribunal dismissed the argument that the child’s underlying intention was to challenge authority and was thus not racially motivated. This decision has important consequences for managers in the health and care sector, whether working with challenging children or the elderly.
Posted by Sarah Erwin-Jones, who specialises in social services, the care sector, education and negotiating legal costs; advises on risk management issues including data protection matters.
Sarah Erwin-Jones
0115 976 6136
serwin@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)
Tags: care staff, employment appeal tribunal, local authorities, Race Regulations Act 1976
Posted in Employment, Local Authorities, Social Care | No Comments »
Thursday, June 2nd, 2011
The Audit Commission’s briefing paper ‘Improving Value for Money in Adult Social Care’ has stated that although improvements are being made in adult social care, there is still much work to be done in order to deliver savings and make a difference to peoples’ lives.
Given the current pressures on services and finances, councils need to be more innovative in achieving efficiency. The briefing identified nine areas in which councils can make changes, but stressed that not one council made changes to all nine areas.
The report pointed out it is not just the usual issues of procurement and partnership that should be considered, but that councils need to be more innovative in addressing adult social care needs.
For social care services to meet future demands councils need to increase the pace of these improvements. One option suggested in the report was for closer working with the NHS, whether by commissioning or delivering services jointly, an option some local authorities are considering.
Laura Richards
0115 908 4886
lrichards@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)
Tags: adult social care, audit commission, local authorities, NHS, social care services
Posted in Local Authorities, NHS, Social Care | No Comments »
Friday, May 27th, 2011
The Department for Education has today published its new proposed changes to the admissions code and appeals code. The changes would see a much slimmed down version of the codes making the admissions process simpler, fairer and more transparent for parents.
Local authorities will no longer be allowed to use lotteries in order to place children in schools, yet other admissions authorities will be allowed to continue the practice. The proposals also intend to make it easier for popular good schools to take more pupils and plans to end the 30 pupil limit on class sizes in some cases.
Interestingly, the proposals give academies and free schools the right to prioritise places for those children from more disadvantaged backgrounds whose family income is under £16,190. This is undoubtedly an incentive for schools to convert as following the introduction of the pupil premium they are likely to gain financially in comparison to their maintained peers.
The consultation on the proposals is set to close on 19 August 2011.
Posted by Katie Michelon, who specialises in education law advice to schools, colleges and LEAs, including commercial advice on education sector projects such as academies, trust schools and federations.
Katie Michelon
0115 976 6189
kmichelon@brownejacobson.com
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Tags: academies, admission code, admissions authorities, appeals code, free schools, local authorities, pupil premium, schools
Posted in Education, Local Authorities | No Comments »
Monday, March 28th, 2011
The latest verdict of think tank the King’s Fund claims that, unless GPs are put under greater pressure to work with local authorities providing jointly-planned services, the government’s health reforms risk failing vulnerable groups.
The report criticises joint working plans under the Health and Social Care Bill, claiming they could undermine services for people with mental health problems, learning disabilities, and multiple long-term conditions, all of whom require jointly-planned services.
GPs have not traditionally had a role in tackling health inequalities; the key concern is that as councils take responsibility for public health, GPs will shun areas of care for vulnerable groups and effective joint working will fail.
The report recommends that GP performance management regimes are aligned with council targets, and that GPs should take on a new role as care co-ordinators, pointing patients towards wider forms of social care.
The effect of the reforms remains to be seen but the Government has a way to go to dispel such fears.
Posted by Dai Durbridge, who specialises safeguarding of children and vulnerable adults in education, social care and health settings; defending claims against education, social care and health providers.
Dai Durbridge
0115 976 6578
ddurbridge@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 10.0/10 (3 votes cast)
Tags: gp, GP commissioning, Health and Social Care Bill, kings fund, local authorities
Posted in Government bodies, Health, Local Authorities, NHS, Public Sector | No Comments »
Tuesday, February 15th, 2011
A recent article in the Derby Telegraph highlighted the nature of frivolous or spurious claims local authorities routinely face. While some may see this as possibly a ‘slow news’ day in Derby, the article does raise some interesting issues for local authorities and litigators alike.
One would like to think that cases involving ‘kamikaze conkers’, are never allowed anywhere near doors of the Court, however, other cases, where perhaps decisions are more finely balanced in all types of litigation, would it be unreasonable to think that Courts will allow local authorities more discretion and perhaps leniency – especially in these days of austerity? Time will tell.
Posted by Jonathan Cook, who specialises in defendant public liability work including employers’, occupiers’ and highways liability cases from initial instruction to trial. Including small claims, fast and multi track work.
Jonathan Cook
0115 976 6150
jcook@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 10.0/10 (2 votes cast)
Tags: kamikaze conkers, local authorities, local authority claims
Posted in Litigation, Local Authorities | No Comments »
Monday, February 7th, 2011
The localism agenda aims to decentralise power to local communities with power being exercised at the lowest practical level. Some commentators have argued that the sort of shared services arrangements seen to date are more about “local centralism”- where authorities design arrangements to retain as much power and influence as possible.
However, rather than contradictory, localism has the potential to bring new energy and a new perspective to shared services. For example, the general power of competence can give councils more confidence to deliver creative and innovative shared services arrangements. Too often the worry about whether an authority has power to implement a good idea can prevent its delivery.
For too long, shared services have been largely confined to public sector to public sector arrangements. Total Place moved things forward by challenging local public services to come together to deliver placed based solutions. Twinning localism with shared services can bring a new perspective to arrangements with local communities being built into shared service approaches.
Posted by Nick Mackenzie, who specialises in corporate law in both private and public sector, mergers and acquisitions, reorganisations, private equity, MBOs, MBIs, joint ventures, corporate governance and director’s duties.
Nick Mackenzie
0121 237 4564
nmackenzie@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)
Tags: local authorities, localism, outsourcing, Procurement, Public Sector, shared services
Posted in Local Authorities, Procurement, Projects & partnerships, Public Sector, Shared services | No Comments »
Monday, February 7th, 2011
It could be argued that the delivery of shared services requires a more entrepreneurial approach, and with that comes its own challenges. Can local authorities, who are traditionally risk averse, really transform themselves into entrepreneurial organisations and do we really want our local authorities to adopt an entrepreneurial ethos that encourages risk taking?
We would do well to remember that many entrepreneurs fail time and time again and that only a few truly succeed. So if we are to encourage entrepreneurism should we not limit that extent of the services exposed to any risks and should we not try to identify a new breed of local government employee who truly embraces this ethos. Perhaps more authorities need to follow the lead set by Sunderland who recently screened thousands of their employees for entrepreneurial talent!
Posted by Dominic Swift, who specialises in commercial propertyand property development law advising on all aspects of development transactions; advises on property elements of insolvency and banking.
Dominic Swift
0115 976 6148
dswift@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)
Tags: local authorities, outsourcing, partnerships, Procurement, Public Sector, shared services
Posted in Local Authorities, Procurement, Projects & partnerships, Public Sector, Shared services | No Comments »
Monday, February 7th, 2011
Our recent shared services report confirms that local authorities are increasingly seeking efficiencies through outsourcing or similar partnerships. There are undoubtedly savings to be made. But also high level risks.
For example, after several years of outsourced operations, it might be difficult and expensive to bring the services back as in-house skills may have been lost, even if the partnership with the private sector partner has been a success.
There is also an inevitable loss of control, where front line services are affected, leading to reputational and political risks that are hard to state in cash terms.
These risks can, and should, be managed through a sound outsourcing contract, but they cannot be avoided entirely and are not easy to quantify.
For many authorities, increased outsourcing will be a vital tool to save costs and adopt an enterprising approach to service delivery. A similarly enterprising approach to risk and reward will also be needed.
Posted by Craig Elder, who specialises in project finance; Projects; PFI/PPP ; commercial contracts ; waste and defence sectors; long term/complex service arrangements;public sector procurements
Craig Elder
0115 976 6089
celder@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)
Tags: local authorities, outsourcing, partnerships, shared services
Posted in Local Authorities, Procurement, Projects & partnerships, Public Sector, Shared services | No Comments »
Friday, January 28th, 2011
The Court of Appeal has recently ordered that Kingston upon Hull City Council who had acted properly and could not be criticised for any procedural step taken in care proceedings, pay the costs of the grandparents who joined the proceedings to be exonerated of all allegations of sexual abuse. The costs could be in excess of £50,000.
At first instance the family court Judge concluded that since it had been reasonable for the local authority to pursue the allegations against the grandparents, the door to a successful application for costs on their part was not open. On the particular facts of this case their Lordships disagreed, potentially landing the council with the legal bill (which has yet to be assessed).
The fact finding enquiry lasted 5 ½ weeks. One of the reasons that the grandparents costs were so high was that their solicitor was in court throughout this period. In future we recommend that local authorities make it absolutely clear when they believe unnecessary costs are being run up in open correspondence and ask the Judge hearing the care proceeding to make rulings on what representation is reasonable.
Posted by Sarah Erwin-Jones, who specialises in social services, the care sector, education and negotiating legal costs; advises on risk management issues including data protection matters.
Sarah Erwin-Jones
0115 976 6136
serwin@brownejacobson.com@brownejacobson.com
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Tags: Court of Appeal, Kingston upon Hull City Council, local authorities
Posted in Local Authorities, Social Care | No Comments »
Monday, January 10th, 2011
Building on the launch of the Government’s eco-friendly car grants available from 1 January 2011, Eric Pickles is urging councils to promote and establish electric vehicle charging points in new developments.
This is part of the Government’s £20m scheme towards the installation of plug in points in major cities across the UK and a larger budget of £300m towards subsidies until 2015.
As Decentralisation Minister Greg Clark stated, there is no point having an electric car if there is nowhere to charge it, the city wide charging point will, in his words, “allow 2011 to be the year when electric motoring is made easy”. Of course motorists, if the scheme is popular, will have to get used to paying for electricity as opposed to petrol for their cars.
With a review of the plug-in car grant happening in 2012, only time will tell if Pickles’ and Clark’s optimism on the take up for the electric car will bear fruit.
Westley Laird
0115 976 6273
wlaird@brownejacobson.com
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Tags: eco-friendly, environmental, local authorities
Posted in Local Authorities, Public Sector, Waste & Environmental | No Comments »
Friday, December 17th, 2010
The newly proposed Localism Bill contains in it a general power for the Secretary of State to order councils to contribute to the UK’s obligation to pay an EU fine, if an act or omission of the council can be shown to have contributed to the fine being imposed.
The EU Treaty clearly specifies that fines are attributable to the member state. This measure would allow the government to fine councils, extra-judicially by executive action, in order to raise money to pay fines legally imposed on the government.
Firstly, can such a measure be introduced without any consultation whatsoever? Secondly, how on earth will it be possible to fairly calculate any liability between the countries of the UK let alone the councils in England?
The current proposals seem unfair, difficult to administer and potentially very burdensome on local authorities. It might be better looking at how local and central government can work together to ensure the UK isn’t fined in the first place instead.
Helene Maillet-Vioud
0115 976 6213
hmaillet-vioud@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)
Tags: EU fines, local authorities, Localism Bill
Posted in Public Sector | No Comments »
Thursday, December 16th, 2010
On 9 December 2010, HM Treasury announced that from 1 April 2011 Academy schools should be put on the same footing as local authority maintained schools, in terms of their ability to recover VAT from HM Revenue & Customs in certain situations.
The announcement focuses on Academies recovering VAT which they incur on incoming supplies of goods and services, which are then used by the Academy for its non-business activities. Since providing education free of charge is generally a non-business activity, this is a very relevant point for Academies.
At the moment, Academies don’t have the same powers as local authority schools to recover VAT which they incur in this non-business context. Additional grant funding has been available from the government to try to bridge this gap. But from 1 April 2011 the intention is for Academies to be treated in the same way as local authority maintained schools on this issue.
Posted by Andrew Noble, who specialises in corporate and real estate tax, employee share incentives, UK and cross-border; advises clients from private individuals to listed companies; Chartered Tax Adviser.
Andrew Noble
0121 237 3952
anoble@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)
Tags: academies, hm revenue, local authorities, maintained schools, Public Sector, Tax, vat
Posted in Tax | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, December 14th, 2010
The Localism Bill was unveiled yesterday on the day that each local authority learnt how much less grant it will receive over the next four years from central government. The big theme of the Localism Bill is a transfer of power from centre to regions. Some powers will travel all the way to the individual.
Local people will be able to take over services with social value, such as care homes and schools. But with no economies of scale, and in such heavily regulated sectors, will well-meaning amateurs be able to run things more efficiently?
The idea of giving hard-pressed working people the ability to veto ‘excessive’ council tax increases may prove a vote winner. But no one likes paying any tax. One of the biggest concerns is whether they will have enough information to understand why the increase is proposed, and the inclination to vote on behalf of their locality, rather than just themselves.
Posted by Chris Webb-Jenkins, who specialises in defending claims against education and care providers and their insurers; risk management, stress, information management and child protection issues.
Chris Webb-Jenkins
0115 976 6175
cwebb-jenkins@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)
Tags: care homes, local authorities, Localism Bill, schools
Posted in Public Sector, Social Care | No Comments »
Monday, December 13th, 2010
A recent Court of Appeal judgement suggests courts will consider the economic restrictions placed on local authorities before deciding if there has been a breach under Section 41 of the Highways Act.
In Ali v The City of Bradford & Metropolitan District Council the Court found that there was no such provision to extend the duty under Section 130 to remove general rubbish and overgrown vegetation and that the duty did not give rise to a civil action for damages.
The Court was conscious that to require highway authorities to carry out regular precautionary inspections of public footpaths would have substantial economic implications.
Its refusal to extend the duties to members of the public, which would have imposed a significant financial burden, is welcome news during these difficult times.
Going forward, it will be more common to put forward this type of argument where all Council departments are facing cuts. Ali suggests that such an argument will be given serious consideration by the Courts.
Posted by Jonathan Cook, who specialises in defendant public liability work including employers’, occupiers’ and highways liability cases from initial instruction to trial. Including small claims, fast and multi track work.
Jonathan Cook
0115 976 6150
jcook@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 6.0/10 (1 vote cast)
Tags: Ali v The City of Bradford & Metropolitan District Council, Highways Act, insurance, local authorities
Posted in Employers & Public Liability, Insurance, Local Authorities | No Comments »
Friday, December 10th, 2010
Can you take photos of your child performing in the school nativity production? It comes as no surprise that people are confused. The law in this area is difficult and complex. This leads to defensive practice. If you say “no”, the risk of breaching the law is removed.
However, knee-jerk refusals cause damage themselves. As well as restricting liberty, they are often contrary to common sense. The area of health and safety is held in low esteem by the nation for this very reason. Information sharing (often and revealingly simply called “data protection”) could go the same way.
The Information Commissioner has this week released guidance dealing with this specific issue. He says clearly that taking photos for your family album, for private use, is lawful. The return of common sense, many people will respond. Yet most schools and sports clubs are not so relaxed, and do impose some restrictions. Let us hope the season of goodwill extends to the family snapper.
Posted by Chris Webb-Jenkins, who specialises in defending claims against education and care providers and their insurers; risk management, stress, information management and child protection issues.
Chris Webb-Jenkins
0115 976 6175
cwebb-jenkins@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 9.5/10 (2 votes cast)
Tags: child protection, Data Protection, Education, local authorities, schools, Social Care
Posted in Local Authorities, Public Sector, Social Care | No Comments »
Wednesday, October 20th, 2010
Local Authorities are required to reduce their costs by 7.1% every year for the next 4 years. This is better than the 30% cuts that most Local Authorities have been planning for, and allows Local Authorities time to achieve the costs savings required, which was not necessarily anticipated. However, if Local Authorities end today feeling relieved about the level of cuts, the Government will have pulled off a fine piece of expectation management.
This level of cuts still represents a significant portion of current Local Authority budgets and achieving the level of cuts required will be a huge task. Ultimately, within four years, Local Authorities are going to have to either simply cease to provide more than one quarter of their services, or undertake wholesale reform across their services so that more efficient services can continue to be provided.
Posted by Laura Hughes, who specialises in planning and environmental law for public and corporate sector bodies; experienced in judicial reviews, planning , land use and right of way matters.
Laura Hughes
0115 976 6582
lhughes@brownejacobson.com
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Rating: 6.0/10 (2 votes cast)
Tags: comprehensive spending review, csr, cuts, local authorities, Public Sector, spending review
Posted in Comprehensive Spending Review, Public Sector | No Comments »
