GUIDE: How To Read Your Council’s Accounts
Posted inUncategorized

GUIDE: How To Read Your Council’s Accounts

Introduction Local authorities are required to publish accounts every year that show how they spend their money. These cover a financial year: for example 2019/20 accounts would cover the period from 1st April 2019 to 31st March 2020. They look back at spending that has already happened: the budget is a forward-looking plan for how to spend money.  Councils publish draft accounts usually in the early summer. Over 30 days, the public then has the right to inspect the accounts and in England residents have the right to ask questions about them to the auditor. They can also file an... [continues]
EVENT: Audit & accountability failure in local government – where next for reform? – 29 June
Posted inUncategorized

EVENT: Audit & accountability failure in local government – where next for reform? – 29 June

https://youtu.be/Z9s34D5tslk     Tuesday 29th of June 10-11:30am A roundtable to discuss audit and accountability failure and its impact on local government, including how to tackle it. Research for Action’s latest report, “Democracy Denied: Audit and accountability failure in local government” shows a serious lack of accountability in local government. Our findings reveal the significant role played by private auditors in disempowering residents. Under the Local Audit and Accountability Act, the public has the right to inspect council accounts and any related documents. Residents can also ask questions to the council’s external auditor, and if they believe spending could be unlawful... [continues]
EVENT: Building local solidarity and horizontal power – 26 May
Posted inAudit and Accountability Events Uncategorized

EVENT: Building local solidarity and horizontal power – 26 May

26 May 2-4pm, register here. How can we as communities and social movements reimagine and reclaim our cities, towns and villages? For many of us, the local elections in May 2021 again provided little chance to change things. Local government has been decimated by successive legislative changes and austerity. Westminster politics provides little hope, with the biggest attack on our civil rights in decades underway and Covid having shown us the consequences of inequality like never before. Yet the pandemic has made us focus on our neighbourhoods. We have checked in on each other, shared food and started mutual aid... [continues]