England’s 10,000 local councils will be descending upon the Houses of Parliament on 20 March 2018 as part of a Lobby Day to meet with Members of Parliament (MPs).
This year, NALC’s Lobby Day will be entering its fourth successive year, with the expectations for it to be the largest demonstration of local councils to date.
Lobby Day is organised annually by the National Association of Local Councils (NALC) to give the most local form of government a chance to promote the work they are doing locally and raise awareness of the challenges their communities face.
Community leaders will be engaging with MPs to discuss how 80,000 local councillors are actively providing democratic and local leadership, taking action on local priorities and delivering vital local services on a daily basis.
MPs will be presented with a copy of NALC’s A prospectus for ultra-localism, which calls on the government to:
- Empower communities to have greater say over decisions that affect them
- Build capacity and support for councillors through training and development
- Devolve more powers to local councils and engage and strengthen relationships between councils at all levels
- Refrain from extending council tax referendums and reform non-domestic rates
The important role local councils play in their communities has already been recognised by cross-party, leading figures. Secretary of state for Housing, Communities and Local Government, Sajid Javid MP and shadow secretary of state for Housing, Communities and Local Government, Andrew Gwynne MP have both praised the work local councils do to help their communities.
NALC’s Lobby Day will build on this and help spread the message even further.
Chairman of NALC, Cllr Sue Baxter said: “In previous years, we have had great success in connecting communities from across England with hundreds of MPs, and raising the profile of local councils in parliament and with government. We now call on all 43 county associations and 10,000 local councils, to engage with their local parliamentarians to achieve this aim for 2018.”
“The main aim of Lobby Day is to build strong relationships between community leaders and their MPs and to help them understand what is happening in their villages, towns and cities. We are expecting this to be our biggest Lobby Day yet and we want all local councils to come forward and give the communities they serve a real national voice.”
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MPs wanting to arrange a meeting with their local councils or county associations can contact NALC at: ben.murray@nalc.gov.uk or on 020 7290 0314.