Medium Term Strategy out for comments
This is an important policy which sets out the Council's approach for the next 3-5 years. Comments are invited by 10 September. This, together with the Sustainable Community Strategy, sets the scene for Northumberland in the years ahead.
Latest on public spending cuts June 2010
This month Steve Stewart, chief executive of Northumberland County Council, has sent two letters to the Council's partners warning them of the range and likely intensity of government cuts. June 8 and June 15. He estimates the total cuts to be in the order of £10 million from this year's budget and stresses that we should expect "a negative impact on the the pace and scale of of our intended service delivery".
VCS puts case to Council
The VCS Consortium meets quarterly with the Executive of Northumberland County Council. At the last meeting in May a paper was presented outlining just why the sector is so important to Northumberland. In these testing financial times it was prepared in an attempt to answer the questions from NCC: "What has the VCS ever done for us?" and "Why should we continue investing and giving to it?" Click here to link to it.
Who Does What Latest from Council May 20 2010
The structural review of the Council's senior management has been approved by the Council and will be implemented in due course. Click on the links for information: For a general overview of intentions; for councillor portfolios; for senior staff responsibilities.
Northumberland County Council - Budget 2010-2011
The County Council has completed its consultation over its proposed spending cuts for the next financial year.
The VCS Consortium has responded to both the budget in general and also specifically to the proposed VCS spending cuts:
Response to the County Councils Proposed Spending Reductions
Communication to the Chairs of Area Committees
Response to NCC Executive 11.01.2010VCS
response to both the Review of relationship between VCS and NCC and NCC spending cuts 8.01.2010
How it's all meant to work
In January 2009 the County Council produced a guide explaining how it plans to work with partners and communities. So the purposes of Community Forums, Area Partnerships and thematic partnerships are described. There are also some helpful FAQs.
Our new unitary Council
The new council was elected on May 1 2008 and, as no single party has overall control, the Party with the highest number of seats, Liberal Democrats, has formed a minority administration. This means that all major policies (like agreement over the budget) need the support of at least one major opposition Party. Hence the endless horsetrading and delays in making decisions.
The Leader of the council is Jeff Reid and the Deputy Leader, whose portfolio includes the voluntary and community sector, is Roger Styring. Here is the Party breakdown of the 67 divisions.
- Lib Dems 26
- Conservatives 17
- Labour 17
- Independents 7
Third Sector Survey
A measure of the influence that local statutory bodies have on the VCS's success can be found from the Ipsos Mori survey of nearly 1000 Northumberland based registered charities and incorporated organisations. This survey was conducted in autumn 2008 and will be repeated again in 2010. Back in 2008, 17.1% of the responses said the influence was "very positive" or "positive" - a very similar result to the all-England figure. It will be interesting to see if that changes this autumn.
Council Review of VCS
In the spring of 2009 the Council decided to review its relationship with the sector. In part this was intended to make sure that all parts of the voluntary sector were treated consistently in the aftermath of the districts disappearing. The review board was made up of NCC and VCS members and reported at the end of November 2009. This coincided with the announcement that the Council planned to cut its grant funding to the sector by 19%.
