Yesterday, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government announced changes to LAAs, LAA Reward Grant and the National Indicator Set.
The changes enable local authorities and their partners to amend or drop any of the current 4,700 LAA targets without needing ministerial agreement. Where they choose to keep the targets, central government will have no role in monitoring them. Local authorities will not be required to prepare an LAA from April 2011, once the current agreements expire.
The news story is available via the following link:
http://www.communities.gov.uk/newsstories/newsroom/1740503
The speech (text and video) via:
http://www.communities.gov.uk/speeches/corporate/townhallwaste
No payments will be made for Performance Reward Grant for the current LAA targets.
The National Indicator Set will be replaced with a single, comprehensive list of all the data that local government is expected to provide to central government. The aim is to make the data requirements placed on local government transparent and to review and reduce this for April 2011. A process will be developed to review this on an annual basis. Local government will be under no obligation to collect or report data that is not on the list.
The Secretary of State has written to all Council Leaders and Chief Executive to confirm the changes. Yesterday's statement can be found
via:
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201011/cmhansrd/cm101013/wmstext/101013m0001.htm#10101329000075