The presentations from the 2025 CALC AGM can now be found here Committee Meeting Papers
News & Updates
Worcestershire County Association of Local Councils
sent on behalf of the leaders of Bromsgrove District Council, Malvern Hills District Council, Redditch Borough Council, Worcester City Council and Wychavon District Council
Dear Partner,
As you will probably already know, 5 of the Worcestershire district councils are currently working up a proposal to submit to the Government to create two new unitary councils to run local government services in Worcestershire. Please see the attached feedback document, which sets out what we are proposing and why. The leaders of each of the councils are asking for your feedback about how your organisation would work with the two new councils and if there’s anything specific you would like us to consider as we finalise our proposal. Your feedback is really important to us and we would like to receive this ideally by 27 October 2025.
Do you know someone who deserves a National Honour?
The Lord-Lieutenant of Worcestershire's office are trying to encourage people to nominate individuals for National Honours. They have just produced the attached leaflet, in case you know someone who deserve's an honour.
The Slideshow is set up so that you can manually move each slide on as you may want to pause and think about the questions as you work your way through.
BEO Presentation to Branches Aug 2025
Please give your feedback to
The National Joint Council for Local Government Services (NJC) has reached an agreement on rates of pay applicable from 1 April 2025 to 31 March 2026. We encourage employers to implement this pay award as soon as possible.
Backpay for employees who have left employment since 1 April 2025. If an ex-employee requests it, we recommend that employers pay any monies due to that employee from 1 April 2025 to the employee’s last day of employment. The table below lists the new pay scales for clerks and other employees employed under the terms of the model contract, including SCPs 50 and above. These should be retrospectively applied from 1 April 2025.
Hourly rates have been calculated using the NJC-agreed formula: annual salary divided by 52.143 weeks (which is 365 days divided by 7) divided by 37 hours (the standard working week).
* Hourly rates
| 1 April 2024 | 1 April 2025 | Scale ranges | |||
| SCP | £ per annum |
* £ per hour | £ per annum |
* £ per hour | Based on SCP |
| 2 | £23,656 | £12.26 | £24,413 | £12.65 | Below LC Scale (for staff other than clerks) |
| 3 | £24,027 | £12.45 | £24,796 | £12.85 | Below LC Scale (for staff other than clerks) |
| 4 | £24,404 | £12.65 | £25,185 | £13.05 | Below LC Scale (for staff other than clerks) |
| 5 | £24,790 | £12.85 | £25,583 | £13.26 | Below LC Scale (for staff other than clerks) |
| 5 | £24,790 | £12.85 | £25,583 | £13.26 | LC1 (below substantive range) |
| 6 | £25,183 | £13.05 | £25,989 | £13.47 | LC1 (below substantive range) |
| 7 | £25,584 | £13.26 | £26,403 | £13.69 | LC1 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 8 | £25,992 | £13.47 | £26,824 | £13.90 | LC1 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 9 | £26,409 | £13.69 | £27,254 | £14.13 | LC1 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 10 | £26,835 | £13.91 | £27,694 | £14.35 | LC1 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 11 | £27,269 | £14.13 | £28,142 | £14.59 | LC1 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 12 | £27,711 | £14.36 | £28,598 | £14.82 | LC1 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 13 | £28,163 | £14.60 | £29,064 | £15.06 | LC1 (above substantive range) |
| 14 | £28,624 | £14.84 | £29,540 | £15.31 | LC1 (above substantive range) |
| 15 | £29,093 | £15.08 | £30,024 | £15.56 | LC1 (above substantive range) |
| 16 | £29,572 | £15.33 | £30,518 | £15.82 | LC1 (above substantive range) |
| 17 | £30,060 | £15.58 | £31,022 | £16.08 | LC1 (above substantive range) |
| 18 | £30,559 | £15.84 | £31,537 | £16.35 | LC2 (below substantive range) |
| 19 | £31,067 | £16.10 | £32,061 | £16.62 | LC2 (below substantive range) |
| 20 | £31,586 | £16.37 | £32,597 | £16.90 | LC2 (below substantive range) |
| 21 | £32,115 | £16.65 | £33,143 | £17.18 | LC2 (below substantive range) |
| 22 | £32,654 | £16.93 | £33,699 | £17.47 | LC2 (below substantive range) |
| 23 | £33,366 | £17.29 | £34,434 | £17.85 | LC2 (below substantive range) |
| 24 | £34,314 | £17.79 | £35,412 | £18.35 | LC2 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 25 | £35,235 | £18.26 | £36,363 | £18.85 | LC2 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 26 | £36,124 | £18.72 | £37,280 | £19.32 | LC2 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 27 | £37,035 | £19.20 | £38,220 | £19.81 | LC2 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 28 | £37,938 | £19.66 | £39,152 | £20.29 | LC2 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 29 | £38,626 | £20.02 | £39,862 | £20.66 | LC2 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 30 | £39,513 | £20.48 | £40,777 | £21.14 | LC2 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 31 | £40,476 | £20.98 | £41,771 | £21.65 | LC2 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 32 | £41,511 | £21.52 | £42,839 | £22.20 | LC2 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 33 | £42,708 | £22.14 | £44,075 | £22.85 | LC3 (below substantive range) |
| 34 | £43,693 | £22.65 | £45,091 | £23.37 | LC3 (below substantive range) |
| 35 | £44,711 | £23.17 | £46,142 | £23.92 | LC3 (below substantive range) |
| 36 | £45,718 | £23.70 | £47,181 | £24.46 | LC3 (below substantive range) |
| 37 | £46,731 | £24.22 | £48,226 | £25.00 | LC3 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 38 | £47,754 | £24.75 | £49,282 | £25.54 | LC3 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 39 | £48,710 | £25.25 | £50,269 | £26.06 | LC3 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 40 | £49,764 | £25.79 | £51,356 | £26.62 | LC3 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 41 | £50,788 | £26.32 | £52,413 | £27.17 | LC3 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 42 | £51,802 | £26.85 | £53,460 | £27.71 | LC3 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 43 | £52,805 | £27.37 | £54,495 | £28.25 | LC3 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 44 | £54,071 | £28.03 | £55,801 | £28.92 | LC3 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 45 | £55,367 | £28.70 | £57,139 | £29.62 | LC3 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 46 | £56,708 | £29.39 | £58,523 | £30.33 | LC4 (below substantive range) |
| 47 | £58,064 | £30.10 | £59,922 | £31.06 | LC4 (below substantive range) |
| 48 | £59,300 | £30.74 | £61,198 | £31.72 | LC4 (below substantive range) |
| 49 | £60,903 | £31.57 | £62,852 | £32.58 | LC4 (below substantive range) |
| 50 | £62,377 | £32.33 | £64,373 | £33.37 | LC4 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 51 | £63,881 | £33.11 | £65,925 | £34.17 | LC4 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 52 | £65,943 | £34.18 | £68,053 | £35.27 | LC4 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 53 | £68,000 | £35.25 | £70,176 | £36.37 | LC4 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 54 | £70,065 | £36.32 | £72,307 | £37.48 | LC4 (substantive benchmark range) |
| 55 | £72,145 | £37.39 | £74,454 | £38.59 | LC4 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 56 | £74,198 | £38.46 | £76,572 | £39.69 | LC4 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 57 | £76,277 | £39.54 | £78,718 | £40.80 | LC4 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 58 | £78,315 | £40.59 | £80,821 | £41.89 | LC4 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 59 | £80,247 | £41.59 | £82,815 | £42.93 | LC4 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 60 | £82,221 | £42.62 | £84,852 | £43.98 | LC4 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 61 | £84,243 | £43.67 | £86,939 | £45.06 | LC4 (above substantive benchmark range) |
| 62 | £86,319 | £44.74 | £89,081 | £46.17 | LC4 (above substantive benchmark range) |
Here is an opportunity for you and/or your councillors to attend this new event .
Adrian Berendt,Director, 20’s Plenty for Us CIC invites you to join his team, Hannah Greenberg and Adrian Berendt who will give a short presentation about the benefits of 20mph, what is happening elsewhere in the UK and will answer your questions about 20’s Plenty for Worcestershire. It should be an interesting and lively event.
We have pleasure in inviting you to a Zoom meeting to hear about the benefits of 20mph for Worcestershire. There will be two opportunities: please register in advance for either of the dates
on one of the links below: This event is free of charge.
Jul 11, 2025 12:30 PM London: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/Rx7oZDRUTzeTDEZ0mlwWDQ
Jul 16, 2025 07:00 PM London: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/ilJC1plVSnCd2-QYB_JVDg
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
Videos of previous “Delivering 20” webinars available here.
Further Planning and Development Training
We also have a new external speaker Lee Searles www.pellegram.co.uk coming to give two very detailed training sessions on Planning and Dealing with Responses and Influencing Local Plan Policies for any of those who would like further training . Please encourage your councillors to attend as well as the guidance and suggestions are most helpful..
Planning Session 1 Dealing with Development Proposals -Clerks and Councillors
Planning Session 2 Influencing Local Plan Policies-Clerks and Councillors
About the Good Practice Mentors
The Good Practice Mentor (GPM) programme is a new and innovative project that brings together legacy, learning and resources from Ageing Better, a seven year Test & Learn project that worked to reduce social isolation and loneliness in people aged over 50, and engaged more than 150,000 people in over 366 projects.
The GPM team includes; South Yorkshire Housing Association Age UK Camden Leeds Older People Forum Torbay Community Development Trust
Each partner brings a unique set of learning and skills to the project, and together we offer a wide range of training, bespoke support for your organisation and toolkits and resources to help you on your journey to reducing loneliness and isolation.
Find out more about the Good Practice Mentor programme and the range of support on offer by emailing Jennie Shrewsbury, Programme Lead - This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Capturing community insight through informal engagement methods
An introduction to different forms of informal engagement approaches to support you to engage and hear from the people in your communities.
Date and time: Wednesday, July 9 · 10am - 12:30pm GMT+1
Location: Online
About this event
Event lasts 2 hours 30 minutes
This session will introduce the idea of using different, informal approaches as ‘stepping stones’ towards further engagement, and demonstrate some of the options you can explore in more depth, such as pop-up events, street outreach and door knocking, with further support from the Good Practice Mentor team.
We’ll explore how to use informal conversational strategies to provide a ‘nudge’ towards engagement, promote your opportunities, and capture informal insight from the people in your local community.
We’ll share some examples of how outreach friendly comms can be used a tool to address barriers to engagement and communicate your message to the people ‘not looking’ for you, and have a go at writing our own.
Finally, we’ll create a map of local, informal assets and identify how these can be used as part of an effective engagement approach.
Creating a shared understanding and vision of community health & wellbeing
The session will support the development of local understanding of the wider health and wellbeing strategy
Date and time: Thursday, July 24 · 10am - 12pm GMT+1
Location: Online
About this event
Event lasts 2 hours
This interactive workshop will provide an overview of current health and wellbeing strategy and help you consider how this applies to your own work more locally. The session will be delivered in collaboration with the Good Practice Mentor team, bringing together local knowledge and expertise with our experience in using co-production and involvement methods across the UK in a range of settings.
During this collaborative session, the GPM team will help you develop your own understanding and definition of health and wellbeing and how this translates into priorities and actions within your own area.
The GPM team will provide an overview of involvement models and principles and introduce your to our 'Co-production from the Heart', which was developed in collaboration with community members during the lottery funded Ageing Better programme.
Informal conversational tools to gather insight from seldom heard voices
An overview of how to use street outreach as an effective tool to find, approach and engage people out in the community, and capture insight
Date and time: Tuesday, August 12 · 1 - 2:30pm GMT+1
Location: Online
About this event
Event lasts 1 hour 30 minutes
Proactive street outreach is an effective tool to find, approach and engage people out in the community. In addition to putting information into the hands of people not thinking about or ‘looking for you’, it can also be used as social action research tool - We call it SOSAR for short!-using informal conversational strategies and open questions, to capture and analyse insight from the people we often consider ‘harder to reach’.
This session will share the impact and evidence of the approach including examples of how GPM SOSAR training has supported a range of organisations to capture insight about everything from social connection, isolation, barriers and behaviour around health, from people less likely to be met and engaged via formal surveys, groups, services and activities.
An outline of further GPM SOSAR training will also be included in the session to enable participants to identify if the approach is something they would like to explore further, with the ongoing support of the GPM team.
Fighting Food Waste
The impact of food waste
▪
7.1m tonnes of food and drink is wasted from UK households each year
▪
Each day, the UK throws away 24m slices of bread and 4.4m potatoes
▪
If food waste were a county, it would have the third biggest carbon footprint after the USA and China
▪
Wasted food accounts for more than 30% of Worcestershire’s black bin waste
▪
By reducing food waste, the average household could save over £700 a year.
Planning
▪
Make a list on paper or your phone
▪
Check cupboards, fridge and freezer before shopping. Take a “shelfie” to
help you remember
▪
Cook double and keep half for later in the week – freeze to keep for longer
▪
Don’t buy for every day – allow for a “leftovers night” or if your plans change
TOP TIP: the free app and website ‘Yummly’ searches thousands of recipes from across the internet and creates an automatic shopping list, which allows
you to tick off items you have before going shopping
Shop sharp
▪
Just buy for a couple of days at a time to reduce waste
▪
Stick to your list while shopping and avoid offers unless you’ll definitely
use them
▪
Buy loose fruit and veg where you can
▪
Buying wonky veg reduces food waste and can be cheaper in some supermarkets
▪
Consider buying veg boxes from “Odd Box” which uses up fruit and veg rejected by supermarkets
TOP TIP: grab free food from shops and cafes with the OLIO app or cut price food from restaurants and shops via ‘Too Good to Go’
Know your dates
▪
“Sell by” and “Display until” are only labels for retailers, so ignore them!
▪
“Best before” just means it might taste dry or have less flavour after this date
▪
“Use by” indicates food safety, so it is not advisable to eat it after this date, especially meat, fish and dairy
▪
Check dates and eat food with the shortest dates first – freeze if you won’t use in time
▪
Food can be frozen right up to the “Use by” date
For more information on reducing your
waste please visit www.letswasteless.com
Perfect portions
▪
Weigh or measure your food – work out the right amount for you
▪
Encourage people to serve themselves from dishes at the table
▪
A mug, tablespoon, spaghetti/rice measurer and simple scales are all
you need
TOP TIP: Use the Love Food Hate Waste portion calculator if you’re not sure how much to cook or are cooking for more people than usual (especially at Christmas) www.lovefoodhatewaste.com
Love your leftovers
▪
Check cupboards/freezer before meal planning to use up what you have
▪
Freeze leftovers in portion sizes meals
▪
Have a good store of canned, dried and frozen foods to use with leftover food
TOP TIP: Forget searching through cookbooks for recipes, type your leftover ingredients into the search bar of the
‘BBC Good Food’ or ‘Yummly’ websites
to find recipes
Savvy storage
▪
Keep out air and moisture by keeping food in bags or boxes
▪
Don’t keep milk in the door as it’s the warmest part of the fridge
▪
Keep the cold in by closing the fridge door quickly and not putting warm
food in
▪
Remember to label and date food before freezing to avoid any “UFO’s” (Unidentified Frozen Objects)
▪
Freeze food in 1 or 2 portion sizes
– it will freeze faster and defrost quicker (empty plastic takeaway tubs are great as usually one portion size)
▪
All foods can be frozen, even bananas
TOP TIP: Fridges work better at 0-5°C, yet a recent study showed the average one was running at 7°C
Share
▪
£500m worth of food is thrown
away in the UK each year when we
go on holiday
▪
Share unwanted food through the OLIO app or the growing number of community fridges (visit www.hubbub.org for their locations)
TOP TIP: Start a food sharing network in your street, village or town by getting more people to use the OLIO app. Just snap a photo, post and share!
Recycle
▪
Recycle your food waste by turning it into nutrient rich compost for your garden, window boxes or pots. Standard “Dalek” bins. Bokashi, wormery, HotBin or Green Cone – there’s a home composting solution for everyone!
For more information on reducing your
waste please visit www.letswasteless.com
SAVE THE DATE: 15TH May 2025 9.30am -1.30pm.
The Arena, University of Worcester, Joel Richards Suite
Elevating the role of community in creating good health and preventing illness
(both mental and physical)
This year the theme of Mental Health Awareness Week is ‘Community’.
In support of this, we are inviting you to join us as we bring people together to explore the value of community not just in preventing poor health but creating good health, why we need to elevate it and how we can do that.
This free, interactive half day event will be opened by Gary Woodman, CEO of Worcestershire Local Enterprise Council (LEP), who will be our Chair for the morning.
It will then commence with a fireside chat between Dr Simon Lennane, GP Ross on Wye and author of 'Creating Community Health: Interventions for Sustainable Healthcare' and Professor Richard Humphries, Senior Fellow at The King’s Fund, Senior Policy Advisor to the Health Foundation, visiting professor at the University of Worcester, and author of ‘Ending the Social Care Crisis: A New Road to Reform.’ Their conversation will be ably guided by Frank Myers MBE, Acting CEO of Community First.
You will then have the chance to discuss the role of community in creating good health from your own perspective and put questions to the panel.
Following this you will have the opportunity to benefit from an example of learning experiences from the Herefordshire and Worcestershire Wellbeing and Recovery College led by Will Thomas, Vision for Learning and Associate Lecturer at the University of Worcester.
There will also be an opportunity to find out more about the role of the University of Worcester in building community, health and wellbeing.
You will have time at the start and end of the morning as well as during the break to meet some of our valuable local partners who are helping to create healthier communities across Herefordshire and Worcestershire.
Who should attend: those working in health and social care and commissioners; VCSE; people providing community activities and services that support health and wellbeing from all sectors including public health and faith groups; parish councillors and village hall committee members; people working or studying at the University of Worcester; experts by experience; employers keen to learn more about what will improve staff absenteeism, wellbeing and productivity and members of the public.
Welcome to the new training opportunities wiyth Breakthrough Training . Please contact caroline@worcscalc.org.uk should you wish to book to attend any of the sessions . (£35 per session to members)
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Parish Council Domains Helper Service: Guidance now available on GOV.UK
Parish councils wishing to move over to a .gov.uk domain can now access guidance on the GOV.UK website. It’s laid out in a step-by-step format, taking the reader all the way through the process, from getting council approval all the way through to choosing your Approved Registrar and what to do when you’re set up.
Hosting the guidance on GOV.UK means that parish councils can access up-to-date information at any time. You don’t have to attend a virtual session with the Parish Council Domains Helper Service team unless you want or need to, even the contact list for the Approved Registrars can be found there. It’s a one-stop-shop for everything .gov.uk domain.
Any questions regarding the new GOV.UK guidance can be sent to
The Local Government Association has informed us that the National Joint Council for Local Government Services (NJC) has reached an agreement on rates of pay applicable from 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025. We encourage employers to implement this pay award as soon as possible.
Backpay for employees who have left employment since 1 April 2024. If an ex-employee requests it, we recommend that employers pay any monies due to that employee from 1 April 2024 to the employee’s last day of employment. The table below lists the new pay scales for clerks and other employees employed under the terms of the model contract, including SCPs 50 and above. These should be retrospectively applied from 1 April 2024.
Hourly rates have been calculated using the NJC-agreed formula: annual salary divided by 52.143 weeks (which is 365 days divided by 7) divided by 37 hours (the standard working week).
Local government services pay agreement 2024-25 and 2023-24 v2
