NORFOLK PTS

Two-part course for Councillors: 16 & 23 April 7-9 pm

Understanding how Parish and Town Councils work and your role and responsibilities is not easy, particularly if you are new to local government. This induction course explains the legal framework giving you the confidence to take a full part in your Council and make a difference in your local area. 

This course guides you through the requirements of data protection legislation to ensure that your council is compliant.  Your council needs to manage, review and record how it deals with data protection, along with subject access requests and data breaches.

Town and Parish Councils are subject to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and anyone can make a request. Most are straightforward but occasionally they prove to be complex and time consuming to answer. 

Two-part course for Councillors: 16 & 23 May 7-9 pm

Understanding how Parish and Town Councils work and your role and responsibilities is not easy, particularly if you are new to local government. This induction course explains the legal framework giving you the confidence to take a full part in your Council and make a difference in your local area. 

Full day course for Councillors

Understanding how Parish and Town Councils work and your role and responsibilities is not easy, particularly if you are new to local government. This induction course explains the legal framework giving you the confidence to take a full part in your Council and make a difference in your local area. 

If you've been a councillor for a while and feel you could benefit from an update on your role, responsibilities and what's new in local government, this course is for you (even if you didn't attend our induction course first). This councillor refresher course explores key topics in detail to help you feel more confident in your role. 

Two part course taking place on 11 and 18  June online

You've been to many meetings in your working life but how are local council meetings different?  Our course provides you with the techniques to structure council meetings professionally and get the best contributions from the meeting participants.

Could your agendas or minutes benefit from a refresh? Do you always know what to include or what to leave out? How about meetings, when should you chip in and where does your involvement end? This course will help with all of these and more.

Understanding how the planning system operates and routinely considering planning applications are key responsibilities of parish and town councils.  We look at the process from both the parish/town council and district/borough council perspective and how to manage the expectations of the public who are likely to attend our meetings.

Two-part course for Councillors: 9 & 16 July 7-9 pm

Understanding how Parish and Town Councils work and your role and responsibilities is not easy, particularly if you are new to local government. This induction course explains the legal framework giving you the confidence to take a full part in your Council and make a difference in your local area. 

You'll be taken step-by-step through the process of preparing a Neighbourhood Plan for your parish. We'll look at the advantages of having a Neighbourhood Plan, the stages for producing a plan, and the time and resource commitment required.  This course includes a case study example of a Norfolk village Neighbourhood Plan – what has worked and what hasn’t.

Most Parish and Town Councils will have at least one or two projects they would like to see come to life in their parish, but they don’t have the funds to make them happen.  Laura has a track record in securing external funding for community projects and understands what funders are looking for.  This course will run through the lifecycle of a typical project from the idea phase to project opening and evaluation.

Do you want to learn more about the Internal Auditor Role? Would you like to gain the confidence to become an Internal Auditor? Then this course is for you.

Every local council must have an internal auditor: someone who is independent of the management of the council and competent to carry out the role.  This role has become significantly more important for ‘exempt’ councils: those with a turnover under £25,000. 

Our autumn Seminar is the perfect opportunity to update yourself on topics relevant to parish and town councils and network with clerks and councillors.

The day includes sessions led by the Norfolk PTS team and invited speakers, as well as break-out sessions during the afternoon.

Are you a councillor or clerk who feels you would like to have a better grasp of your council's finances? Local councils spend public money but who specifically controls the finances?  This course gives a comprehensive overview of the council's financial year.