Local Government Training Group

Introduction

The Local Government Training Group (LGTG) is responsible to the Local Government Staff Commission for Northern Ireland and carries out the Commission's statutory function of:

“Promoting or assisting the development of, or providing, facilities for the training of officers”

The LGTG was established in 1993. Its role is to assist the district councils in Northern Ireland to identify and address training and development needs. While each council is responsible for training and developing its own employees, the LGTG acts on behalf of the local government sector as a whole to add value in the learning process for individuals and organisations.

The LGTG is funded by the district councils who make an annual financial contribution in proportion to the net rateable value of their districts. The total contribution for the 2011-12 financial year is £300,000. The Accounting Officer for the LGTG is the Staff Commission's Chief Executive, Dr Adrian Kerr MBE.

How we operate

The LGTG meets five times each year under the chairmanship of one of the SOLACE representatives. The current Chair is Ashley Boreland, Chief Executive of Ards Borough Council.

The development and delivery of courses and programmes are subsidised from the central fund.

Short courses and some staff development programmes are made available on both an open and in-house basis.

Research and development lead to new initiatives, designed to meet the changing needs of the local government sector.

Support is provided to individual councils to run pilot courses or programmes where there is a potential future benefit for all councils.

Training is provided in response to new legislation and/or government initiatives, such as Freedom of Information.

Assistance is available to professional groups in the local government sector to meet their particular training needs.

What we do

The LGTG aims to add value to the training and development activities of the district councils through, for example:

Assisting in identifying training and development needs
Developing competency frameworks
Piloting courses and programmes
Providing a menu of knowledge and skills based courses
Promoting staff development programmes accredited by the University of Ulster and the Institute for Leadership and Management
Promoting leadership development and performance management
Supporting the Women in Local Councils development initiative
Facilitating best practice workshops
Assisting in elected member training

What we achieve

In a typical year the LGTG:

Provides over 130 courses and programmes
Supports training and development for over 1,700 officers and elected members
Arranges around 3,000 days of training

The LGTG’s strategic objective is:

“To enhance knowledge and skills and to build capacity …” in the district councils.

Currently this objective is being pursued in the context of the local government reform and modernisation agenda, through contributing to the work of bodies such as the Capacity Building Working Group.

The LGTG also actively supports SkillsPlus, which promotes the skills agenda on behalf of local government throughout the UK; and Interchange, which facilitates good practice in human resource management across all sectors of the economy in Northern Ireland.