Doncaster parish council is honoured with prestigious national award

Sprotbrough and Cusworth Parish Council has secured the National Association of Local Councils’ (NALC) Foundation award – the first stage of the national organisation’s respected Local Council Award Scheme – and comes as parish council chiefs canvas local opinion on ways of developing play areas and green spaces within the communities.

Parish chair, Coun Tony Nicholson, said: “We are delighted. Thanks to the dedication and commitment of our clerk Emma Garner, we have not only become the first organisation of our kind in South Yorkshire to achieve this award but only the ninth in the whole of Yorkshire.

“The award recognises that we achieve good practice in governance, community engagement and council improvement. And also that we go above and beyond our legal obligations, playing a key role in the Sprotbrough and Cusworth communities and continuously seeking opportunities to improve and develop further.

“In terms of the future, we are not complacent, we intend to progress to the next stage of the scheme. We are reviewing ways in which we can keep on improving our offer to the local community and welcome feedback from local people and partners on how we do this.

"We have just recently launched a public consultation, asking our residents for their thoughts on developing two of our public parks and play areas and are working closely with local partners on joint schemes that benefit our communities.”

A NALC spokesperson said: “The Local Council Award Scheme is a peer assessed programme that has been designed to both provide the tools and encouragement to those councils at the beginning of their improvement journeys, as well as promoting and recognising councils that are at the cutting edge of the sector.

"It is through the sector working together to share best practice, drive up standards and supporting those who are committed to improving their offer to their communities that individual councils and the sector as a whole will reach its full potential.”