The Oxfordshire Local Industrial Strategy has been published to be help the region become a top three global innovation hub by 2040.

A Forest for Cornwall has been revealed to be the flagship project of Cornwall Council's climate change action plan.

Ministers have confirmed that the Better Care Fund will be renewed for 2019 to 2020, bringing the pooled funding to over £6.4 billion.
The Better Care Fund provides financial support for councils and NHS organisations to jointly plan and deliver local services, enabling patients to leave hospital sooner to get the care they need at home.
The Department of Health and Social Care say that the planning requirements will reduce the overall reporting burden on local partnerships while improving the measurement and effectiveness of the Fund.

The Royal Institute of British Architects has launched a call for urgent action to tackle the severe lack of age-friendly housing.

Ministers in Scotland are to consider the introduction of an additional charge to help cut down on the number of single-use coffee cups used every year.

The government must fix the broken education funding system and bring forward a strategic ten-year education funding plan.

The Salvation Army has found that there is significantly less money to care for older people who live in rural areas across England.

The Treasury is set to reveal the biggest public sector pay rise in six years as one of Theresa May's final acts as Prime Minister.
The Times has reported that soldiers are set to get a 2.9 per cent rise while teachers and other school staff will get 2.75 per cent, police officers, dentists and consultants 2.5 per cent and senior civil servants two per cent. The pledge does not cover nurses or other junior civil servants.
The pay rises, above the level of inflation, will likely be funded from existing budgets.

County councils are warning that costs of ‘well-intentioned’ reforms to expand SEN services are threatening to ‘break’ their budgets.

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has revealed the locations of 50 new water fountains in the capital to help cut plastic waste.
Distributed across shopping and business districts, green spaces, busy high streets and stations, the water fountains are being installed across busy areas of London to help people ditch single-use plastic bottles and reduce plastic waste.
The Mayor has partnered with Thames Water on the new water fountain network, which will include 20 rail and Underground stations.