Submit.com at LGPN North, Manchester, 28 – 29 April 2025
The challenge
Funding Is Everywhere, But It Is Fragmented
It was a genuine privilege to speak at LGPN North in Manchester this April. The room brought together some of the most progressive councils from across the north of England and Scotland, and the energy throughout those two days reflected it.
The conversation started with a straightforward observation. Councils are managing funding across housing, community development, climate initiatives, and regeneration. In many cases, the people running those schemes are talented and the systems they use are adequate. But the processes differ from team to team. The data does not connect. And visibility across the full picture is, at best, patchy.
“Individually, it works. Collectively, it doesn’t. When an FOI request lands, or audit season arrives, or members want to understand the impact of funding decisions, that fragmentation becomes very visible. And very costly.”
Submit.com · LGPN North 2025
The context
Local Government Reorganisation Makes This More Urgent
The challenge is not static. With local government reorganisation and devolution well underway, councils are taking on more services and managing more funding streams than ever before. The structural change is happening, but the infrastructure for managing grants consistently has not kept pace.
More funding flowing through fragmented processes simply amplifies the problem. What was manageable at one scale becomes genuinely unworkable at another. Councils that were coping now are unlikely to keep coping as their responsibilities grow.
Why grants management keeps getting overlooked
Grants management sits across multiple directorates, which means no single team owns the problem. Each team’s process appears to work in isolation, so the fragmentation rarely surfaces until something forces cross-council visibility: an FOI request, an audit, or a major reorganisation.
Delegates at LGPN North, Manchester, April 2025
The approach
A Shared Capability, Not Another Silo
What Submit.com is focused on is turning grants management into a shared council capability, with one structured approach covering the full funding lifecycle from application intake through to post-award reporting and compliance.
That means every scheme runs consistently, regardless of which directorate is managing it. And it means decision-makers can see funding and impact at a council-wide level, not just within individual teams.
The full funding lifecycle
One process. Every directorate. Complete visibility.
●Application intake
●Assessment and review
●Award and decision
●Drawdown management
●Reporting and audit trails
●Post-award tracking
In practice
Working With Councils to Get There
Submit.com has been working with Socitm on this agenda. A recent session with Suffolk County Council provided a concrete example of what is possible when councils approach grants management strategically rather than operationally. Suffolk are actively moving away from fragmented grants processes towards a unified model that spans the full funding lifecycle.
The conversations at LGPN North confirmed that this is a challenge many councils recognise once it is named. Councils that had not previously considered grants management as part of their digital transformation agenda quickly saw how it connected to governance, audit readiness, and the operational pressures brought by local government reorganisation.
Submit.com at LGPN North, Manchester, April 2025
“It is vital to get on top of this ahead of some major changes with local government reorganisation. The conversations in Manchester confirmed that.”
Submit.com · LGPN North 2025
What is next
Continuing the Conversation
Submit.com continues to grow its presence across the UK. If your council has not yet considered grants management as part of your digital transformation strategy, it is worth a conversation. The starting point is usually simpler than teams expect: mapping existing schemes, identifying where data does not connect, and understanding what consistent reporting would actually require.
Submit.com will be attending Socitm’s President’s Conference in June and looks forward to continuing these discussions with councils navigating reorganisation and the wider devolution agenda.
To find out more about how Submit.com supports local authorities with grants management, visit
submit.com
or get in touch with the team directly.
Talk to Submit.com
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