We're looking forward to another busy year supporting all of our members.

Our mission is to be the national champion for rural services, ensuring that people in rural areas have a strong voice. We are fighting for a fair deal for rural communities to maintain their social and economic viability for the benefit of the nation as a whole.

In 2019 we aim to:

• Continue to fight for fairer funding for rural areas with the Fairer Funding Needs Review Consultation
• Contribute to the Business Rates Retention Consultation
• Host a Rural Vulnerability Day in Parliament in early February to bring together organisations and MP's to discuss rural vulnerability.
• Launch the State of Rural Services Report 2019
• Host the 2 day National Rural Conference in September
• Host 7 regional seminars/networking meetings around the country on key rural topics
• Host 2 Rural Services Partnership meetings aimed at bringing together non public sector organisations to network and share best practice on service delivery in rural areas
• The Rural Health and Care Network was launched in October 2018, this is a growing partnership of organisations and we are looking to expand it's membership in 2019!

and of course we will continue to provide key services to our members for example:

• Weekly Rural Bulletin - a round up of news and analysis in one place
• Rural Funding Digest - Information about grants and funding available
• Rural Observatory - this is being refreshed for a relaunch in 2019 but still has large amounts of information for member authorities
• Performance Analysis for Local Authority members