Council spending on local services down 21% over past decade
Articles like this give those of us mired in the front line fight of trying to make less go further in local government the opportunity to stand back and think just how horribly local government has been hollowed out. The story tells us:
Council spending on local services has fallen by more than a fifth since 2010, according to a report from Britain’s leading independent economics thinktank.
In a reflection of the austerity drive imposed on local authorities by Conservative-led governments during the past decade, the Institute for Fiscal Studies said spending on services in England had fallen by 21% between 2009-10 and 2017-18.
In a sign of the increasing difficulties facing local authorities across the country, the leading tax and spending thinktank also said the funds available to councils would become increasingly inadequate in the 2020s, rendering the current financing system for the country’s local authorities through council tax and business rates unsustainable.
David Phillips, an associate director at the IFS, said: “Current plans for councils to rely on council tax and business rates for the vast bulk of their funding don’t look compatible with our expectations of what councils should provide.”
The shifting demands of an ageing population mean the current 3% cap on annual council tax rises would mean adult social care would require 60% of local tax revenues within 15 years, up from 38% now, according to the report