It’s going to be another tough year for local government finances, with virtually all local authorities planning to increase council tax, one in ten councils warning that they may not be able to meet their statutory obligations and confidence in the sustainability of local government finance remaining low. Continue reading “A tough year ahead for local government finance”
Category: Local Government
The great funding challenge
The Government is very good at telling us how much funding it is allocating to different services. But it is less good at focusing on how well these services are doing. The Performance Tracker, published by the Institute for Government and the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) bridges this gap. And its findings are far from reassuring. Continue reading “The great funding challenge”
Where next for local government funding?
With each week that passes, it seems that another local authority joins the list of those whose finances have reached crisis point. First it was Northamptonshire County Council that hit the headlines, but top-tier councils in Sussex, Lancashire, Suffolk, Surrey, Torbay and Oxfordshire also seem to be feeling the heat. And Somerset County Council, down the road from me, has just voted through £28 million of cuts over the next two years, leading opposition councillors to describe the council as on the ‘brink of bankruptcy’. Continue reading “Where next for local government funding?”