Council leaders have welcomed the funding announcements in yesterday’s budget but were disappointed by the absence of investment in adult social care, public health and children’s services.
In the spring budget, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced a raft of new ‘Levelling Up Partnerships’, with £400m in investment, £200m for regeneration, £200m extra for potholes and road improvements, and a further £100m for charities and community groups.
Mr Hunt also announced new deals for the West Midlands and Greater Manchester combined authorities, and confirmed 12 investment zones and £60m for leisure centres with swimming pools.
Alongside these measures, the Chancellor also announced the Government’s intention to boost the workforce by encouraging disabled people, pensioners, parents of young children and universal credit recipients into work.
Cllr James Jamieson, chairman of the Local Government Association (LGA), welcomed the new funding and measures for employment support, improving local roads, protecting swimming pools, early years’ education and childcare, and regeneration.
He also said the levelling up funding will give councils the opportunity to ‘forge ahead with ambitious plans to transform their communities and unlock potential for more local growth.’
However, Cllr Jamieson was frustrated by the lack of funding for overstretched social care, public health and children’s services.
‘Given this is a ‘back-to-work’ Budget, it is disappointing there is no further investment in adult social care, public health and children’s services, which all play a vital role in supporting economic growth and helping people back into work, alongside boosting people’s health and wellbeing.’
In the spring budget, Mr Hunt also acknowledged the Government’s stalled plans for local government finance reform and pledged to ‘bring a wider proposal to improve the local government finance landscape in the next Parliament’.
‘We want to work with government on a long-term funding plan which ensures councils have adequate resources to deliver local services for our communities,’ said Cllr Jamieson.
‘Alongside sustainable long-term investment in local services, bringing power and resources closer to people is also key to improving lives and building inclusive growth across the country, and many more places are ambitious to follow in the footsteps of the devolution trailblazers which are a positive step towards more local decision making.’
Cllr Tim Oliver, chairman of the County Councils Network (CCN), welcomed the devolution and regeneration announcements.
He also welcomed the funding announcements, but while acknowledging that they came during a ‘challenging set of financial and economic circumstances’, he warned they ‘do not address all of the extra inflationary costs impacting on councils’.
The District Councils’ Network (DCN) argued that for devolution to be effective, power would need to be devolved closest to local communities and not to more remote bodies.
Cllr Sam Chapman-Allen, chairman of the DCN, said: ‘Many of the Chancellor’s measures offer the potential to help councils to drive growth in their communities, but in much of England this will only happen if the Government embraces the unique power of district councils – as the most local principal tier of local government – to deliver prosperity and wellbeing.’
